Our Hearts as One

Johan: Part 31

French translations at the end of the chapter
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His house was huge. 2 stories and painted a subtle gray color. The nervousness I felt before going into Antoine's house was nothing compared to how I felt now. My father had never been completely present my whole life but he was around often when I was younger.  After a while he stopped appearing. I reached my hand up to the door and hesitated, but Ted's reassuring hand on my shoulder gave me the confidence I needed to knock on the door.

 "Joseph, tu es de retour si tôt..."  The man who came to the door was tall and slim with curly black hair and blue eyes. He had afternoon stubble and a newspaper in his hand which he looked up from but didn't glance at me, he looked straight to Ted. "Et qui pourriez-vous être?"

"Uh..." Ted looked at me and I tried to recover from my shock. He didn't even pay a second glance to me like he saw me on a regular basis.

"You're Robert Dubois?" I asked.

"Yes, why are you..." His sentence cut short and he stared at me long and hard. "You're not Joseph so why do you look so much like my son..... Unless...." Robert dropped the newspaper he was holding. "Dear God... Johan?"

It felt weird to say this to a stranger but I managed to say "hi dad."

"My boy!" Robert said, tears flooding his eyes. "My boy has come home!" He flung his arms around my neck, his body shaking with sobs. "I've been looking for you for 10 years! I-" he couldn't finish his sentence because of how choked up he was getting. He managed to control himself for a second and waved the two of us inside.

We entered into a large antique looking living room. "Would you boys like some coffee? Tea?" He asked but we both shook our head no. My father picked up a box of tissues from the table his computer was on and blew his nose. Afterwards he washed his hands and then regained his composure. He stuck his hand out to Ted. "Sorry about that. It's a bit overwhelming seeing my son after 10 years. I'm Robert."

"No problem sir. I'm Ted, Johan's..." He broke off and looked over at me, questioning if I'm okay with letting my dad know my soulmate is male.

I hesitated at first but then sighed. It's been ten years. If my dad wanted to get to know me he's going to have to know the most important thing in my life. I nodded to Ted.

"I am Johan's soulmate." Ted said firmly.

"Really?" Robert said and looked at me. I nodded my head and be broke into a large smile. "Well I'll be damned. Welcome to the family son. You better treat my boy right." He said and clapped Ted on the back, making my face turn the color of a strawberry. "Sit, sit. I'm sure I have a lot of explaining to do."

"Yeah..." Johan said.

"Just promise me you'll tell me all about you when I finish." He said. "Joseph will be so excited."

"Who?" I asked.

Roberts face became solemn. "I'll explain in a little bit. I'll start from the beginning."

Ted and I sat on his couch and he sat in a recliner across from us. Ted rested his hand on my knee to reassure me and then we gave him our full undivided attention.

"Rosanna and I met in 1987 when we were both just 17 years old. We hit it off with eachother and quickly fell in love. But we weren't soulmates."

I guess I should have known as much considering they separated. Soulmates just can't do that.

"We soon lost interest in finding our soulmates and decided to move from our home in England, to live here in Paris. We both attended the University of Paris and had moved in together by the time we were 22. Your mother was such a bright person and even if we were struggling, I never once saw her frown. She made me the person I am today and we loved eachother unconditionally. By 1995 we were married. And by 1997...Rosanna was pregnant. It was one of the best days of our lives when we found out we were going to have a child, made even better when we realized, we were going to have two."