Mobius

Ever since the day his twin brother was swept out to sea as a child, Daniel George has been on a downward spiral. He can’t make friends; he can’t hold down a relationship. And he can’t begin to grieve. In his state of denial, the two obsessional memories he has of that fateful day are of chasing Alex along the cliff tops, and of seeing himself on the sitting room carpet with his new magic set, fashioning a Mobius loop from a strip of paper.

Life is turned on its head when on the twenty-fourth anniversary of the tragedy, while visiting the local churchyard, Daniel stumbles upon an unconscious man propped up against his mother’s gravestone. A young nurse, Gulnaz Rahmani, herself paying her respects to a deceased relative, rushes over to help. She finds evidence of head injuries suggesting a beating; the man’s breathing is rapid and shallow. As the paramedics arrive and carry him away, Daniel takes one last look at the man, and through the dark-ringed eye sockets, the cuts and bruises and the white, emaciated skin, he recognises the face of his long lost twin.

In wild confusion, Daniel bolts from the churchyard, the woman in hot pursuit. For much of the night they sift through his mum’s old photo album, unpicking the circumstances around the disappearance; that fateful Christmas Day walk on the Devon cliffs and Alex’s hot-headed attempts to scale the rocks. Before she leaves, Daniel's new acquaintance is persuaded to accompany him next morning to the hospital, and guide him through the challenge of bringing the prodigal, miracle-twin home and nursing him back to health.

In his desperation to solve the riddle of this shock reappearance, and what has left Alex mute and disabled over twenty years later, Daniel decides they must return to the Devon cliff tops where he fell.

But is the man in his care really his twin brother? And can Daniel cope with him increasingly sabotaging his burgeoning relationship with Gulnaz? As the responsibilities of being a carer escalate, with Daniel turning away from the nurse and towards drink and drugs to make sense of it all, the tiny, cramped flat becomes a powder keg that sooner or later must explode. When it finally does so, the results for everyone are catastrophic and profound.