Rodrigo, a piano-tuner and former composer fallen on hard times, begins a love affair with the soon-to-be-married Susana. When a bomb in the city of Medellín nearly kills them, Rodrigo and Susana surrender to their attraction and fall into each other’s arms. Cocooned in her apartment above the vibrant city, Susana opens up to him every night and tells him a story of each of the different men from her past. Her stories inspire him to compose again, but his obsession makes him jealous and paranoid. When Susana finally leaves her fiancée to be with Rodrigo, he becomes obsessed with her fidelity.

In August 1987, Héctor Abad Gómez was murdered on the streets of downtown Medellín during the darkest moments of the dirty war against the Colombian left. Why was he killed? Who could have had a vested interest in silencing a university professor, human rights activist and doctor who was a precursor of the concept of "public health" in Colombia?

In the polarized and violent Medellín (Colombia's 'City of Eternal Spring') of the 1970s, doctor Héctor Abad Gómez is concerned about both his children and children from less favored classes. After a devastating loss in the family, Héctor gives himself to the greater cause of public health programs for the poor in Medellín to the consternation of the city's authorities.