It is Halloween night. After work in the kitchen of an industrial laundry mainly staffed by recovering alcoholics and ex-prostitutes, an older unmarried woman named Maria attends a party at the home of a man named Joe. Maria served as his nurse when Joe was a baby. While playing traditional Irish Halloween games, a blindfolded Maria chooses clay rather than water, a ring, or a prayerbook, signifying (at least according to Irish superstition) that she will die soon.
