Roman Holiday
Баня.
That's what he really wanted. A banya, with birch twigs, and a cold pool, or even a snowbank to step out into after he'd sweated out this week.
But there was no banya in the Plaza, and Gaby was in the bathroom still. So he poured himself some vodka, even though the Italians don't keep it cold, as it should be.
Finally Gaby finished in the bathroom, a massive towel turbanning her hair. "All yours," she said.
He knocked back the last of the three fingers of warm vodka, and disappeared into the steamy bathroom, where he proceeded to fill the huge (western decadence!) tub with the hottest water possible.
He ached from head to toe, in places where he hadn't ever realized he even had places—it had been, easily, one of the most grueling weeks of his life. The near-drowning had been bad enough on its own, coming as it had so soon after his dive onto the dock. But the chase followed soon after, and he was covered with bruises from that, from being hit by the Land Rover, from rolling down the hillside—and finding, apparently, every rock and exposed root on that hillside—to having most of that motorcycle land on his upper body.
Deep bruises were all the exam in the carrier's sick bay had revealed, and, of course, the abrasion on his cheek. He was lucky, they said, that his injuries hadn't been worse, far worse, but the X-rays had been negative.
He stretched out, relaxing into the heat, feeling the warmth soak into abused muscles. He honestly couldn't remember ever being in a tub this large, so massive compared to the tiny one in the communal bathroom at home. He could even shower in this one without having to duck to get under the spray. Luxuries such as these were few and so far between that he couldn't recall staying anywhere as luxurious as this while on missions.
There had been luxuries, in the past, until…. He'd been ten when they came for his father, had driven his mother to extreme measures to provide for her son, her only child. Then they had come for Illya himself, to put him in their program, to bring him up in their system, to atone for his father's transgressions, his mother's descent into… no! He wouldn't think about that.
But it was hard. The child to whom luxuries had once meant comfort had learned harsh lessons about the fleeting nature of such things, and had so internalized those lessons that even as an adult, there were guilts attached to his enjoyment of even so small a thing as a tub nearly long enough to lie down, a shower head mounted so high on a wall that he needn't crouch.
He managed to shove the guilts aside this time, relaxing into the warmth, until startled out of a doze by a concerned Gaby pounding on the door. He hauled himself up, cooling water streaming from him into the draining tub. He dried off, relishing the softness of the hotel's towels against his battered flesh, dressed as quickly as stiffening muscles allowed, then went to finish his packing, Gaby scurrying past him into the bathroom again, to retrieve items still cluttering the counter.
"All packed," she told him, carrying a small case out to the suite's sitting room. "Bellboy's on his way up."