In
Los Angeles in 2003, after an evening of playing poker with another couple, Debbie Dunn and Peter Coleman have sex and spend the night together in her home. Twenty years later, Debbie and Peter are best friends. He has moved to
NYC and become a successful businessman, while she still lives in Los Angeles and works as an accountant at her son Jack's middle school. Debbie calls Peter on his birthday, and they discuss her plans to head to NYC soon to complete an accounting program to help her get a better-paying job. Debbie's ex-husband's actress girlfriend, Scarlet, is to watch Jack for the week but flakes when she is offered a role in
Vancouver for two weeks. Peter, who has just broken up with his girlfriend and is between jobs, offers to go to LA to take care of Jack. In California, Peter learns the extent of Debbie's overprotective parenting and decides to help Jack loosen up a little. He gets skybox tickets to a
Los Angeles Kings game and encourages Jack to invite along two classmates, but this goes awry when they ignore him. Meanwhile in NYC, Debbie meets Peter's ex-girlfriend Minka, who invites her out for drinks and attends her accounting classes. At the bar, Minka helps her catch the attention of book publisher Theo Martin. Later, she also shows Debbie Peter's unpublished novel he had hidden in his apartment. After reading the manuscript, Debbie pretends to be a freelance editor as she tries to convince Theo to give it a chance. Peter grows closer to Jack and convinces the hockey coach to let him try out for the team. Meanwhile, Debbie goes out on a date with Theo, which ends with them spending the night together. Debbie accidentally sets off the apartment's remote camera, leading to Peter witnessing them. Disturbed, he goes to a bar to meet with an old girlfriend but cannot bring himself to sleep with her. That's when Peter realizes that he is in love with Debbie. Back at Debbie's, Peter talks about his relationship with Debbie with their mutual friend Alicia. She encourages him to finally act on his feelings for her rather than repress them again, as he's been doing for decades. On Debbie's last day in NYC, she passes her exam and unintentionally discovers Peter's hidden mementos of her. When Debbie meets with Theo, he tells her he has gotten her an interview with
Macmillan so they could potentially date. However, she confesses that she is in love with someone else. In LA, Jack's hockey tryout goes well, but he ends up injured. Peter calls Debbie, and she is enraged that he endangered her son, even though Jack appears okay. She rushes to leave and get back home to her son, telling Peter to be gone before she arrives. Peter and Debbie come face-to-face at
LAX. After a heated argument, he declares that he is deeply in love with her, and has been since they met, and they kiss passionately. Six months later, they are married, Peter has become a published author and moved in with them in California. She is an editor at an indie publishing house, and Jack is on the hockey team. ==Cast== •
Reese Witherspoon as Debbie Dunn •
Ashton Kutcher as Peter Coleman •
Zoë Chao as Minka •
Jesse Williams as Theo Martin • Wesley Kimmel as Jack •
Tig Notaro as Alicia •
Steve Zahn as Zen •
Rachel Bloom as Scarlet •
Griffin Matthews as Professor Golden •
Vella Lovell as Becca •
Shiri Appleby as Vanessa •
Michael Hitchcock as Alex ==Production==