Summary

Óscar Amalfitano, a professor at the University of Santa Teresa in Mexico, lives alone with his daughter Rosa. Amalfitano is fifty and Chilean originally, while Rosa is seventeen and a Spanish citizen, like her mother. Amalfitano's wife, Rosa's mother, Lola left the pair when Rosa was quite young.

When Lola and Amalfitano were together, they lived in Barcelona. Lola told Amalfitano that she had to leave to go see a poet she knew in her youth in Mondragón. The poet now lives in a psychological asylum, and Lola has convinced herself that she must free him. She tells Amalfitano that the two were bohemian lovers when she was younger, which Amalfitano knows is delusional because the poet is gay. Rosa leaves for the asylum under the pretense of leaving for just a few weeks, and does not say bye to...