Summer 1945 in Germany. In Nordstrand, a peninsula on the North Sea coast, the British army of occupation has set up its central administration in a carefully cordoned-off base cut off from the mainland. Gesa works in the military base's laundry with other German women. Her fiancé, a former Wehrmacht officer, is being held in the nearby internment camp, on the other side of the sea and the barbed wire. To find Gesa secretly at night in the dunes, Friedrich is not afraid to swim across the inlet. But the young woman falls in love with Simon, a British officer of German origin. She soon decides to tell Friedrich everything, but the dramatic events of that night prevent her from doing so...