At a junior high school St. Valentine's Day dance in 1988 San Francisco, Jeremy Melton, an outcast student, asks four popular girls to dance. The first three girls, Shelley, Lily, and Paige reject him coldly, while the fourth girl, Kate, politely responds "maybe later". Their overweight friend Dorothy accepts Jeremy's invitation and they proceed to secretly make out underneath the bleachers. When the school bully Joe Tulga and his friends discover them, Dorothy claims that Jeremy sexually assaulted her. Joe and his friends publicly strip and severely beat Jeremy, and his nose starts bleeding under the distress. Later, Jeremy is expelled and eventually transferred to a reform school.