Ahlaam is a bewildered young woman, confined to the asylum after witnessing the violent arrest of her fiancée, an opposition activist, on their wedding day.

Previously living an apparently idyllic life in pre-war Baghdad, studying for a degree in English, she is now living in a confined existence in a state of delusion, still wearing her wedding dress as a mocking reminder of the ordinary life she once imagined for herself and her husband-to-be.

Deeply bruised and brutally damaged at the hands of the regime, she is left with little hope, but a dream.