A young woman, Hannah, age 19 (played by Rachel Hendrix ), collapses while performing on stage during a college play. She is rushed by her parents, who are in the audience, to the hospital. She has asthma and epilepsy. A doctor tells her the cause of her symptoms was that she was born premature. Her dad has brought a copy of a page from Hannah's journal where she talks about suicide. Her parents tell her in front of the doctor she was adopted because she was a survivor of a failed abortion. The news shocked Hannah.
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Hannah tries to get away from everyone by going to a lake, but her friend Jason (played by Jason Burkey) finds her there to try to comfort her. She tells him what she has learned about her birth. All she knows is she was born in a hospital in Mobile. Alabama but her birth mother is not identified on her birth certificate. The lack of information about her origins drives Hannah crazy.
Jason and a bunch of other students decide to go to New Orleans for spring break. They get a fat hippie uncle, name Bmac (played by Chris Sligh) with a decrepit VW bus, that he affectionately calls “Evelyn” to take them for the trip. Hannah agrees to go with them because even though she could care less about going to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, Jason tells her they will pass through Mobile, Alabama. This convinces Hannah to go along. Hannah's father confronts Jason and demands he talk Hannah out of the trip because he is concerned that she is so ill. The father is also a doctor. He is over-bearing, yet all he really wants to do is to protect his adopted daughter. But he allows Hannah to decide and she decides to go.
They stop at the beach, get stuck in the sand, almost get in trouble with the police, but the police officer let's them go when Hannah tells all of them that the only reason she is on the trip is to hopefully find her real birth mother in Mobile, Alabama. When they check into a cheap hotel Jason's girlfriend Alanna (played by Colleen Trusler) tells Hannah that she is not wanted and the only reason Jason invited her was he was too kind to tell her. Hannah walks off in the middle of the night. The next day Jason finds her walking down the road. Jason rented a car and wants to drive her to Mobile leaving behind his girlfriend with the other group going to New Orleans. Hannah and Jason stop at a hotel that only has one room they can afford. It has only one bed which is awkward, so Jason takes blankets and sleeps on the floor by the end of the bed. Hannah confesses to Jason she is virgin. She freaks out and leaves the room.
They end up sleeping fully clothed on the sofa in the lobby. They are discovered sleeping on the sofa by the hotel manager in the morning who refunds the room charge because the room was not satisfactory.
When they arrive at Hannah's birth hospital they find an abandoned building. They enter to find some clues, getting caught by the police breaking in. Meanwhile, back home Hannah's parents talk about if they should tell her the full truth, but Hannah's father says to his wife she cannot handle the full truth. Hannah tells the police she broke into the building to find out about her birth, showing the policeman her birth certificate. The officer recognizes the person, Mary Beasely (played by Jasmine Guy) that signed the birth certificate from many years ago. He uses the police computer to find out her address for Hannah and let's Hannah and Jason go without charging them with a crime. Hannah and Jason goes to Mary's house. Hannah goes inside alone. Mary was the nurse at the abortion clinic that helped Hannah's mother with the abortion. She tells Hannah that her mother was very conflicted about having the abortion but did not even know the father's name, just some guy she met at a bar. When the abortion failed the mother came back the next day to try the procedure again. But she was already in labor.. Mary tells that her mother had twins and Hannah's brother was born first. So little and missing an arm that was torn off in the failed abortion attempt the day before. Hannah as the second baby was the big surprise. Mary gives Hannah the hospital bracelet worn by her mother in the hospital which has her mother's name on it. She tells Hannah her brother died four months after being born. She tells Hannah her mother is now named Cindy Hastings (played by Shari Rigby) and is a lawyer. She tells her where she is.
Hannah goes to see her birth mother. Her mother denies that she knows about her and completely rejects her. Hannah returns home and fights with her adopted father for not telling her the truth. She finds out her adopted mother also had twins but they were lost by natural miscarriage. That is why when Hannah's adoptive parents found out about the abandoned twins, they adopted both of them, Hannah and her brother that died. Hannah's father takes her to show her the grave of her brother. Hannah gives her real mother a note with the old hospital bracelet included that says she forgives her.
Best part of story, including ending:
What is most interesting is that Hannah's adoptive parents desperately wanted to have children but lost them during pregnancy by natural miscarriage, yet Hannah's birth mother tried to abort her twins yet failed. This is a very sensitive look at a very complex issue.
Best scene in story:
When Hannah meets Mary the nurse it is really a great scene. Mary was so touched by Hannah's birth survival of the attempted abortion, she left the clinic and stopped being a nurse because she could no longer see the aborted fetuses as “tissue” but instead saw them as babies.
Opinion about the main character:
Hannah has tremendous courage to find out the truth. She has a hard time dealing with it, lashing out unfairly at her adoptive parents, but she finds the real meaning of love in the end.
