Grieving widower Garret Blake (Kevin Costner) builds boats for a living. Rebuilding his life; now that's another matter. But that's before Theresa Osborne (Robin Wright Penn) comes to his North Carolina village. Theresa, a lonely divorcee and researcher for the Chicago Tribune, knows Garret is the author of the message she found inside a bottle on a Cape Cod beach. And she knows the message spoke to her in a way that profoundly touched her heart...