A farm on the German-German border that recently stopped being a border, in the summer of 1990. Family members from the West visit and everyone is feeling their way through these uncertain new times as everyday life goes on in the summer heat. Son Johannes has turned the farmhouse’s attic into a refuge for his girlfriend Maria and himself. Maria is reading Dostoevsky and wanders through meadows, engaged in a search for the meaning of life. Her encounter with Henner, a much older neighbour, becomes her testing ground, drawing her in, like fate.