A department-store window decorator learns there is a vacancy for her dream job in the run-up to Christmas, only to find a professional rival has his eye on it too.

It's no holds barred when two Manhattan department store employees vie for the same job during the busy Christmas season. Sloan Van Doren is a driven young woman determined to become the next window dresser at McGuire's department store and to uphold a 95-year-old artistic holiday tradition. Serious and professional, she's the polar opposite of the happy-go-lucky Jake Dooley, who also wants the job. When Mr. Fitch, the head of advertising and promotion, gives them a challenge, the competition is on: each will create a series of seasonal storefront windows twice a week until Christmas. The creator of whichever window display gets the most attention from passersby will get the job. As they go through their paces, with Jake's obvious talent grabbing the public's attention, a silent but mutual attraction develops between the pair, hampered by the contest and the presence of Kenneth, Sloan's blue-blood boyfriend, who can't understand the importance Sloan is placing on this job. Supporting the efforts of the window dressers are McGuire's veteran window washer Mac and brassy bathroom attendant Rita who have eyes for each other but haven't done anything about it yet. Love is in the air at McGuire's, but things aren't exactly what they seem.—Anonymous

McGuire's Department Store has a 95-year tradition of having the best Christmas window displays in New York City. That tradition is in jeopardy this year as its two decade senior designer, Miss Jeffers, has quit at the start of the Christmas season, taking most of her design staff to work at a competitor, except Sloan Van Doren, a two-year member of the design team, and recent hire Jake Dooley. There is no time to hire an experienced replacement, so Fitch, the store manager, based on an initial assessment of their skills, gives Sloan and Jake each one of the two display windows to decorate for the Christmas season, the displays to be changed once a week, meaning four designs apiece. The one whose windows draw in the most customers to the store will be the new "Miss Jeffers". Sloan and Jake are opposite personalities, with specifically Sloan's opinion of Jake being low, despite neither truly knowing anything of the other. Based on her pretentious sounding name, her ever changing well-appointed business attire, her expensive academic background, the constant telephone calls from her mother that he overhears, and dating snobbish upper-crust Wall Streeter Kenneth (not Ken or Kenny) Carlyle, Jake assumes meticulous Sloan grew up in privilege, with lawn parties and country clubs being the norm. Sloan believes slacker Jake has always skated by life on his superficial charms, but she also admits that he is very talented, that natural talent which she wishes she possessed. Despite her outward confidence, Sloan is a bundle of insecurities as she tries to get ahead in the business. As the two compete for the job as Miss Jeffers, they begin to get to know each other beyond the facades, their feelings toward life, the top job, and each other, which is affected by their relationships with Kenneth, Mac, the store's window cleaner, and Rita, the brash ladies' room attendant.—Huggo