Unhappy in her marriage, Rachel decides to separate from her husband, the businessman Virgílio. Determined to turn her life around, she moves from Petrópolis to the southern zone of Rio de Janeiro with her daughter, Clara, and goes to live in her mother Laura's house in Ipanema. There she falls in love with the charming, but gruff, Heitor, owner of a mechanic shop. He lives with his sister, Irene, in an old townhouse, one of the main settings of the telenovela.