“Damn it, Ricky,” I said, teeth chattering as we exited the igloo. “I thought this was supposed to be relaxing!”
If I hadn’t been spending the last month studying every minute change of Ricky’s face for meaning, I might have missed the flicker of worry that came before his sheepish smile.
“Come on,” he said. “You don’t feel good? Not even a little bit?”
I paused, focusing on the sensations in my body. I did. My skin felt like it was buzzing pleasantly, my body light and loose with endorphins.
“No, I do, I do,” I relented. “But hopefully the rest of these are . . . less masochistic?”
“They are, I promise.”
And they were. We jumped from room to room like schoolkids let loose in a mall, sometimes lying flat against the hot floors, sometimes sitting up straight, backs pressed against walls lined with amethysts and charcoal and clay. One sauna was filled with tiny wooden blocks, and we buried ourselves within them, waiting until the other guests cleared out before tossing them in handfuls at each other. An old Korean woman caught us jogging to our next sauna and chastised us, and we skittered to an amble and then snickered at being caught. By the time we decided to go to the cafeteria, my cheeks hurt from smiling.
It was dinnertime, so most of the other guests had the same idea as us. The line to order food stretched halfway into the dining area.
“We can wait an hour for it to die down?” Ricky suggested. On cue, his stomach growled loudly.
“I don’t think you can wait an hour,” I teased. “I’m hungry. Want to find a table, and I’ll hold a place in line?”
Ricky surveyed the room. Almost all the tables were occupied, but a few groups were clearly finishing up.
“Cool,” he said. “Wait, I’m going to run to the locker room and get my phone first. Can you get me the japchae if I’m not back yet?”
“Yeah, of course,” I said, and then I watched him go.
The line was going to take me some time to get through, so I busied myself peering over the heads of the other customers to try to view the menu. Being friends with Michelle had made me familiar with Korean food, but there were options that I hadn’t heard of before. Squinting, I searched the menu for something familiar. Should I get the oxtail soup, or just play it safe and get bibimbap? Maybe the budae jjigae? Would that be too much for one person?
“Definitely get the haejangguk,” a deep voice behind me said. I whipped around to see the speaker. A muscular Asian guy with a sleeve tattoo smirked back at me; I realized that I’d been musing out loud.
“Hmm,” I said. “I’ve never had that one before. What is it?”
“Hangover soup,” he said. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his shorts and gave me a devilish smile. “You know, the kind of thing you eat after a long night out.”
I assessed him as he listed the ingredients. Okay. So he was hot. His broad chest strained the shoulders of a spa uniform that was probably a size too small, and his full, pink lips stood in stark contrast to his pale skin. He looked like a proper K-pop star, if they hit the weights and joined a biker gang. And he clearly knew it, given the transparent way that he was checking me out. Probably one of those Asian dudes who listened exclusively to hip-hop, saw the Ass waggling along from behind, and decided to see what I looked like from the front. Old Angie would’ve been all about this, even if just for the story. Current Angie’s mind was further away, in the men’s locker room.
But Current Angie was a fool. Why was I pining after a guy who had explicitly stated his disinterest when there was a perfectly good smoking rack of galbi standing right in front of me?
“So, there’s no meat?” I said when he was done.
“Oh, there’s plenty of meat,” he said, his tone heavy with suggestion.
“Eh, on second thought, maybe I want something vegetarian today,” I said, glancing back at the menu and steering the conversation into neutral territory.
“Then the kimchi ramen’s good,” he suggested. He pushed his damp hair out of his eyes. “This your first time here?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’ve never been anywhere like it.” I looked past the cafeteria into the sauna room, staring at the gleaming peak of the pyramid. “It’s been really nice, though. I’ll be back.”
“Did you get a scrub?” he asked. When I shook my head, he whistled. “You need to go back and get one. They take off, like, a layer of skin, but you end up soft as a baby. See?” He held out his arm in invitation. “Feel.”