In which Rickie leads his friends to a beloved dell near Cambridge, a sanctuary both physical and spiritual amid the waxing and waning of youth, where conversation turns to the complexities of friendship and the divisions within their college society. He then unfolds to them the intimate story of his upbringing, marked by loneliness, parental estrangement, and the early deaths that shape his solitary character with a tender mixture of candour and reticence.

In which a group of earnest undergraduates engage in a late-night philosophical debate on the existence of reality, symbolised by the curious case of a cow that may or may not be there. Among them, Rickie Elliot navigates the warmth of companionship, unexpected visitors, and the quiet stirrings of his own uncertain future, all set against the gentle hum of Cambridge life.