Dr. Robert Richardson, a dedicated young general practitioner, seeks to establish himself in an isolated fishing village on Cape Breton Island off the Nova Scotia coast. The population is poor and the struggling physician generally gets paid for his efforts in barter. When he meets Belinda McDonald, a young deaf mute callously dismissed by family and neighbors as "the dummy," he alone senses her innate intelligence. He overcomes the initial skepticism of her flinty, gruff father and indifferently cold aunt, who operate a hardscrabble grist mill and farm, and devotes himself to teaching the young girl sign language and lip-reading. Hopes are even raised that she might even eventually qualify for a medical procedure that might improve her condition. Her optimism is crushed, however, when she raped by Locky McCormick, a brutish local fisherman. Traumatized, she is unable to communicate the outrage to her family...

Eight haunted people meet and fall apart - looking for redemption in each other. Jim is throwing watermelons off his office roof. He's testing the effect for a possible suicide. But then there is Sue on an adjacent roof about to jump herself. They meet, delay their departure and set off searching for other ways out than down. Sue's ex-boyfriend, Dean, is struggling with his creativity. His paintings are getting panned and his poetry ripped apart. He needs a muse - and who better than Gina, the experimental prostitute with dodgy legs who lives next door. However, Dean soon finds out that Gina never does anything for free. After a short fling with Dean, Olly is lost in a world of sexual confusion when forced to look after his deaf-mute brother Chris for the day. Olly discovers that not only does Chris has gay feelings too, but is more comfortable with them than he is. They embark on a searing quest through Soho's gay community to help Chris loose his virginity...