The golden sun of Catalonia beat down with a familiar, intoxicating warmth that Natán Comas felt deep in his marrow.
This was home.
He was back on the pristine, sun-drenched coastlines of northeastern Spain, and with every deep breath of the salty, Mediterranean air, he felt another layer of the suffocating pressure of the past year peel away.
He loved Catalonia with a fierce, unwavering devotion.
He loved the weather, the way the sunlight seemed to dance across the azure waves, and the way the heat wrapped around him like a comforting blanket.
It was a stark, almost jarring contrast to his current life in England.
He honestly missed this place more than he could ever describe in words.
When he was in Manchester, it felt as though he were living in a different, drearier dimension.
Manchester was an endless, gray canvas of rain, heavy clouds, and biting winds that seemed to seep right through his thick club-issued winter coats.
The winters there were brutally long, the sun setting by mid-afternoon, plunging the city into a cold, damp darkness that often mirrored his own bouts of homesickness.
In Manchester, he had to constantly battle a quiet, creeping seasonal depression, longing for the vibrant, colorful streets of his childhood.
He missed the smell of authentic paella drifting from seaside restaurants, the chaotic, beautiful sounds of rapid-fire Catalan being shouted across the squares, and the feeling of hot, granular sand between his toes.
Here, under the endless blue sky of the Iberian Peninsula, he wasn’t just a £40 million asset or a tactical piece on a chessboard; he was just Natán.
The weather alone was a balm to his soul.
The English rain had a way of making everything feel heavier—the training sessions, the defeats, the media scrutiny.
But the Catalan sun?
The Catalan sun was pure, unadulterated energy.
It recharged him.
It reminded him of long summer days as a child, kicking a battered leather ball against a crumbling brick wall until his mother called him in for dinner.
He loved the beach most of all.
It was his sanctuary.
The rhythmic, hypnotic sound of the waves crashing against the shoreline was the only soundtrack he needed.
Walking down the promenade, feeling the radiant heat baking the pavement beneath his crocs, Natán finally felt like he could breathe again.
Manchester may be his home most of the year, but Catalonia would always hold his heart.
And to the people of this sun-kissed region, Natán was nothing short of a national hero.
As he strolled down the bustling beachfront, the heartbreak of the Euro 2016 final felt a million miles away.
The locals who stopped him every few paces didn’t seem to care in the slightest about the narrow 1-0 loss to Portugal.
They didn’t dwell on the tactical suffocations or the missed opportunities in Paris.
All they cared about, all they wanted to talk about, was that one of their own had conquered the continent.
To them, Natán had been the best player, not just for the Spanish national team, but in the entire tournament.
Old men sitting outside cafes raised their glasses of vermouth to him, shouting, “Visca Natán!”
Young teenagers in knock-off jerseys chased him down for selfies, their eyes wide with sheer adoration.
He stopped by a small, family-owned gelateria right on the edge of the sand.
The owner, a burly man with a thick mustache who had known Natán since he was a scrawny academy kid, outright refused to accept his money.
He thrust a massive cone of lemon and stracciatella ice cream into Natán’s hand, patting his cheek and proudly declaring him the pride of the coast.
Eating the ice cream, Natán continued his slow walk down the beach, the sweet, tart flavors cooling him down.
He pulled his phone from the pocket of his linen shorts, squinting through the harsh sunlight at the screen.
A notification popped up: Manchester City had lost a preseason friendly to Bayern Munich.
A knot of frustration instantly tightened in his stomach.
He wanted to be there.
He wanted to be on the pitch, impressing Pep Guardiola, learning the new system, and fighting for the badge.
His competitive instinct screamed at him to cut his holiday short and book a flight to Manchester.
But Pep had been adamant.
The new manager had personally mandated this vacation, practically ordering Natán to stay away from a football pitch and clear his head.
Deep down, Natán knew it was for the best.
He was a student of the game, and he knew the dark, cautionary track record when it came to younger players who overplayed.
The history of modern football was littered with the tragic tales of teenage prodigies who had been run into the ground by their clubs and countries, their bodies breaking down before they even hit twenty-three, their primes drastically shortened by muscle tears and chronic fatigue.
And he was only nineteen.
He had to protect his body.
He sighed, locking his phone and shoving it back into his pocket, forcing himself to let the anxiety of the upcoming season go.
As he walked past a row of brightly colored beach umbrellas, his gaze drifted toward the shoreline and caught sight of a woman sunbathing on a striped towel.
She was lying there, soaking in the blistering midday heat with the languid, effortless grace of a sun-drenched feline.
Natán wasn’t one to typically stop and gawk—he had been around supermodels, actresses, and socialites at exclusive VIP parties in Manchester and Madrid—but there was something uniquely magnetic about this woman that entirely arrested his momentum.
She wore a striking, minimalist black string bikini that contrasted beautifully against her deeply tanned, glistening skin.
Her body was an absolute masterclass in modern, hourglass proportions.
She possessed a narrow, impossibly taut waist that flared out into wide, curvaceous hips and thick, sculpted thighs that looked perfectly at home under the intense Mediterranean sun.
She had recently dyed her hair a brilliant, dark black strands cascading over her shoulders and framing her face like spun gold against the stark black of her bikini straps.
Even with her eyes completely hidden behind massive, dark designer sunglasses, her facial features were deeply arresting.
She had high, razor-sharp cheekbones, a delicate, perfectly sloped nose, and famous, incredibly full, plush lips that were painted with a subtle, glossy nude tint.
A delicate gold body-chain rested against her collarbone, catching the sunlight and flashing brilliantly with every shallow, even breath she took.
There was an undeniable aura of high maintenance and immense wealth about her—from the flawless, seemingly airbrushed quality of her skin to the perfectly manicured, almond-shaped acrylic nails that rested lightly on her flat stomach.
Yet, despite the obvious, heavy glamour she projected, she looked remarkably serene, entirely lost in the ambient noise of the crashing waves.
Natán eyes traced the elegant curve of her spine and the smooth, athletic tone of her calves.
She didn’t look like a local; she looked like an imported Hollywood siren, dropped onto the rustic Catalan coast by a private jet.
He wondered, fleetingly, what her story was.
There was a subtle tension in her posture, a quiet guard that suggested she was deeply used to being looked at, used to the heavy, lingering stares of strangers.
She was, without a single doubt in his mind, one of the most stunningly beautiful women he had ever laid eyes on, an absolute vision of contemporary perfection radiating under the Spanish sky.
Natán found himself staring for a fraction of a second longer than was polite, genuinely struck by her natural beauty.
But then, he just shrugged.
He wasn’t here to chase girls.
He was here to disconnect.
Tearing his eyes away from the blonde stranger, he heard the familiar, rhythmic thud of a football being kicked nearby.
A group of locals, a mix of kids and adults, had set up two makeshift goals using flip-flops in the sand.
A massive, genuine smile broke across Natán’s face.
He put his crocs in sport mode and jogged over to the impromptu pitch, seamlessly joining the game of beach football, instantly losing himself in the sheer, uncomplicated joy of the sport.
For Kylie Jenner, this remote stretch of the Catalan coastline was supposed to be a desperately needed sanctuary.
Thousands of miles away from the relentless, flashing cameras of the Calabasas paparazzi, the suffocating daily drama of her family’s reality TV empire, and the constant, buzzing anxiety of managing her cosmetics company, she had just wanted to exist in total anonymity.
Lying on the warm sand, feeling the golden Mediterranean sun bake into her skin, it was the most relaxed she had felt in months.
The hypnotic rhythm of the waves was a perfect, natural white noise, drowning out the chaotic stress of her Los Angeles life.
But the peace was fleeting.
Slowly at first, and then all at once, the ambient sounds of the beach were shattered.
The low hum of the ocean was replaced by a sudden, raucous commotion.
A crowd was gathering just a few yards down the shoreline, completely ruining her vibe.
People were shouting rapidly in Spanish, clapping their hands, and loudly cheering, making it utterly impossible for her to relax.
Annoyed by the sudden disruption, Kylie let out a soft, frustrated sigh.
She sat up, crossing her legs on her towel, and pulled her dark designer sunglasses down the bridge of her nose to glare at whatever was causing the uproar.
She expected to see a loud street performer, or maybe some obnoxious tourists making a drunken scene.
Instead, her eyes landed on the epicenter of the crowd, and her breath suddenly caught in her throat.
There, effortlessly dodging a group of excited locals in a makeshift game of beach football, was quite literally the most attractive man she had ever seen in her entire life.
He was young, likely right around her age, with a thick, messy mop of dark, wavy hair that fell perfectly across his forehead, gleaming with a light sheen of sweat.
His skin was a flawless, sun-kissed olive, radiating a warm, natural glow that no bronzer or highlighter in her massive cosmetics line could ever hope to replicate.
He wasn’t overly massive or hulking like the American football players or towering bodyguards she was so used to seeing; instead, he was built with the lithe, functional perfection of a Greek statue.
He wore nothing but a pair of simple linen shorts, putting his incredibly toned, coiled musculature on full display.
His chest and abs were heavily chiseled, defined by deep, shadowed V-lines that disappeared beneath his waistband, but it was his legs that truly left her speechless.
His thighs and calves were absolute tree trunks of pure, explosive power, sculpted with such intense, vascular definition that they looked carved directly from marble.
As she watched him play, she was entirely mesmerized by the sheer, liquid grace of his movements.
He didn’t just run; he glided across the uneven sand as if he were floating, moving with a panther-like agility that was dangerously intoxicating.
He would drop his shoulder, feinting with such devastating speed and fluidity that the locals fell over themselves trying to keep up, only for him to throw his head back and unleash a loud, deep, and incredibly infectious laugh.
His smile was blindingly bright, lighting up his entire face and crinkling the corners of his warm, dark eyes.
He looked so happy, so incredibly free and unbothered, radiating a pure, masculine joy that struck Kylie right in the chest.
She had absolutely no idea who he was.
To her, he was just a mysterious, breathtaking stranger playing in the sand.
But as she sat there, clutching her knees to her chest, a heavy, fluttering wave of butterflies erupted in her stomach.
The rappers, actors, and Hollywood socialites she usually dated suddenly felt incredibly plastic, arrogant, and manufactured compared to the raw, visceral magnetism of this joyous, athletic Spanish boy.
A fierce, sudden crush took immediate root in her heart, and Kylie found she couldn’t take her eyes off him, utterly desperate to know who he was.
Instinct immediately kicked in.
Instead of staring back like one of his starstruck fans, Kylie smoothly lowered her dark sunglasses back over her eyes.
With deliberate, agonizingly slow elegance, she laid back down on her striped towel, turning her back to the commotion.
She casually picked her book back up, completely turning her attention away from the spectacle.
She was going to play hard to get.
After all, she was Kylie Jenner—and that strategy always worked.