During the last Wednesday of Mardi Gras, Binx Bolling, a 29-year-old stocks and bonds salesman in New Orleans, receives an invitation to lunch from his Aunt Emily. Binx feels a prickle of foreboding, remembering when Aunt Emily broke the news of his brother Scott’s death when Binx was a child.
Binx lives a peaceful life in an undistinctive suburb called Gentilly. He takes pride in being a good tenant and an upstanding citizen. His main hobby is going to the movies, sometimes accompanied by a girlfriend (usually his current secretary). Today, however, Binx’s quiet life is interrupted by the memory of the “search.” This idea first came to him several years ago, while he was injured in a ditch during the Korean conflict. The search is an attempt to get beyond the “everydayness” of life. Once a person becomes aware of the possibility of the search, they can’t help pursuing it, but someone who remains oblivious to the search remains in despair.
At Aunt Emily’s, Binx learns that Emily’s stepdaughter, Kate, who struggles with her mental health, has been stashing sedatives in her room. Aunt Emily thinks that Kate is nervous about her upcoming marriage to Walter and wants Binx, who’s always been a good friend to his step-cousin, to keep her distracted with Mardi Gras events. Aunt Emily also grills Binx about his future, asking him what he wants out of life and encouraging him to enroll in medical school so he doesn’t waste his potential. Binx doesn’t know how to respond, but promises he’ll give her an answer in one week’s time, on his 30th birthday. Later, when Binx talks with Kate, she admits that she’s planning to break her engagement with Walter, but it’s not because of the trauma in her past (her first fiancé, Lyell, was killed in a car crash which left Kate unscathed). In fact, although Lyell was a good man, his death felt liberating to Kate.
Binx works for Aunt Emily’s husband, Jules Cutrer. On Friday, Uncle Jules gives Binx last-minute tickets for a stocks and bonds conference in Chicago next week, promising Binx will be rewarded for going. Binx dreads the prospect of traveling to a nondescript, anonymous city and worries that Jules will give him a promotion, which will disrupt his tidy, quiet life. Meanwhile, at the branch office he runs, Binx has become obsessed with his secretary, Sharon Kincaid, and starts asking her to work late as part of a scheme to win her love.
On Friday night, after falling asleep to thoughts of Sharon, Binx is awakened by a call from Aunt Emily—Kate’s missing. Not long after, Kate arrives by taxi at Binx’s house, excited about a discovery she made at therapy today—she doesn’t have to live up to her therapist’s expectations or anyone else’s but can simply be “free” instead. Watching Kate’s euphoria starting to collapse into depression, Binx gently offers for Kate to come and live with him. She takes this as a marriage proposal, and Binx doesn’t deny it, but she’s too distraught to give an answer right now.
The next day, Saturday, Binx invites Sharon to go to the beach with him, and she agrees. As they set out in Binx’s car, Binx feels a twinge of malaise, or despair over life’s meaninglessness, but a hit-and-run accident soon disrupts the feeling. After the collision, Binx lies in a ditch with a sore shoulder, much like in Korea. Sharon tends him, and they continue to the beach, where they spend the day swimming, flirting, and kissing, and Binx feels content. As they drive home, Binx reflects that settling for the “Little Way” of everyday happiness might be better than continuously searching for a transcendent happiness.
Binx and Sharon stop at Binx’s mother’s fishing camp for the night, where Sharon meets Binx’s six young half-siblings, including Binx’s favorite, Lonnie, who is disabled and uses a wheelchair. That night, Binx and Sharon take Lonnie to the movies which, due to the film, the Southern atmosphere, and the cheerful company, is a singularly enjoyable experience for Binx. However, he wakes up that night feeling despair; he questions both the devout Catholicism of his mother’s family and the principled skepticism of his father’s family. He can only conclude that, even if God exists, God doesn’t make any clear difference to Binx’s search. However, the next day, Binx and Lonnie enjoy one of their customary religious discussions, during which Lonnie expresses his desire to die and be with God, and Binx discourages Lonnie from fasting during Lent. During the drive home, Binx feels despair again, having lost enthusiasm for Sharon—who’s engaged anyway, it turns out.
The next day at Aunt Emily’s, Binx learns that Kate overdosed on sedatives, though Kate, now revived, tells Binx that she hadn’t meant to attempt suicide. She wants to escape New Orleans for a little while, so Binx lets her book tickets for both of them to Chicago—he’s leaving for the conference tomorrow. They slip off that night, without telling anyone. During the train journey, Binx and Kate discuss marriage, and Kate concludes that their marriage will only work if Binx always tells her what to do and reassures her. Binx agrees that he can do this. After a whirlwind visit to Chicago, the pair is summoned home to New Orleans by Aunt Emily, who’s furious that Binx never told her they were leaving; everyone panicked over Kate’s disappearance. Kate and Binx arrive home just after the last Mardi Gras parade.
The next morning, a disillusioned Aunt Emily gives Binx a stern lecture. Because Binx betrayed her trust, she now knows that her hopes for him were misplaced; he’s no hero, but ordinary. Furthermore, she is weary of a world in which mediocre people feel free to shirk their obligations. Binx can’t think of anything to say in his own defense, but he assures Aunt Emily that her attempts to instill nobility, duty, and culture in him were not unappreciated.
Today is Binx’s 30th birthday, and he believes his search has been a failure. Just as he’s feeling despair, however, Kate shows up at his house. They discuss marriage again and agree that if Binx can guide and comfort Kate through her daily struggles, then things might work out. Binx is also willing to go to medical school as Aunt Emily wishes. As they sit in Kate’s car, Binx watches a man emerging from an Ash Wednesday service and wonders if God’s grace can be present alongside the most ordinary business of life.
That June, Binx and Kate marry, and Binx starts medical school. The “search” isn’t part of his life anymore, and he doesn’t have any authoritative conclusions to offer anyway. The following year, Lonnie gets a fatal viral infection just before his 15th birthday. While Binx stays with Lonnie and his other half-siblings at the hospital, he asks Kate to run an important errand for him downtown. With Binx’s patient encouragement, Kate faces her fear and does as he tells her.
