The Attorre family lives in a respectable outskirts: Luca, freelance journalist, Susi, ballerina forced to teach dance to overweight ladies, and Lucilla, the quiet sixteen child full of imagination but affected by severe asthma bronchial. In a magnificent and incomprehensible Rome, Mary Ann arrives; she is an Irish student of art history, an au pair for the little Lucilla. She will stay one year in Italy and at home Attorre, and this period will be full of legitimate and illicit ties, friendship and love.