One Year Ago in Spain

Chapter 1 Claire

Claire

They kissed like they were talking about the weather. And not the tornados of the Midwest or the searing wildfires of California. Just a tepid peck on the lips, as exciting as a partially cloudy evening.

All around them, Manhattan heaved like an impatient dragon, its sidewalks shimmering like scales sweaty with humidity. Streetlamps blazed, and the horns of taxis wailed. Everything in the city was alive—feverish, irrepressible.

Everything except Claire and her date.

It was the third time she and Glenn had been out together, and now they stood outside the perfectly acceptable restaurant where they had both eaten perfectly acceptable chicken with a sautéed vegetable medley. The conversation had been perfectly acceptable, too—not bad but not great. Just…fine.

Glenn smiled at her. He was tall enough that she couldn’t see the balding patch on the crown of his head, but she knew it was there. He had nice teeth—he was a dentist, so he’d better have—and he seemed to wear a uniform of standard-issue polo shirts in tame shades of blue, paired with tan chinos.

They were supposed to be heading to the opening of a new exhibit by a Spanish artist. Claire’s best friend—one of the lawyers she worked with—was married to the gallery owner, and he was throwing a swanky party with cocktails and a live band tonight.

“Should I get us a ride?” Claire asked.

Glenn kept smiling in that mild way of his.

“Um…” She looked around them to see if she’d missed a cue about what was going on, but no dice.

He took her hand. “I was wondering,” Glenn said, shouting a little to be heard over the street noise. “Would you like to be exclusive?”

Claire blinked at him. “Exclusive?”

“You know, not seeing anyone else?”

She frowned, but just a tiny one—the kind that only the person frowning really knows is happening while the rest of the world goes on blissfully unaware. “Oh, I know what exclusive means, but…why?”

Glenn let out a short laugh. “Because I thought it might be nice if we didn’t kiss anyone else.”

She didn’t think he was kissing anyone else. And Claire certainly wasn’t seeing other men. She was a corporate attorney at one of Manhattan’s top international firms, on the cusp of partnership, which meant nearly all her waking hours were spent at the office. It had taken her and Glenn weeks to find a compatible evening in their schedules for this third date.

“Also,” Glenn was saying, “because we’d be good together. We’re both smart and we have our lives figured out—which, to be frank, even though we’re both thirty-one, is no longer a given for our generation. We’re both practical and clearheaded. It’s the foundation for long-lasting success.”

Claire sighed. She’d grown up on epic love stories and movies, like the Outlander books and Titanic . So Claire wanted fire and passion, a man who stayed with her not because it was sensible, but because he couldn’t imagine a life without her. And Glenn’s speech was nowhere near what she’d once dreamed of as a romantic declaration.

But she wasn’t getting any younger, and he was the kind of man you wouldn’t be embarrassed to bring home to the family—if Claire’s parents were still alive or she had any siblings, which she didn’t.

Yet if she and Glenn were this bland at the start, what kind of future would this relationship hold? Besides a high probability of predictable stability?

A taxi pulled up at the curb near them, vomiting out passengers onto the sidewalk. Immediately, two different couples—red-faced from the heat and humidity—lunged toward the open door, fighting to claim the car. Getting a ride on a Saturday night in Manhattan was no small feat.

Glenn stepped away but didn’t do anything to help shield Claire from the melee. Not that she needed a man to save her, but she wouldn’t have minded a little chivalry.

“So, what do you say?” Glenn asked once one of the couples had victoriously crammed themselves into the cab and left the other pair growling and punching at their phones, trying to find an available ride.

“Say to what?” Claire asked, her mind still on the minidrama over the taxi.

“Being exclusive. You and me, together.”

“I think…Well, I like you, Glenn.”

He grinned at her with his very straight teeth.

“But the thing is…” Claire took a deep breath. “Don’t you think we deserve more? I mean that in the nicest way possible. Maybe you’re right and we would be a good team, but don’t you deserve something more than just a well-functioning team member by your side? Don’t you deserve someone where, when she’s gone, you still think about her all the time? Someone you want to text whenever you have a break in your schedule? And after a long day, you want nothing more than to curl up next to her and hear all about her day? Because, if we’re being honest, I doubt you feel that way about me. Right? And I…I respect you, Glenn, but I don’t feel that spark with you, either.”

Glenn crossed his arms across his polo shirt, which was now sweat-soaked at the pits. He closed his eyes briefly—had she gone too far? But he’d said he appreciated Claire’s clearheadedness, right? Like the attorney she was, she’d laid out a well-thought-out argument for their respective happiness. It just didn’t involve being together.

When he opened his eyes, he nodded calmly, as if he’d just considered a patient’s description of a toothache. “What you described is, indeed, the fantasy. But that’s all it is—a fantasy. And, Claire, come on, you care more about practicality than passion. Look at your life. You’re a lawyer. And you chose to go out with me, a dentist. We are people of responsibility. A little boring, a little uninspired, perhaps, but steady. Fantasies are for dreamers, not for dentists and lawyers like us.”

For the second time in just minutes, Claire found herself blinking at him. If Glenn had gotten angry or stomped off or something else dramatic, she could have taken it. But instead, he had returned her careful line of reasoning with a rational argument of his own—one that walloped her in the stomach far harder than if he’d told her to fuck off.

“Claire?”

She shook herself out of her thoughts.

“No,” she said.

“I’m sorry. What?”

“No,” Claire said, looking him in the eye. “You’re really nice, Glenn. And maybe you’re right, but I’m not ready to give up yet. I still want—”

“The impossible?”

She bit her lip, then nodded. “Yeah.”

Glenn laughed without humor, but he was too placid a person to be angry. “All right, then. Best of luck to you, Claire. I hope you find the love of your life.”

“You, too, Glenn.”

He nodded once, then headed off toward the subway station.

Claire allowed herself one more long exhale. And then she turned in the other direction and began to walk toward the gallery where her friend Yolanda was waiting for her.

—

Claire trudged through Greenwich Village, mostly oblivious to the people and storefronts as what Glenn had said about her echoed in her head.

Boring.

Uninspired.

You care more about practicality than passion.

Was it true?

Claire’s life was remarkably predictable. She woke every morning at 5:30 a.m. , went for a run through Central Park, came home and showered, then made the same oatmeal with raisins, walnuts, and cinnamon for breakfast. She left her apartment at 7:25 to catch the train, which got her through the front doors of the law firm at 7:47—enough time to grab a coffee from the break room and read through any emails that had come in overnight before hopping on client calls starting at 8:30. The only thing Claire couldn’t predict was when each workday would end, because sometimes there were calls with clients on the West Coast or even in Asia.

But my reliability is why my clients love me, Claire thought, trying to reassure herself.

And being reliable wasn’t mutually exclusive with wanting to hold out for a bigger love. Right?

Then again, if she thought about the epic love stories she’d grown up with, they always involved a large dose of spontaneity and upheaval—time travel, sinking ships, and giving up everything and everyone you’d ever known.

It was a lot to ask.

Oh god, what if Glenn had been right about her?

Claire wove around some of the stinking trash bags that had been left out to fester on the sidewalks. Deep in her thoughts, she almost walked right past the Rose Gallery and its exhibition Surreal Delight .

But the dead streetlamp above her suddenly flickered on and illuminated the plate glass window, and Claire drew in a breath in surprise.

There was a long oil painting of the Manhattan skyline on a rainy day. At first glance, it was just another realistic steel and gray view of the city. But then Claire’s eyes traveled to the bottom half of the painting, where a small girl in a yellow rain jacket crouched next to an enormous puddle that spanned the length of Manhattan. And in its watery, upside-down reflection was a whole different world—one where the skyscrapers were towering sunflowers, and the little girl was a euphoric bumblebee.

The next painting was also realistic on its face: a Spanish chef laboring over flames and a large pan of paella. The kitchen staff around him sweated and bustled, and the rich, deep colors of the painting reminded Claire of classical European art.

But the exhibit was called Surreal Delight, and on closer inspection, she noticed that the saltshaker in the chef’s hand was scattering not salt, but tiny hearts, the little red confetti tumbling down onto the saffron rice in a shower of culinary love.

“I want that, ” she said out loud. Not the literal painting—although she wouldn’t mind having it on her wall—but that feeling, that twinkle of joy in her otherwise orderly world.

Behind her, the gallery door opened.

“Claire!” Yolanda Davis—her best friend, colleague, and the wife of the gallery owner—popped her head out. She was, as usual, impeccably put together, her dark skin contrasting beautifully with a pale pink silk blouse, her natural hair blown out. “I thought I saw you through the window. Come inside! And where’s your date?”

“Glenn went home early.”

“That bad, huh?”

“No, not really,” Claire said. “Just…not enough.”

She followed Yolanda inside and sighed gratefully as the icy blast of air-conditioning hit her skin. The melodies of a saxophone and flamenco guitarist echoed through the high rafters, and a ritzy Fifth Avenue crowd milled around the gallery, drinking sangria and rebujitos while occasionally looking at the paintings on the walls.

“Claire Walker, haven’t seen you in ages.” Jason—Yolanda’s husband—came up and greeted Claire with a hug. “What do you think of the exhibit?”

“I’ve only had a chance to see what was in the window, but…it’s extraordinary.”

“Can I get you a drink?” Yolanda asked. “The sangria is great, but the bartender’s also making tinto de verano, which is kind of like sangria, but fizzy.”

“Yes, please. I could definitely use a drink.”

Yolanda darted off to the bar. Jason started to tell Claire about the nearest painting but then broke off and, looking over her shoulder, said, “Oh, there’s the artist. Do you want to meet him? I’ll introduce you. He’s from Madrid, but he’s going to be here in the States for a couple years as a visiting professor at the New York Academy of Art. He’s a classical realist—with a touch of the imaginative. Monstrously talented and passionate, which is so refreshing in this age of soulless AI art, you know?”

Jason waved at someone. Claire turned around. She was only five-four, so she couldn’t see over the heads of the people in front of her. But it didn’t matter, because the crowd parted, and there he was.

“Matías de León,” Jason said, “I’d like you to meet a friend of mine, Claire Walker.”

He was just like his paintings, viscerally real and rendered in warmth: Waves of black hair. Olive skin. Broad shoulders and muscled forearms that were proof of hours working with his hands.

But then, like the title of his exhibition, there was the glimmer of surreal delight—his eyes were like pools of honey in morning sunlight, rich and gold with promises of undivinable depths.

“ Un placer . A pleasure,” Matías said, his English gently accented with Spanish.

Claire’s mouth opened, but no words came out.

Yolanda reappeared with drinks. But when she saw Claire speechless—and knowing how, as a lawyer, Claire was never without something to say—Yolanda winked at Jason and said, “Why doesn’t Matías give Claire a personal tour of some of his paintings in the back of the gallery? You know, since she arrived late and missed the introductory speech?”

Without missing a beat, Jason said, “What a fantastic idea,” and steered Claire and Matías away from the music and the bar and the majority of the guests. Jason and Yolanda then melted into the party without even a glance back.

Claire laughed nervously. Yolanda wasn’t known for her subtlety, but what the heck was she thinking? There was no way a gorgeous Spanish artist was going to be into Claire. She dated balding dentists and the occasional accountant.

“I am so glad you could come tonight,” Matías said as they made their way deeper into the Rose Gallery. Heads turned wherever he walked.

“You are? Why?” Claire didn’t mean to blurt that last bit out, but her nerves had the reins right now.

“I was worried no one would attend my gallery opening,” he said. “But Jason has done a wonderful job with it. Are you having a nice evening?”

“Not until now.” Claire immediately felt her face flush the same red as her drink.

Matías grinned, and it was charmingly lopsided—nothing like Glenn’s perfectly symmetrical smile.

What is going on? Claire never spoke before she thought; you learned that in the first year of law school.

They reached the back wall. There were only a couple of other guests back here, so Claire and Matías had this part of the gallery pretty much to themselves. Matías was close enough to her that she could smell the pine and spice of his cologne, and her heart thrummed a little faster.

“Although Jason asked me to give a speech earlier tonight,” Matías said, “I do not really like to talk about my work. I put everything I have to say into the art itself, you know? So, please.” He waved toward the paintings that hung around them.

Claire’s pulse sped up more, but for a different reason now. Publicly, she pretended to like paintings and sculptures and such because it was the kind of sophisticated thing that all the partners at the law firm seemed to enjoy. Being Yolanda’s friend also meant she heard a fair bit about the art world.

Yet the truth was that Claire had never been the sort who was particularly moved by art—not like the people who had annual passes to MoMA who could stand in front of a canvas and talk for hours about its complexity. Paintings were just pictures to Claire. So she started psyching herself up to come up with some eloquent lies to tell Matías.

But then she was face-to-face with his work again, and it was like trying to walk during an earthquake while the ground was still shaking. Basic assumptions weren’t straightforward anymore.

Each of his pieces was painted in a style reminiscent of classical European masters, done on wood panels rather than canvas, which seemed to give the colors a richer, almost glowing quality. Matías’s style was very realistic, except that in each painting there was one incongruous, imaginative element.

There was a portrait of a man and a woman at home, him drab and slouched and slack-faced on the couch watching mindless TV, completely unaware that beside him, his wife was gleefully reading a book from which a cute, thimble-sized red alien had emerged and was waving from the pages. Claire laughed out loud, remembering her own amazement when, after moving to New York and having some subway commuting time to kill, she’d rediscovered the joy of reading.

Next, she stood for a long time in front of a painting of a little boy in a field blowing on a dandelion, but rather than seedlings, there were tiny drones, dutifully flying off into the blue sky with his wishes. A trill of happiness vibrated through Claire; this was a vision counter to all the doom-and-gloom headlines about how computers and robots were going to devour humanity. Instead, Matías had found a way to show a path forward where technology was infused with hope.

But it was a painting in the quiet corner of the gallery that knocked the breath out of Claire. In it, a gap-toothed, smiling monk held out a partially peeled orange to the person gazing at the painting. But it wasn’t an orange peeking out from under the peel—it was the planet Earth.

Peace, cupped in his hands and offered to every single person who stopped to look.

“Oh my god, Matías,” she whispered.

He’d stood quietly next to her as she walked through his work, understanding that sometimes the best tour is one the traveler leads herself on. Now he smiled, and those golden eyes glimmered under the gallery spotlights.

If it were possible to know someone’s soul without knowing the person at all, this was how. Matías’s art was his pureness, his sanguine exuberance, his belief in the promise of the world. And—just like when Claire first saw his painting of the Manhattan skyline reflected in a puddle as a forest of sunflowers—she thought,

I want that.

I want him .

But ordinary people only get to mingle with the extraordinary for brief interludes before they have to return to the normal world. Claire knew to savor these moments because she wouldn’t get to have them again once she walked out of the Rose Gallery’s doors.

Unfortunately, the adoring crowds soon found Matías again. A group of society matrons converged on him and swept him away before Claire could even thank him for sharing his work.

She stood there alone then, with his art, wondering if someone like her could ever inspire a similar passion in someone as vibrant and original as Matías.

But after a few seconds, Claire laughed at herself. She had had her brief interlude with the extraordinary, and now it was time to return to the norm.

—

He called her at her office the next day at 9 a.m.

“Hi, Claire? It’s Matías. I asked Yolanda for your number. I hope that was okay. I’d like to take you to dinner.”

Claire gawked at her phone for a moment. Was he really asking her out?

Her voice squeaked when she answered. “Um, dinner sounds good. What date were you thinking of?”

“Tonight, if you’re available.”

Tonight? Attorneys were never free on such short notice. Claire’s calendar was often booked a month in advance.

“Unfortunately, I’m busy all this week,” she said.

“Oh, okay. I understand. If you are not interested, I am sorry for bothering you—”

“No, wait! I am! Interested, I mean. But I have to work late.”

Matías laughed softly. “All right. Well, what if it is a late dinner tonight? You have to eat, don’t you?”

“I do,” Claire said. “But I honestly don’t know how long I’ll be working. I have a call at seven that will last at least two hours, and I’ll have some follow-up work I have to take care of afterward. I might be here until eleven or so. I was planning to just grab a salad from the cafeteria before they close and eat at my desk after my call.”

Matías made a disapproving tsk with his tongue. “Claire, that is no way to live. In Spain, meals are more than just nourishment. However, I understand that you’re busy, so I’ll tell you what—I will bring food to you at the office after your call tonight. Give me thirty minutes for a break, and I will prove to you that dinner can be efficient and pleasurable.”

The way he said pleasurable sent a warm rumble straight through her core.

—

Windsor floor 2, a reception hall as elegant as a Four Seasons hotel; floor 3 was the copy center and gym; and floor 4 was the free employee cafeteria. Floors 5 through 7 were glass-walled conference rooms, and then the rest of the levels were attorneys’ offices. Every lawyer at Windsor & Black LLP had their own office with a heavy oak door, and their secretaries and paralegals sat outside their respective attorneys’ offices in pods in the center.

Just after nine, Matías arrived, and Claire brought him upstairs. The usually bustling floors were empty now, other than a handful of attorneys still in offices here and there, their doors shut to avoid all distractions so they could finish their work and hopefully get home before midnight. Her own desk was so covered in binders and stacks of paper that there was nowhere to eat, so she led him to the law library.

It was a beautiful space, all soaring ceilings and marble columns, that sadly no one used anymore because research was all done digitally now. When Claire had first started working at Windsor & Black, she’d sworn to herself that she would visit the library every day to remind herself that law and justice were revered, noble concepts, not just a glowing computer screen and endless conference calls. But that promise had fallen by the wayside, long ago consumed by demanding partners and even more demanding clients.

She let out a contented sigh, though, as they stepped into the library now.

“Intimidating,” Matías said as his gaze brushed across the towering shelves of leather-bound tomes.

Claire smiled. “Nah. It’s all a facade. Attorneys are just nerds who like big words, and lots of them.”

“You sell yourself short,” Matías said. “But there is one thing I have in common with lawyers—we keep late hours.” He held up the cooler and canvas bag he’d brought. “Spaniards eat dinner at nine or ten at night, too.”

Claire laughed and led him deeper into the library, to a table in the back corner.

Matías pulled out a tablecloth. It was brightly colored, like blue and yellow ceramic tiles, and he lifted it into the air like the parachute game children play, tablecloth hovering for a long moment, before letting it settle gently onto the otherwise ordinary table.

He unpacked real plates—not paper—and weighty silverware and cloth napkins, too.

“Three courses in thirty minutes,” Matías declared, and Claire laughed.

“Where did you order from?”

He furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”

“The food? Where did you get it?”

“Oh! Well, let’s see. The Manchego, I purchased from Murray’s Cheese. The olives and almonds, I bought from Despa?a in SoHo. The fruit and vegetables are from the farmer’s market near my apartment, and the vinegar and olive oil I bought the first day I was in New York, from Mercado Little Spain.”

Claire stared at him with her mouth open. “Wait. You mean you made me dinner from scratch?”

Matías made a face. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”

She didn’t want him to figure out that many New Yorkers never cooked. They just ordered delivery through apps, with the food arriving slightly soggy but still pretty warm at their door.

To begin, he artfully arranged a shaved-apple salad with arugula, Manchego cheese, Marcona almonds, and a tart cider vinaigrette. Claire gasped at the crisp sweetness of fruit contrasted with peppery greens and the richness of nuts and cheese.

“This puts my cafeteria salad to shame,” she said.

“I hope so.”

But it wasn’t just that it was leagues more delicious than regular salads. It was that he’d made it for her .

Next, Matías presented her with empanadillas de atún—half-moon pastries filled with tuna and green olives—then spooned a sauce made of tomato, onions, garlic, and bell peppers, cooked until deeply caramelized.

“Should I use a knife and fork?” Claire asked, not wanting to commit a cultural faux pas on their first date.

“You can,” Matías said. “Or you can just pick it up like this—”

He bit into an empanadilla and oh god, his mouth. The pastry crumbled in a shower of buttery decadence, and Claire wanted to crawl across the table and lick the stray smudge of sofrito sauce at the corner of his lips. But she restrained herself because (a) she was Claire Walker, who didn’t do things like that, and (b) they were in a library, for goodness’ sake. Even if it was a deserted one after office hours.

But then Matías brought out a small glass jar filled with what looked like speckled caramel.

“This is bienmesabe canario,” he said. “An almond dessert from the Canary Islands, where my great-grandparents were from. This is an old family recipe and my favorite from childhood.”

He dipped a spoon into the jar.

Leaned toward her. “Try it…”

Claire parted her lips.

The silver tip of the spoon touched her tongue. Sweetness hit her taste buds, and she moaned.

Every woman has her limits.

She pushed aside the remnants of the picnic, climbed across the table, and kissed him, their mouths like molten sugar.

Claire had never slept with anyone before the sixth date, but Matías was not made for rules.

He laid her down on the plush carpet of the library and disassembled her carefully pressed suit, piece by piece. She yanked his shirt over his head and fumbled at his fly.

Despite the air-conditioning of the staid library, their bodies melted together like the heat that shimmers in the air in the middle of summer days.

When she came, she held in her scream, but the books shook on the shelves around her.

When it was his turn, he whispered her name.

The full, contented silence that followed said everything else they needed to know.

And that was how Claire Walker fell in love with Matías de León.