Sometimes love is inexplicable.
In a small, remote town on the coast, a friendship develops between two special youngsters on the fringe of the local society. Sensitive, delicate Ruth is forced to leave the town she has known all her life and travel to a distant land. There she discovers the artistic talent within her, and becomes deeply immersed in another world, rich in sights and sensations, the door to which she discovered while still in her home town.
David leaves the town as well, on his way to developing as a musician. The fragile relationship between him and Ruth alternates between off and on over the course of their lives. David forges a path for himself in the world of music as a clarinetist and composer, but his yearning for Ruth continues to accompany him for years. Ruth, torn between the two worlds, struggles to choose.
This is a story about the place of art, imagination and longing in the shaping of the human soul, and about the drawing power of love.