Confined to her bed with an illness, she finds a pencil in her great-grandmother's workbox, but the house she draws is as unsatisfying as always - like a shaky doll's house with grass as unlike anything growing as ever. But that night, she dreams and re-discovers her drawing in a completely new world. Returning to this world night after night, Marianne encounters a strange but familiar boy and the house takes on an increasingly ominous significance for both of them.