Regretting You

Seventeen years later, 16-year-old Clara is driving home and struggling to decide whether she should pick up a school peer named Miller Adams, who is abandoned on the side of the road. Clara and Miller have not spoken in a year, but she worries about leaving him outside in the hot weather. Miller has avoided Clara for the past year and even traded lockers to move away from her. Clara decides to pick him up.

Miller immediately asks Clara to help him move a sign that marks the city limits. Clara reluctantly obliges. When she asks Miller why they moved the sign, Miller explains that his favorite pizza restaurant will not deliver outside of the city limits, so he is moving the sign slowly toward his home so that they will deliver. In the car, Miller nosily inspects Clara’s belongings, including her folder of college applications for theater programs that she has hidden from her parents. When Miller receives a call from his girlfriend, Clara overhears Miller lie about hitching a ride with her. Clara pulls up to Miller’s home and is shocked by its humble appearance. Inside, Miller introduces Clara to his grandfather and shares his dreams of attending film school in the future. Due to financial constraints, Miller will be attending community college first. Miller follows Clara on social media as she leaves his house.

Morgan and Jenny are now in their thirties. As they prepare a meal together for Morgan’s birthday, Jenny informs Morgan that she and Jonah have decided to get married. Jenny and Jonah broke up as teenagers after Jonah’s graduation and recently reunited for a one-night stand after Jonah’s father’s funeral. After learning that Jenny is pregnant, Jonah and Jenny rekindled their relationship. Years earlier, Chris and Morgan married after discovering that Morgan was pregnant with Clara.

While Jenny answers a call from Clara, Jonah helps Morgan in the kitchen. Sensing tension, Jonah gently confronts Morgan about her avoidance of him since his return. In their awkward silence, Morgan thinks about how much she hates the swinging kitchen door in her home, which she and Chris inherited from Chris’s parents.

The family sits down for dinner. Chris works in quality control at the local hospital where Jenny works as a nurse. Formerly a businessman, Jonah now teaches history at Clara’s high school. Clara’s best friend Lexie joins the family for dinner. Clara soon joins and reveals that she gave Miller a ride home. Her father warns her not to get involved with Miller, whose father, Hank, is serving time in prison. Clara bemoans her parents’ overprotective natures. Jonah attempts to defend Miller and reason with Chris, but Chris refuses to give in. As the dinner continues, Morgan sits in silence while the others chat and feels isolated.

Later, Jonah gifts Morgan a bag full of watermelon Jolly Ranchers, her favorite candy from childhood. Touched that Jonah remembered, Morgan forgives Jonah for leaving suddenly all those years ago. After everyone leaves, Morgan informs Chris about her decision to return to college. He questions her desire to return to school but reluctantly supports her.

Clara joins Morgan in the kitchen and reminds Morgan about their birthday board tradition. Every year on their birthdays, Morgan and Clara add to their respective vision boards together. Clara adds her goal for Morgan to the board and writes her hope that her mother will support her acting career. Upon Clara’s suggestion, Morgan writes her goal to find her passion. Questioning her life choices, Morgan asks Clara to describe her in one word. When Clara describes her mother as predictable, Morgan grows dismayed.

The next morning, Clara prepares for school and discovers that her mother has not made breakfast as she does every morning. Clara regrets calling her mother predictable. Jenny arrives with her infant son Elijah to drop him off for the day. Morgan will be caring for him during Jenny’s first week back to work.

As Jenny and Clara leave for the day, Clara tells her aunt that Miller has unfollowed her on social media. After picking up Lexie, Clara learns that Miller and his girlfriend broke up the night before and that Clara’s car ride with Miller was the cause. Clara arrives at school and meets Jonah to discuss the film competition she wants to enter. Jonah informs her that the other student who is interested in competing is Miller; he suggests Clara and Miller work together on the project. When Miller arrives, he rejects Jonah’s plan due to his ex-girlfriend Shelby’s jealousy over his relationship with Clara. After Miller leaves, Clara signs them up without Miller’s knowledge. Clara texts Jenny with an update on Miller’s breakup. When Jenny cryptically alludes to being the other woman in a relationship, Clara grows curious.

At home with Elijah, Morgan receives a phone call informing her that Chris has been in an accident. Frantic, she attempts to call Jenny before heading to the hospital, but she can’t reach her. The Labor and Delivery unit of the hospital, where Jenny works, informs her that Jenny was not due to return to work until tomorrow. A confused Morgan unexpectedly greets a concerned Jonah as he arrives at the hospital. Eventually, Morgan and Jonah realize that both Chris and Jenny have been in an accident. They make arrangements for Jonah’s mother to pick up Elijah and Clara and learn that Chris was driving Jenny’s car. A doctor enters and informs them that Jenny and Chris have died.

Clara grapples with her grief in the week following her aunt and father’s deaths. At Chris’s funeral, she distracts herself by caring for Elijah. Overwhelmed with grief, Clara blames herself for the accident because she had been texting Jenny at the time of the accident. Morgan lied to her about Jenny picking up Chris after he got a flat tire. Miller arrives at the funeral and asks Clara how she is doing. When Clara shares her desire to leave, Miller agrees to drive her.

In the car, Clara asks Miller if he has any marijuana because she wants to get high and “really want[s] to get out of [her] head today” (80). Miller procures a joint from a coworker. Clara smokes marijuana for the first time and ignores a text message from her mother. After they smoke, Miller informs Clara that he and Shelby have reconciled. Morgan, who has tracked Clara’s location, interrupts them. In her car, Morgan confronts Clara about smoking weed with Miller and takes her cell phone away as punishment.

In the aftermath of Chris’s death, Morgan calculates how she and Clara will financially support themselves. Overwhelmed, Morgan avoids taking action and refuses to think about why Jenny and Chris were together the day of the accident. Jonah arrives and mentions the possibility of Jenny and Chris having an affair. Morgan refuses to discuss it. Jonah inquires about the location of Chris’s car and begins to investigate. When he returns, he tells Morgan that the car was left at a hotel.

Jonah and Morgan travel to the hotel to collect Chris’s car and the belongings left in the hotel room. Morgan waits in the car while Jonah enters the hotel room. He returns with Jenny’s duffle bag. Curious, Morgan looks inside and discovers lingerie, which confirms Jenny and Chris’s affair. Upset, Morgan demands they leave without retrieving Chris’s car. Jonah obliges.

Back at home, Morgan has a panic attack in her front yard. Jonah sits with her until the panic attack passes and then leaves. As Morgan greets Clara inside, she begins to grow suspicious of how similar Clara and Elijah look and questions whether Chris is Elijah’s father.

After Morgan goes to her room, Clara sneaks out of the house. She leaves her mother a note telling her that she will be with Lexie. When Lexie is unavailable, Clara drives to a movie theater. Noticing that Miller works there, Clara waits in her car and debates whether to go in. She enters the theater. Miller offers her a free ticket to a movie.

Later, Miller joins her in the theater. After the movie ends, Clara and Miller chat alone in the theater. When she returns home, Clara is surprised to find her mother has returned her cell phone. She makes plans to return to school the next day and messages Miller on Instagram. The two send messages back and forth before Miller stops the conversation because his girlfriend has access to his account. Emboldened, Clara gives Miller her phone number. They continue to chat over text. However, Clara, reminded of her aunt’s warning about being the other woman, stops the conversation and deletes Miller’s number.

At home, Morgan is awakened at midnight by frantic knocking at the front door. She finds a distressed Jonah with Elijah. Upset over his realization that Elijah is Chris’s child, Jonah repeats that “[he] can’t do this” (111). Clara interrupts their conversation. When Jonah flees the house without Elijah, Morgan follows him. Jonah accuses Morgan of knowing about Chris and Jenny’s affair and Elijah’s paternity. When Jonah discusses abandoning Elijah, Morgan offers to keep him for the evening and suggests Jonah sleep on his decision. Back inside the house, she lies to Clara about the cause of Jonah’s distress.

Three days later, Clara updates her friend Lexie on Jonah’s abandonment of Elijah. As they speak, Clara and Miller stare at each other across the hallway. In the parking lot, Miller parks his car next to Clara’s and silently gestures for her to jump in his car. After a few intense moments of silence, Miller confesses that his feelings for Clara confuse him and asks her to leave his car. Clara does not listen at first, but eventually takes a lollipop from Miller’s mouth, places it in her own, and exits Miller’s car. He speeds off.

Morgan worries about how she and Clara will survive now that she may need to care for Elijah. Clara arrives home from school and questions why Jonah has abandoned Elijah. Morgan sends Clara to the store for diapers and cries uncontrollably as she washes Elijah’s bottles.

Clara chooses a route to the store that drives past Miller’s house. Frustrated by Jonah’s actions, Clara decides to drive to Jonah’s house and confront him. She discovers a depressed Jonah and an unkempt house. Angry, Clara scolds Jonah for the extra responsibility he has placed on her mother. Inspired by Clara’s words, Jonah rushes off to retrieve Jonah.