A young man named Eugene Jones (Paul Chequer) wakes up to find himself dead in a hit and run accident. He is lying on the ground but does not know how he got there. He has met the Torchwood group before and recognizes them as they investigate his death. His phone rings and Gwen (Eve Myles) answers it and tells his mother he is dead. She finds pictures of random shoes on the phone and is intrigued.
Eugene follows her around as flashbacks of his past occur to him. He was a great math student, but lost a competition and disappointed his father, who left that night. His science teacher gave him an object like a glass eye that had fallen from the sky, and he began to collect such artifacts, but Torchwood was never interested in them.
He tried to sell the object on eBay to buy tickets to Australia with his co-worker Linda (Robyn Isaac). The bidding went up to 15,000 pounds and he arranged to meet the bidders, whom he hoped would be the aliens who lost it, at the Happy Cook Restaurant, near where he died. It was his co-worker Gary (Celyn Jones) and a video clerk named Josh (Steven Meo) who were scamming him. They offered him 34 pounds. He decided to bug out, tried to take pictures of the buyers but only took the waitress’ shoes, then swallowed the object and left. He walked into traffic and died. Gwen was able to figure all this out.
Captain Jack (John Barrowman) believes the eye-shaped object was a Dogon Sixth Eye, which gives a fresh perspective on life. Gwen finds Eugene’s estranged father, informs him of Eugene’s death, and he shows up for the funeral. Gwen recovers the object from his remains. As she watches the father re-connecting with the family at the wake, she does not notice the car about to run her down. Eugene pushes her out of the path of the vehicle, becoming corporeal at that moment. Gwen gives him a kiss and he vanishes in a white glow, leaving the Eye behind.
The story was clearly influenced by A Wonderful Life with Jimmy Stewart. Eve Myles is prominently featured in this episode because another in which she has a small role was filmed at the same time—an old Doctor Who trick. When he is dead, Eugene casts no shadow. The DVD he watches at one point is the “lost” SF classic A for Andromeda, with Julie Christie in her first role. Throughout, Gwen appears to feel Eugene about her somewhere and even seems to speak with him. The episode was a minor one as these things go, but it was touching and human.