My Soul - Mi Alma (Ongoing)

9 Madrid

After a busy and relatively uneventful Easter break,  I had so much to prepare for my three weeks in Madrid, I was finally good to go.

After mama's outburst about me not going and having nothing to do with Carlos, not even with Spanish art, she had been unusually quiet. I spoke with Carlos every evening and counted the days till I finally could see him again. Mick and Stuart were off to Aspen skiing for a few days, so the house had been unusually quiet.

I arrived in Madrid Thursday evening local time. I got to sleep for a good part of the seven-hour flight, so my jetlag hadn't kicked in. There he was – waiting for me in the arrival hall.... 

"Carlos!"

"Mi Alma!" 15 seconds and I was in his arms. My heart was beating at an unhealthy rate. We sat in awkward silence in his car on the trip back to the city, studying each other. He looked fantastic, with a nice suntan and a happy look on his face. He took my hand and said – "Mi Alma, I have ordered a hotel room for you but I would much rather you stay with me." 

"I would love to stay with you," I said – do you still live in the same house? "No," he shook his head, "I moved when Mariella died. I live in an apartment 20 minutes walk from the Prado museum in Belen."

His apartment is in a renovated 17th-century building. It looks as if time had stood still on the facade, but it had a parking garage with direct elevator access to his floor. The apartment was spacious and minimalistic. On the wall, just behind the grand piano, there was one of mama's paintings. I could tell it was one of her older works, probably between 20 and 30 years old.

"Coffee or wine mi Alma?" He had carried my bags into his bedroom and returned to the living room "wine, please, but why do you have one of mama's paintings?" 

"I bought it just before I left New York. It is actually inspired by her memory of my house in Sevilla. I bought it to have something of you with me. I didn't need a painting to remember you. My memories are vivid, but I liked it. The thought of always having something of you close to me gave me a lot of comfort over the years when I was afraid I would never see mi Alma again."

I took a sip of my wine "what is it with the Bech and the Alvarez families?" I told him about mama's outburst just before easter, where she asked me to stay away from Carlos and even stay away from working with Spanish art.

"I'm just getting dinner in the oven; I thought you would be too tired to eat out today, after your long flight." Carlos put a lasagna in the oven, and we walked out to his spacious terrace. "I asked you a question, Carlos, what is it with our two families that mama doesn't want me to know? The way she talked, it was almost like something straight out of Romeo and Juliet and the conflict between the Capulet and the Montague." 

"There are no conflicts between our families as such. Still, things happened during the Franco regime that did upset both families. Just before your abuelo died, I promised him not to talk with you about it." Carlos said.

"You know, abuelo never visited Spain after he emigrated to the US."  I told him.

"Mi Alma, we will talk about it later, I'm planning this weekend in Sevilla – does that sound good to you? My uncle is the principal librarian in charge of the Alba collections of books, letters, and drawings. I know you have seen some of the letters between Goya and the Duchess of Alba – or Maya, but in the last couple of years, they found some new ones that would interest you."

He got the food out, and I passed out. So much for the jetlag not setting in. I remember nothing more before I woke up nude in his bed at 5 am. Carlos's arms were tight around me, and I was wide awake. I started caressing his beautiful, lean and muscular body, he reacted with just tightening his embrace, a tired voice saying – "try to get some more sleep Alma it's a long day tomorrow." 

I twisted and turned for a while, and decided to get up and use the bathroom. Carlos snored - loudly.

I went out into the kitchen and helped myself to some of the lasagnas I fell asleep from yesterday. Whan the hell do you do when you're up at 5 am? I got my laptop out and tried to go over some memo points for this morning's meeting with his staff – Carlos sure can cook, that lasagna was fantastic.

At 7 am, Carlos came into the kitchen, nude and with a massive erection. Six feet and three inches of pure beauty.  "Care to join me in bed, or do you want to go for a run in the park?" He smiled mischievously. I opted for the bed.

Lovemaking with Carlos is something out of this world. Well, I don't have all that much experience with long term relationships, most of mine have been one night stands, and not too many of those either. 

Good thing I brushed my teeth, I thought, when Carlos placed a sloppy kiss on my lips – forgetting the lasagna I had eaten for an early morning snack. Carlos's breath tasted like morning breath, with a hint of garlic and red wine. I didn't care – I had to remember Micks' words before I left; Stop overthinking and lower your shoulders.

Carlos is a sweet but demanding lover, I could have stayed in bed all day, but we had work to do – so we ended the lovemaking with a joint shower. Washing his gorgeous body with his lavender body wash made me hot all over again. "Alma!" he moaned. "Do you mind taking me in your mouth?" I sat down on the bathroom floor, and put my lips around his impressive member. He came all over my mouth, I tried to swallow, but I was still a mess. "Oh no," he laughed. "I think we have to wash you all over again."

At 8:30, We walked over to the museum and met up with his team. They suggested some pictures they wanted to include in the exhibition. Carlos had already briefed them on the theme for the exhibition; Goya and his women, and they liked the idea. Goya was a well-known womanizer, and he portraited a lot of Spanish women. Rumors will have it that he slept with most of them. The most infamous was, of course, the two Mayas the portraits of the Duchess of Alba; the dressed and the undressed Maya (La Maya vestida and La Maya desnuda)  I also wanted a lot of text boxes explaining Goya's life and art and hopefully coming up with some unknown details about the artist and his work.

We walked around the museum and made a rough selection of about ten paintings. We would go through what was in storage the upcoming week, and also possibly lending some paintings and drawings from private collections and other museums.

Carlos told the team that we would go to Sevilla for the weekend and wouldn't return before Tuesday. We would go through the Alba collections' letters and drawings. 

Carlos and I walked back to his apartment, packed a weekend bag, and set off to Sevilla, I snapped a picture of my mums painting in his living room and sent it to her.

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