Dark secrets won't stay buried. You can run. You can hide. But in the end, unearthing them is the only way to break their curse.
Nicholas is running from a nightmarish legacy of abuse. Asha is a young artist violently forced to give up her dance career. She seeks refuge among a generous, healing family. The very place where Nicholas has found solace. Despite her fear of being hurt again, Asha is blind to the danger lying dormant within Nicholas. Captivated, yet frightened by her ethereal beauty and deep strength, Nicholas must face his secret, or flee.
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Nicholas longs for connection and acceptance, but doesn't trust what might be found inside himself if others get too close. Seeking comfort, and rebelling against his mother's passionless neglect, he sinks into a vacuum of promiscuity. Then, awakened by a shocking self-revelation, he rises to a state of pious self-control.
Just when he thinks he has succeeded in overcoming his dark past, Asha enters and destroys his well-ordered life, triggering painful memories of his past. But his growing love for Asha as he watches her struggle to put her life back together keeps him from running away. Witnessing her courage and determination, her triumph as well as her grief, Nicholas begins to hope that he, too, might find true healing.
But first he must find a way to absolve himself, kill the shame which plagues him.
A journey to find and apologize to a person he once wronged ends in failure, and he reacts by deciding that he himself is the shame which must be destroyed. In the climactic scene, he lays himself open to the imagined wrath of God, fully expecting death in retribution.
Instead, he finds mercy and enlightenment, then excruciating but welcome grief, and finally, courage and determination to follow Asha down the path of healing.
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