Evan Dubin is a busy young man. A senior in high school, he is attempting to defend his state wrestling championship in one weight class, while taking on his boyhood rival in another weight class. He discovers the love of his life, only after she starts dating his best friend. Then his brother, nine years his senior, asks him to keep an unthinkable secret from his family, straining an already tenous sibling relationship and tearing him apart inside. How Evan deals with all of these stressful occurrences will determine his future for years to come.

Richard Dubin is a talented distance runner at a major southern university. Pain is the story of Richard's senior year as he proceeds with varying success through the year, from cross country through the Olympic Trials, all the while trying to manage a seesawing relationship with a beautiful and fascinatingly unpredictable woman, 10 years his senior. Richard's university is one of the great American party schools and we are treated to a series of uninhibited college blowouts, featuring copious liquid consumption, naked kegstands, nude relays. . . and, most daring of all, poetry reading! As the pressures mount, Richard's life begins to unravel. All the forces converge at the Olympic Trials in New Orleans and it is there that Richard comes to the edge of the abyss.