Russian-American poet and New York social worker Sasha Galper prepares to celebrate his fiftieth birthday. Upon learning that his ex-fiancee fled Russia and married a Danish killer maniac, Sasha is attached to the memories of his former lover and rethinks his and her life choices. The news of her sudden and scandalous fame makes Galper doubt himself. He thinks about what would have happened if he had not changed his bright life as a bohemian American poet in Moscow for the comfortable and modest life of a civil servant in New York.