A high-school senior and his girlfriend get married when they find out she's pregnant.

It's 1956 in the beach town of Trilby. After asking the important questions, 16-year-old working-class Robert Joseph "Bo Jo" Jones asks his same-aged girlfriend, upper-middle-class Julie Greher, to marry him: she's 10 weeks pregnant from their sole sexual encounter. The secret wedding happens the next day. These are only the first steps in both teens doing and saying what they believe are the right things under the circumstances, no matter how they truly feel. Their life inexperience is shown in the process, which includes each finding out what little they know of each other. To some extent, they both realize that being married means the loss of each's previous planned future. The situation is further complicated by both sets of parents injecting more than their two-cents' worth into what Bo Jo and Julie should do, with Mr. and Mrs. Greher throwing their financial weight to get what they want, determined to put on the best public face. During difficult times, Julie often thinks of what might have been with older, overly-sensitive college man Evan Clark, who has shown romantic interest in her. She gets another perspective on married life from her new friend Lee Baragan, who is slightly older and has been married for two years, and from Grandmother Greher, who might be able to see Julie and Bo Jo's marriage beyond their forced-marriage situation. Whether Mr. and Mrs. Bo Jo Jones have a long-term future together might depend on the hypothetical: what if no Baby Jones were on the way?—Huggo