The plane touched down at Barajas just after noon.
Hiro stepped off the aircraft with his bag over his shoulder, calm on his face. The Spanish sun was high and bright, a sharp contrast to the cool Japanese spring he had left behind, and the air smelled of asphalt and heat and something faintly floral, the familiar scent of Madrid.
A car was waiting for him.
The drive to his apartment took twenty minutes, and Hiro watched the city slide past the window, the wide boulevards, the gleaming towers, and the cafés spilling out onto the sidewalks. It felt like coming home, but only for a moment, because there was no time to rest in it.
Two weeks until the derby.
He closed his eyes. Let's get to work.
In the afternoon, he arrived at the training ground. However, unlike before, he wasn't the first to arrive.
He could blame it on the jet lag since it hadn't been that long since he boarded the plane.
