Page 71 of Once Bitten, Twice Fried
“Tomorrow’s great. Do you want to grab lunch or something?”
“I was thinking about my hotel room.” Zoe was pensive. “I’d rather not air these things publicly.”
Julie lifted a brow.
“You know. Tabloids. Social media gossip.” Zoe bit her lip. “Sorry, maybe I’m being paranoid but-”
“It’s OK, I understand.” Julie felt another punch in her gut, like she was some sort of shameful secret in Zoe’s picture perfect life. At the same time, she was excited to be in an intimate space with Zoe again. Who knows what else could happen? She shouldn’t expect anything, but the thought of it was overwhelming.
“Thanks, Julie.” Zoe looked straight at her. “You’re a good fr-” She stopped. “A good person.”
An awkward silence fell between them again. Julie looked away to see that Adam was now acting very drunk and was yelling something. It was tough to hear what was going on since more and more people were gathering around him.
“I better go back and see what’s next for my catering team.” Zoe said quietly.
Julie nodded as Zoe slipped away. She had no idea what to think. It felt like she’d ruined her entire friendship with Zoe just because she’d given into what she wanted for once. Of course, Zoe was responsible too, but if Julie hadn’t initiated things last night, what would’ve happened? She’d managed to get Zoe’s friendship back after 10 years and lose her forever in less than two weeks. She could already picture Zoe telling her that all of this was a mistake and that they shouldn’t see each other anymore. At the same time, Julie couldn’t possibly keep it bottled inside and spend her entire life pining after Zoe either.
Adam was acting more and more erratic, demanding bottles of champagne and ordering people to have fun. When Julie walked back towards the house and past him, Adam started sobbing and his family and friends moved in closer. She overheard his brother telling him that it was time to go home. Adam nodded helplessly, finally accepting what was happening.
Camille stood at the entrance to the house, texting frantically. She lifted her head when she saw Julie.
“Is the wedding cancelled? What do we do?”
Julie turned around to look back at Adam, sobbing into his mother’s shoulder, and then back at Camille. “Well, what do you think?”
“What a mess,” Camille sighed. “Have you seen David? The camera guy who was with me?”
“Well, he’s gone with Yasmine,” Julie said, then bit her lip. Maybe she shouldn’t have mentioned that?
“Sorry, what?” Camille almost dropped her phone. “Why is he with her?”
Julie shrugged. She didn’t want to put herself into more trouble.
“That bastard.” Camille shook her head. “He did tell me that he knew Yasmine from before but he never gave me any details. Pretty sure they used to sleep together.” She smirked.
This woman really was the rudest person Julie had ever seen. Julie smiled, her teeth gritting inside her mouth and decided to just walk away. The last thing this wedding needed was Julie punching a journalist.
She walked into the house. Zoe was busy talking to one of her chefs. She glanced at Julie when she walked by and quickly looked away. This was definitely the first time in Julie’s life where a wedding got more stressful after the fact.
Chapter 31
Julie woke up sweaty, taking a minute to realise where she was. She had a slight hope that everything that had happened in the past few days was just a bizarre lucid dream. She grabbed the blankets around her to realise that she was home, in her own bed. She lay there for a minute.
She’d ended up going back to Brussels early yesterday, before Zoe and the other bridesmaids. She’d felt completely helpless and knew she wasn’t being of use to anyone anyway, and the whole thing just started to feel overwhelming. When the guests finally started trickling out by mid-afternoon, she’d taken her chance, with Leila’s blessing. Julie had driven home numb and on autopilot, then fallen face-first into her bed soon after she stepped into her apartment. Yesterday felt like it had happened in a haze. None of it really made sense.
She remembered she was supposed to meet up with Zoe later for lunch, to talk things through. She was too numb to feel any kind of hope that something good would come out of it, but if nothing else, she could get some closure on where they both stood. A bit of clarity would be nice right now. She realised that they’d never actually confirmed a time or place. She grabbed her phone, and sure enough, an unread message from Zoe from the night before waited for her. She must have sent it just after Julie had arrived home and crashed into bed.
The Benedictine, 12 noon. If you still want to talk.
Julie thought about Zoe’s fears that a tabloid would catch wind of them together, to the point that they’d have to meet behind closed doors for lunch. For a moment, she had a wild thought that maybe Juliedidwant the tabloids to know about this. For them to put on paper that there was something between her and Zoe. To tell the world that this was real, and always had been, and she wasn’t going crazy. But of course, she knew that all that would do was hurt Zoe. This was Zoe’s story more than anything. She was the one who had everything to lose. All Julie could hope for today was closure, and she had to be grateful that Zoe was giving her that.
She glanced at the clock on her phone. She had some time before meeting up with Zoe. She could use the time to freshen up and gather her thoughts to reduce the risk of saying anything stupid to Zoe later.
* * *
Zoe’s hotel was located in the city centre, a small boutique hotel surrounded by a mix of mediaeval-looking buildings, churches and more mismatched restaurants and bars. It was a very touristic area but Julie could understand that Zoe’s assistant had probably picked a hotel that was close to a train station but also not in a shady area. Or maybe Zoe was missing the touristy bits of Brussels and had booked it herself. Julie was curious to know.
She stepped into the hotel lobby. The space was elegant, with expensive-looking chairs and sofas resting against an opulent dark wallpaper. Julie instantly felt like a fish out of water. As she looked around uncomfortably, she couldn’t help but think that as much as she didn’t belong somewhere this fancy, this was Zoe’s everyday life in London nowadays. Being there made Julie more and more aware of how much Zoe would lose if she chose to leave Tom to be with her. Not that the idea was even on thetable. It suddenly dawned on her that she kept thinking of Tom as her romantic rival, when they were clearly not even boxing in the same league. He and Zoe were probably fine dining all the time and staying in luxurious hotels like this every other night. All Julie could do was cook her an omelette. Their lives had intertwined but were still different at the core. Julie wished she’d thought of it earlier.
