Jimmy carries a leather, black doctor’s bag around with him containing the rope he plans to hang himself with. He returns home to the fictional town of Ballylough to the cold austere beauty of West Cavan to seek salvation for sins committed in the past before saying goodbye.

In the 1970s, a foundling lad, Patrick “Kitten” Braden, comes of age by leaving his Irish town for London, in part to look for his mother and in part because his trans-gender nature is beyond the town’s understanding.