Chapter 24
A fter some swift goodbyes - both in the living room and out in the garden - Zoe headed upstairs and followed the corridor to her room.
A small part of her wished she could run into Julie - who might have forgotten something downstairs or wanted a glass of water from the kitchen - but nothing happened.
She slowed down in front of Julie’s closed door and held her breath, but couldn’t hear anything inside.
Zoe was half-relieved. She was hoping for some resolution, but she was also exhausted.
After a moment she moved on to the next door, which led to her own room.
She walked in and flicked on the light, then frowned.
Earlier the room had been stuffy, so she’d left her balcony door open to air the place out during the day.
It wasn’t stuffy any longer, but the smell of cigarettes seemed to be wafting in.
She heard a cough, and went out to the balcony to investigate.
Julie’s bedroom window was just next to Zoe’s balcony. The window was open, and Julie was leaning out of it, smoking.
“Julie?” She craned her neck to get in Julie’s field of vision.
“Huh?” Julie started as she noticed Zoe, and coughed again.
“I didn’t know you smoked.” Zoe scraped her memory to remember a time she’d ever seen Julie with a cigarette, but came up blank. In part because her brain wouldn’t shut up about how effortlessly cool and cute Julie looked with her cigarette in the dark. It was like being sixteen all over again.
“Well, I usually don’t. As you can tell.” Julie coughed again. “I borrowed one from Leila who said that it was good stress relief.”
“And so you thought that starting smoking in your thirties was a good idea?” Zoe chuckled.
“I could do worse, I could start doing heroin or something,” Julie answered. She looked at the burning light at the tip of her fingers, hesitated for a second then turned to Zoe. “I don’t think I can finish it alone. Do you wanna share?”
The last time Zoe had smoked was probably at a party in college. She was happy she’d never picked up the habit, but for once she was tempted.
“Yes, fuck it.” She looked at Julie. “Should I-” Zoe pointed at herself then at Julie.
“Yeah, come over. If I hand it to you over the balcony, it might fall and start a fire. We’ve had enough troubles for tonight.”
Zoe nodded. The tiredness she felt just seconds before was gone and gave room to something entirely new. She hurried out of her room and knocked on Julie’s door.
“It’s open.”
Zoe slowly opened the door and peered in.
The light was off, and she could see a silhouette at the window at the back.
She quietly closed the door behind her - like she was doing something illegal - and walked up to Julie who moved aside to leave her space on the windowsill.
Zoe settled next to her, her arm brushing against Julie’s.
“There.” Julie handed her the cigarette, between her fingers.
Zoe picked it and wrapped her lips around the end. The thought of Julie’s lips being at the same spot right before flooded her body with warmth. The nicotine hit almost immediately and Zoe felt a bit dizzy.
“I haven’t done this in forever.” She closed her eyes.
“Looks like you are going to start smoking in your thirties.” Julie bumped her shoulder against Zoe.
“God, no. I’m too much of a cheapskate to start such an expensive habit.
” Zoe gave the cigarette back to Julie. She looked out of the window.
The sun had fully set now. The trees in the distance were barely visible.
They could hear a few faint voices coming from the garden on the other side, but it was mixed with the chattering sounds of cicadas.
Zoe turned around and leaned on her elbows, her back to the windowsill.
“How do you feel about the documentary?”
Julie shook her head. “All of it is bad for my blood pressure.” She turned to Zoe, her eyes glinting with annoyance in the dimmed light. “Don’t tell Yasmine, but I’m so pissed at Adam. How self-centred can you be?”
“Yeah, that’s surprising, to say the least.”
“I don’t think it’s surprising. I’ve met him a few times and he’s just… He’s very nice, don’t get me wrong. I just…” Julie sighed. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t like him?”
“No, he’s alright.” Julie scratched her eyebrow.
She passed the cigarette to Zoe again. “It’s just that Yasmine’s my best friend and I hate to see her unhappy.
I’ve never seen them fight, and there’s no denying that they’re very much in love.
But there’s always something. He’s done something thoughtless, or he has to miss an event that’s important to her, or there’s some weird drama with his career that’s stressing her out.
Even if he’s a nice guy, he makes her unhappy more often than he makes her happy. ”
“I see.” Zoe took a drag. “Relationships are weird, eh?” She gave Julie a rueful smile.
“Yup. They are.” Julie leaned further on the windowsill. “I just always thought that relationships were all about finding ‘The One’, then you get married and it’s simple. But all of this is so complicated.”
“Amen to that.” Zoe suddenly remembered that she hadn’t called Tom yet.
She was dreading it. She pushed the feeling aside.
Nothing was going to drag her away from this windowsill, with this woman and her half-cigarette, tonight.
The call could wait until tomorrow. Julie reached for the cigarette, grazing Zoe’s hand in the process.
Zoe’s hand froze, while Julie’s was snatched quickly away.
“Oh, sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Zoe felt her head getting lighter and lighter. Her heart was beating fast. Was it just the cigarette? She handed it to Julie. “You should finish it.”
“You sure?” Zoe nodded and Julie happily took it from her.
Outside, the faint voices in the garden had gone quiet, and the song of the cicadas seemed to crescendo to take their place.
“I also always thought that getting married was simple. How difficult can something be when you’re both in love with each other?
” Zoe started, not really certain where she was going.
“But then… What if you fall in love with the wrong person?” She bit her lip and turned to Julie, who was looking at her with big blue eyes.
“I don’t know,” Julie crushed the butt of the cigarette on the windowsill then threw it in the garbage bin next to her, keeping her gaze on Zoe the entire time. “Do you feel like you’re in love with the wrong person?” Zoe could hear something guarded in her tone.
Zoe moved her hand closer to Julie’s. She didn’t really know what she wanted. She just felt that there was too much distance between them.
“I don’t know how to tell.” She swallowed, staring back at Julie. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears.
“I guess it’s just what feels right.” Julie’s hand moved a bit closer.
It was all too much. Zoe looked away. She felt Julie’s fingers gently touching hers. Zoe willed her hand to move, to retreat back to safety, but it stayed put. She’d been craving Julie’s touch too much for her to pull back now.
Julie spoke again. “Zo… I have no idea what’s going on but… yesterday on the road, before Yasmine called us…” She paused. “I need to know.”
Zoe’s head was spinning. There was still time for her to leave. She could excuse herself and pretend that nothing had happened. Just like she did ten years ago. But Zoe didn’t want that, not this time.
She took a breath. “I’ve missed you, Julie. Since you’ve been back in my life, everything has changed. And I know it sounds stupid because it’s been less than two weeks. But everything from ten years ago… It’s still there.”
Julie took Zoe’s hand and ran the pad of her thumb along her knuckles. Zoe shivered.
“For me too. You’ve been driving me crazy ever since I set eyes on you again, ” Julie sighed. “Talk about bad timing.”
Zoe barely heard what Julie was saying after that first sentence.
It was done. They’d both said it, both admitted how they felt - not then, but now.
It was like the last tether line on a hot air balloon had been cut, and now she was floating free, away from everything safe and into unknown territory.
“I’m about to get married…” Zoe whispered, not sure if it was for herself or for Julie to hear.
“I know. We shouldn’t.” Julie inched closer. She hadn’t said what exactly they shouldn’t do, but it hung in the air, unspoken.
Zoe turned to face Julie. She gently touched Julie’s face. “Maybe this is just a dumb crush. Maybe it’ll go away.”
Julie was about to say something, but Zoe suddenly couldn’t stand talking any longer.
She leaned in and touched her lips to Julie’s.
She felt Julie jump slightly in surprise, but a second later she felt Julie’s hand on her waist, pulling her in closer, and Julie’s lips pressed hard against hers.
Zoe could taste the cigarette on Julie still and kissed her back even harder.
In response, Julie let her tongue enter Zoe’s mouth.
Her fingers were digging into Zoe’s back.
Zoe felt a rush of everything. She knew she wasn’t supposed to be doing this.
And she knew she’d come to Belgium looking for exactly this.
She was briefly transported back to that bedroom on that one fateful night and wished she’d never left, wished she’d told Yasmine she couldn’t be there for the plumber.
Wished she’d gone home later that summer - if at all.
She could’ve resolved everything with Julie, whose kisses made her dizzy, whose touch left her wanting more.
She could have left things properly. She could have stayed with her forever.
Zoe slowly moved her hand to the back of Julie’s head, where her hair met her neck. She felt Julie shiver in her mouth.
Julie finally moved back, looking at Zoe breathlessly. She leaned forward and gave Zoe one more soft, warm kiss, as if it was a parting gift.
Zoe stared at her, realisation inevitably seeping in. “What have we done?”
Julie slowly shook her head, stepping away from the windowsill and back into the dark of the bedroom. “It can’t happen again.” She took her hands away from Zoe. “It can’t happen again,” she repeated.
Julie’s eyes looked sad. Zoe wanted to take her face and kiss her again, telling her everything would be fine. But it wouldn’t be the truth. She moved away, nodding, because she didn’t know what else to do.
“If it happens again…” Julie swallowed hard. “It’ll break me.”
“I know. Me too.”
“We only have a few days here, then afterwards you’ll be back in London and I’ll be in Brussels. We can go back to our normal lives.” Julie’s voice was trembling.
Zoe’s heart tugged. She had just gotten this friendship back and had already been looking forward to their newly rekindled friendship and now it was all ruined. “Yes. We can do it.” She gave Julie half a smile. “We did it for ten years already.”
Julie suddenly grabbed Zoe’s hand. “No, I’ve been waiting for ten years.” She removed it. “Sorry, I mean-”
Zoe took Julie’s hand back into hers. “It’s OK. I was too.”
Julie looked at their hands together, then back at Zoe. “I’m sorry, Zo.”
“Please don’t be.” Every second spent in this room just made Zoe want more from Julie. She couldn’t let that happen. “I probably should go.”
“Yes, I think so.”
Zoe reluctantly let Julie’s hand go. She gave her one last look then turned around and left as quickly as possible.
She couldn’t let Julie see that tears were streaming down her face.
How did everything go so wrong? And why did it feel so right?
She’d half-hoped that kissing Julie would make the tension go away, that it would make her realise that Tom was who she needed to be with.
Instead, it was only further evidence that Julie and her fit together like nobody else did.
Zoe closed her bedroom door quickly behind her and then crumbled into her bed, softly sobbing against the crisp linen of the pillows. She didn’t know how she would be able to live the next ten years of her life without Julie.