Page 89 of Once Bitten, Twice Fried
The warm air of a June evening wrapped everything outside. Julie walked down a street crowded with livelyterrasses, still hardly daring to hope. Every single person outside was laughing and smiling. Would that be Zoe and her an hour from now or would they both be crushed by whatever happened next? She reached the 6-way intersection on the corner of the square and made a point of waiting until the way was clear at each crosswalk. This road was a chaotic free-for-all with hardly a stop sign and she’d always wondered why there weren’t more accidents there. It would really be her luck if she got hit by a car right now while Zoe was waiting for her just a few metres away. Or was she?
She was. Julie saw her as soon as she entered the plaza. Zoe sat on the long low bench that stretched alongside thefritkot,her arms crossed.. She was wearing a dark bomber jacket with a light t-shirt and jeans, a small backpack lying at her feet. Julie stopped for a moment. Zoe was there, she hadn’t lied, but still it didn’t give her any more clue where things would go from there. She briefly thought about what Yasmine had said. No matter what happened, she had to let Zoe know the extent of her feelings for her. She needed to start from a clean slate from their last interaction.
Zoe took notice of Julie and stood up, raising her hand in a small wave. At once, Julie’s heart started hammering in her chest. There was no turning back now. She walked towards her.
“You’re here.” Julie felt like her brain hadn’t yet caught up with what was happening.
“I am. You are too.” Zoe smiled.
“I guess we’re both here.”
“You look sharp.” Zoe looked Julie up and down.
Julie nodded. A million compliments for Zoe fused in her head but none of them managed to come out.
Zoe shifted on her feet, her arms still crossed, then she pointed at the fritkot behind her with her thumb. “Shall we?”
“Lead the way.”
The two women walked in silence towards the window of the small green cabin of the fritkot. Julie ordered for the both of them, not really thinking about it. Once she realised what she’d done, she apologetically turned to Zoe.
“Oh sorry, is that alright?”
“Well, I can’t really complain. You still know my order after all this time,” Zoe blushed.
“Not a lot of people pick a pineapple-based sauce for their fries the first time they get them and actually enjoy it.” Julie looked away. She just wanted to grab Zoe’s face and kiss her. No discussion or explanations needed.
“Brazil sauce is the best sauce and you know it.”
“Remember that time you tried to make it yourself?”
“Oh god.” Zoe laughed. “That was bad, wasn’t it?”
“Too much pineapple can kill the pineapple, it turns out.”
The man in the fritkot handed out two cones of fries which Julie took. She gave one to Zoe. “Let’s go sit by the water.”
The banks of the ponds were full of people enjoying the late afternoon sun, but the two women managed to find a single empty bench looking out onto the still water. The ducks, swans and geese were already gone for the day. The rows ofmaisons de maîtreon both sides of the ponds sat magnificent in the light.
“Hmm.” Zoe let out a delighted sound as soon as she bit into her first fry. “Still the bestfritkotaround.” She paused and licked her fingers. “Or did another one beat it in the past ten years?”
“Nope, it’s still the best. Some things never change.” Julie’s mood had improved quite a lot as well. There was nothing that potatoes fried in beef fat couldn’t solve.
“I still wish I could get the grasp of the two-frying technique.”
“I told you, it’s easy. You’re a professional chef, you’d get it in no time! The first frying is to cook the potato and then the second frying is to-” Julie stopped suddenly as Zoe’s face was hit by the golden hour light. A wonderful spectacle. She’d been so mad at Zoe when she’d gone to her hotel and found out she’d left, but it had always been hard for her to stay cross at Zoe for long. Julie tried to get back on track. “The second frying is to make it crunchy. It’s what makes it golden as well.”
“And remind me about the timing?”
Julie swallowed. “It’s around 10 minutes for the first frying at low temperature, then you have to wait a long time for the fries to cool down and then you can fry them again at high temperature for 3 minutes.”
“So for some things I guess it’s better to wait until the second time around, isn’t it?” Zoe said pointedly. She chuckled.
They reverted back to an awkward silence. Julie went very fast through her fries, trying to think how to start saying what she needed to say.
“Zoe.” She cleared her throat. “I have something to tell you.”
Zoe looked up from her own fries, looking anxious. “I also have something to tell you.”
