The Big Dirt Nap

Six

If the Titans spa had ever been an ongoing concern, it must have been back in the days when women in turbans stood in exercise machines and tried to jiggle the fat away. A glass door on the second floor was labeled Gaia's Palace—at least someone knew their Greek mythology. The room held little more than a bare reception desk, some candles, and a small bamboo plant in a shallow dish of wet pebbles—dollar-store nods to an Asian sensibility, but they were trying.

While I waited for someone to greet me, I poked around, eventually sneaking a peek at the spa's appointment book. I was curious to see if there were any other clients that afternoon, or if I was the only one who'd been coerced into using the spa. Just as I opened the book, the door to the treatment room swung open, and I slammed the book shut.

No waiflike creatures in black here. No long-necked model wannabes moonlighting from their jobs as haughty hostesses in trendy restaurants. Just Sveta. Quite possibly moonlighting from her other job as a professional wrestler. She led me into the treatment room that she had already prepared and I followed her in with all the enthusiasm of someone about to be strip-searched at the airport.

"Salon receptionist is off today," she mumbled in a heavy Russian accent. "We have big group coming soon, so she will be here long hours." I thought Sveta was lying, but gave her credit for being a good employee attempting to keep up appearances for the guests. "Today we have salt scrub."

Apparently I didn't have a choice. I was here. The salt was here. And so was Sveta. She ordered me to strip down and held up a sheet to shield her eyes while I did. A plastic shower cap and a paper thong were on the table behind me and I put them on as she instructed. New Age harp music played in the background. Relaxing was difficult. Finally I hopped on the table and lay facedown while she covered my butt and legs with a cool cotton sheet.

Wearing scratchy white gloves, she began exfoliating my back, starting at my shoulders and moving her hands in short downward strokes.

"First we do this. Slough off dry skin from winter. Should have humidifier. Heating and air-conditioning is bad for skin."

She finished my back and repositioned the sheet to expose a different part of my anatomy. I was just about to drift off.

"You are writing about flower?" she asked.

Was it in the company newsletter? I told her I was.

"Is good for hotel?"

I told her hordes of people would visit Titans because of the article. They'd come from all over.

"That's what they say about the foreign writers, but it never happens. And they're lousy tippers."

I could tell that annoyed Sveta because she was scraping at my flesh a little harder than before. That last stroke was almost a smack.

"Terrible thing happened last night," she said, after a few minutes. Was this supposed to be relaxing? Sveta's xenophobia and the police blotter? I grumbled a noncommittal assent. "Bad for hotel," she said.

And not so great for Nick, either.

"He was pretty man, but not to be trusted," she said.

Any thoughts I'd had of a relaxing or therapeutic spa treatment were gone. Now that I was practically naked and under the woman's catcher's-mitt hands, what did she want from me? Could I run out of here in a shower cap and paper underwear if I had to?

I turned my head to the other side to give myself time to think.

"You're right," I said, stalling for time.

She attacked my legs and arms with renewed vigor, brushing so hard that not only would my skin be smooth after this treatment, I might even weigh less. She was really getting into her work now, holding up my left arm by the wrist and sanding me down with a spa glove. Out of the corner of my eye I could see little flakes of winter skin sloughing off.

"He let Oksana believe he cared, but he was a fake." I hoped she didn't have too much invested in Oksana's being jilted, or I'd have no skin left.

"Lovely girl," I said, mumbling into a towel and hoping to diffuse some of her agitation.

"She is, but she's a child. And he was a liar. Nick bought her a few dinners. That was it. She wants to be rescued. You must rescue yourself."

After delivering that insight into her personal philosophy, Sveta finished with my B side and I turned over. Why was she telling me this? Was this her own message or one she was delivering for someone else?

"Still," I said, trying to lighten things up, "if all the liars in the world were killed, there wouldn't be many of us left."

Her message delivered, she laughed, deflated my "A" side, then drizzled a gritty almond-scented oil on my skin and worked her hands in small rhythmic circles to distribute the scrub.

When the scrub was finished, Sveta pointed me toward the Swedish shower, where I was pelted by three columns of icy water. I covered my face and let myself be spun around until Sveta took pity on me and turned the water off. She enveloped me in a wall of terry cloth and I shook the water from my eyes.

"When I worked at The Baths," she said, "we would have done platza next, but no oak leaves here."

I'd heard of platza—a friend of mine swore by it. But I hadn't yet warmed up to the idea of paying a stranger to beat me with branches. "Do you mean The Baths in New York City?" I asked.

She nodded. "I lived in Brighton Beach and took D train to the Village. Too expensive," she said, leading me back to the treatment room. "I come back here, more friends."

She patted the table, now covered with a mylar sheet and a thick padded fabric. I hopped on and she proceeded to anoint me one last time. This was the part that always made me feel like a baked potato. She folded the fabric over me and crimped the edges of the mylar so that I was encased in silver foil from my neck to my toes. All that was missing was a sprig of parsley and a dab of butter.

"Twenty minutes. You want washcloth for forehead?"

I passed on the washcloth, but asked her to turn off the cheesy harp music.

"Is no problem."

She killed the music and the lights. Just as she was leaving the room, I saw the lights of the reception area and the silhouette of her next client, a tall man who drew a deep breath and wheezed before addressing Sveta in Russian.

I'd be smooth as a baby's bottom for my meeting with Bernie, but I wouldn't be relaxed until I was vertical, dressed, and out of there.