Just for the Summer

Justin Dahl becomes an online curiosity after writing a Reddit post about the bizarre pattern in his dating life: women he dates for any meaningful length of time seem to meet their soulmates immediately afterward. The post grows out of a miserable few months in which his longtime roommate and best friend, Brad, moves out to live with Faith, the woman Justin briefly dated, leaving Justin stuck in a dreadful studio apartment with a giant Toilet King billboard outside his window. In a petty response, he adopts an ugly rescue dog and names it Brad too. At the same time, Emma, a travel nurse who has experienced the same pattern with her own exes, sees Justin's post and sends him a message.

Emma and Justin quickly discover an easy rapport. Encouraged by Emma's blunt, protective best friend Maddy, they move from messages to long calls and video chats. What begins as a joke becomes a theory: if both of them are supposedly the people who send partners toward their real soulmates, maybe dating each other will stop the cycle. They compare their histories and make rules for the experiment, deciding their curse seems to require at least a month of steady contact, several real dates, and a kiss. Emma is supposed to leave for Hawaii, but instead she secretly changes her summer assignment to Minnesota and rents an island cottage with Maddy, surprising Justin when she arrives.

Their first in-person date confirms that their connection is stronger than either expected. Justin plans thoughtful outings, and Emma is drawn to his warmth and humor. He is struck by her compassion when she gently helps a confused older woman at a bus stop, and she shares painful pieces of her childhood with an unreliable mother who often abandoned her. The date ends with a jolt when Emma's mother, Amber Grant, arrives unexpectedly by yacht with Neil Rasmussen, the wealthy owner of the property where Emma is staying. Amber quickly inserts herself into Neil's life, and Emma falls into the old emotional confusion of wanting her mother's love while knowing how chaotic she can be.

Meanwhile, Justin's own life is growing more complicated. His mother, Christine, is about to go to prison for embezzling money from a nonprofit, and Justin is preparing to take legal guardianship of his younger siblings Alex, Sarah, and Chelsea. He is angry at Christine, overwhelmed by the practical burden ahead, and afraid of failing the children. Emma becomes the person he can tell the truth to. Rather than excusing Christine, she urges him toward empathy and helps him think about grief and damage in a more complicated way. Their emotional intimacy deepens even as Emma keeps insisting that whatever they have is temporary, partly because Justin's new life includes children and responsibility, exactly the kind of rooted life she has always avoided.

As the summer continues, Emma becomes increasingly woven into Justin's world. She meets his siblings, helps with Chelsea, wins over Sarah during a humiliating lice outbreak, and starts to feel at home in the domestic rhythm of his household. Justin, meanwhile, falls hard and stops thinking of their arrangement as an experiment. He wants Emma to stay. But Emma's fear of permanence remains strong. Even after their first real kiss and escalating physical tension, she still frames their connection as temporary. Justin is hurt when he realizes she may want him without wanting the life that comes with him.

Amber makes everything worse. She becomes involved with Neil, who also turns out to be Emma's boss at the hospital, and Emma keeps hoping this time her mother may really be changing. Instead Amber spirals again, creating scenes, stealing from Neil, and showing that her supposed therapy is not real treatment at all. Emma is pulled back into the role she has played since childhood: caretaker, cleaner, interpreter, and emotional shock absorber for damage she did not cause. At the same time, Justin becomes a source of startling steadiness. When Emma is stranded alone on the island and violently ill with what appears to be norovirus, Justin drops everything, crosses the lake on a ridiculous unicorn pool float when no boat is available, breaks into the cottage, and gets emergency help from doctors Briana and Jacob. Then he stays, nurses Emma through recovery, and quietly proves that when she calls, he will come.

That rescue changes the relationship. During their days recovering together, Emma admits she missed him, Justin admits the same, and their emotional closeness becomes impossible to deny. They care for each other through shared illness, stop pretending they are detached, and finally become fully intimate. Justin asks Emma to stay in Minnesota, and after briefly pulling back in fear, she returns to his house in the rain with the rosebush he gave her and says she will try. Emma and Maddy extend their contract. Emma gradually becomes part of Justin's daily family life, sleeping at his house, helping with the children, and privately admitting to herself that she loves him.

Just as Emma begins to feel safe, Amber's damage erupts on a larger scale. After another destructive breakdown at Neil's house, Emma spends her birthday with Justin and his siblings, who give her a restored version of Stuffie, the childhood toy Amber had recently returned to her. Buoyed by the family's care, Emma finally checks the DNA test Maddy urged her to take. The results reveal that Amber lied for years: Emma has an entire maternal family, including a half brother, Daniel Grant. When Emma meets Daniel and his wife Alexis, she learns that Amber had grandparents, a family home, and money from the sale of that home, and that she maintained contact with them while Emma was growing up neglected and isolated. Emma realizes her childhood deprivation was not only chaos; it involved deliberate deception and choices.

Emma confronts Amber, hoping for honesty or remorse, but Amber instead admits she hid Emma from her family because they would have raised her and kept her, as they did Daniel. That confession severs Emma's last emotional tie to her mother. Soon afterward Amber throws a candle during another fight with Neil and starts a fire in his house. Overwhelmed by the confrontation, the lies, and the collapse of her last fantasies about Amber, Emma dissociates and flees toward the airport. Maddy tracks her down at a hotel, feeds her, and names what Emma cannot yet say clearly: her urge to run is a trauma response, not proof that she is doomed to hurt everyone. Even so, Emma believes she is too unstable to stay with Justin and the children. She returns only to end the relationship in person. Justin tells her he loves her, but Emma refuses to let him wait for someone who is still ruled by fear. She leaves Minnesota.

Six months later, Emma is living in Wakan with the maternal family Amber hid from her. Daniel and Alexis have helped give her the permanence she never had, and Emma and Maddy now work locally instead of traveling. Emma commits to therapy, including CBT, talk therapy, and EMDR, and begins to understand her complex PTSD and avoidant attachment instead of being controlled by them. She goes no contact with Amber and slowly builds a life that is stable, rooted, and chosen. When she feels strong enough to risk love instead of fleeing it, she decides to go back to Justin.

Before Emma can reach him, Sarah calls her from school because she has gotten her first period and trusts Emma to help. That crisis gives Emma a way back into the family and proves she was never forgotten. Justin, however, is still deeply hurt. He has spent six months rebuilding his life, grieving Emma, and convincing himself that loving her meant letting her go. When he first sees her, he thinks her return only reopens an old wound. But Emma stays, does not run, and finally tells him everything she could not say before: she loves him, she left because she was not healthy enough to stay, and she has done the work to become someone who can choose permanence. Justin stops her from leaving again, admits he still loves her, and asks her to stay. They reunite, this time without pretending it is temporary. Two years later, with Emma living with him and their bond firmly established, Justin proposes using the Toilet King billboard that once symbolized his loneliness. Emma loves the gesture and says yes.