Page 64 of Backslide
Screw my head on right.
You’ve got this, I hear my dad say. Or maybe it’s John the driver.
But the heat enveloping my shoulder, radiating all the way down my body, and coiling at my core, is saying something different. Gingerly, I grab the heating pad and move it to my stomach, then I turn on my side and let it curl with me, offering comfort.
The next morning, I do in fact beg off the booze bus. Which I object to anyway on the basis of terminology alone.
I believe in buses. And I believe in parties. But, in an ideal world, never the twain shall meet.
There’s too much potential puking involved in both.
Cara is totally understanding and practically offers to stay behind too, but obviously that’s out of the question.
Once she’s given me a pass and I’ve promised to beextrafun later, I wait to hear the main door to our suite wheeze open and slam shut before I climb out of bed and venture into the common room. Noah has made coffee again and, though I am intent on avoiding actual contact with him today, I feel like it’s still acceptable to drink his brew.
He has left his door open and I can’t help but notice—when I walk over and fully snoop—that his bathroom mirror is still steamed up from a shower. Horribly, I instantly flash to an image of him lathering up—and scurry away, pulling my mind out of the gutter.
Besides, I have big plans for the day and I’m pretty excited.
Though I have wandered around the property a bit, visiting the chicken coops periodically en route to meals to say hello, I have yet to enter the spa barn. And based on the scents emanating from its recesses, it is not to be missed.
After all, this is where the amazing distilled flower mist was born! How else can I pay homage?
I figure the spa will be good for my shoulder and my brain. So, I’ll commune with my higher mind. And drink some cucumber water.
I am so zen.Om.
But when I meander the quiet dirt path to that corner of the grounds and pop inside wearing my robe, I find an abandoned reception desk. It’s in the style of a bleached-out paddock, behind which a birch shelf is lined with natural beauty serums and creams. There is no one to be found. I peek in and around the area, by the racks of impossibly soft yoga pants and a crystal display, down the treatment room corridor featuring gathered sprigs of hay mounted along the walls.
They’ve really doubled down on the farm theme.
Unsure of what to do, I peek back outside, returning to the property’s main path, and fortunately bump into a member of the staff, a young woman with blue hair and a soft-spoken voice.
“Can I help you?” she asks.
Oh, if only.
“I was just interested in the spa…”
“Ah,” she nods. I feel like she gets me. Just like Damien thinks he does. I gag. “When the property is rented out in this capacity, it’s not staffed unless there are specific massages and treatments scheduled. But the hydrotherapy area is open for use—and it’s wonderful. Help yourself!”
So I do.
I head back inside past the desk and push through raw wood barn doors to reveal another world: Under a lofted ceiling, adorned with modernist pendant lights, plush but sharp-edged daybeds form single-file lines on either side of hot and cold plunge pools. Each lounger is appointed with a succulent in a ceramic planter to create a sense of organic symmetry. Light spills in through rows of windows, illuminating a countertop bearing bone broth, hibiscus tea, lemongrass elixir, and trays of fresh fruit and date bars. Instead of cucumber water, there is green grape water. This is wine country, after all.
As I step onto the stone-tiled floors, I realize they’re radiant, emanating heat from deep within—kind of like me. I shake my head, defiantly.
Will. Not. Go. There.
Once again, I can’t help but note the photographic potential for this space, at once immaculately designed but not at all stuffy.
Down a short corridor on one side, I find a eucalyptus steam room—with its glass door properly fogged up—beside a cedar sauna with steaming coals.
And it’s all mine! The booze bus has ferried my favorites and least favorites away for the day and left me alone in paradise.
I slip off my robe—noting that my shoulder is already feeling a bit improved—and hang it on a hook outside the sauna, which is where I plan to begin. I grab a rolled-up towel to lie on and one for behind my head, then quickly dig through that organic market bag Noah left me. It’s cute. I’m now using it as a tote.
See?I am resourceful!
