That evening, when work was done, and they had told Annerieke that they would not come for coffee this night, Huib and Margreet went to his house.

"How lucky, that you live so close to your work, that you can walk to and fro, and also in such a beautiful area..." Margreet sighed. "Sometimes I just walk here, and then I automatically become happy."

"Oh yeah, I can imagine. These surroundings are ordinary to me, I'm used to them, but on the other hand I do enjoy them almost every day. I think it helps that I am rarely in a hurry, can just walk quietly to work or home and look around, even stand still for a while to observe birds. Or a deer, I saw a deer a few weeks ago that had walked up from the woods here behind our property. Actually that should not be possible, because in consultation with the forester we had placed a fence around our property. Otherwise the animals can go to the village via our land, and that is not their place of course. It turned out that this deer had peaked somewhere in between. I called the forester, and waited for him to come and help the deer back together. The animal was tamer than I had thought, so it was not difficult to lead him back. The fence turned out to be broken in one spot, so I fixed that right afterward. I was able to take a picture of the deer, when the forester helped him towards the forest, just look."

Walking along, Huib took his cell phone out of his pocket, searched for the photo and showed it to her.

"Wow! That really gives you a feeling of holiday! Do you see squirrels regularly, too? I like those so much, those beautiful tails, and how they jump and climb and float from tree to tree."

"So hey, you get all poetic about it!" Huib laughed. "Squirrels I see in the back of the field regularly. They don't usually come close to my house, unfortunately. Then I might have to lure them with food, but I don't really like that. I only feed animals in emergencies, when it has snowed or frozen heavily in winter. But even then squirrels usually don't need anything extra, they have already filled their storage room."

"I always find that so beautiful, that animals just know what to do. A bird never stocks up, I think, but a squirrel does. Could animals have a soul too, that they know from the inside?"

Huib thought for a moment. "I've never thought about that, but what you just described seems to indicate it. How else would they know how to live? When we as humans look at different animals, we see that animals of the same kind have similar behaviors. They are not identical to their peers, but neither are we humans. But they do know what to do, so there must be at least something in them that resembles a soul. Maybe a soul in simpler form or something?"

"Yeah, something like that..."

They had passed Annerieke's house and the big barn and caught sight of Huibs house. Margreet had not walked that far before, and so had not seen the house before.

"What a nice house!" she exclaimed. "That’s really something for you, so much wood!"

"Yes, most of the woodwork is my work too. Erik and a friend of his also did a lot of the work, especially laying the floor and the masonry. I did pick out the bricks myself. That's another thing, it just happened, it just seemed normal. But now that I show it to you and hear your reaction, I feel how special it really is, that I was given this, and was allowed to work on it so much myself. Erik was an amazing father, really!"

"How do you deal with that, that you miss him?"

"Sometimes I miss him very much, then I start talking to him and then sometimes I think 'act normal Huib, he is no longer here'. But on the other hand I still have a very strong feeling that he is here. I know he is fond of you!"

"Fond of me? How so? I mean, I've never met him!"

"No, not in person, but somehow his soul discovered you before he died, when we were building this house. I felt from the beginning that he was happy with you. And then I dreamed it too..."

They entered the house. Margreet looked around and immediately saw the picture on the mantelpiece of the fireplace.

"That's Erik, it can't be missed. Actually, I had already thought so, because you don't look very much like your mother, but very obviously like your father. I can feel it now too, Huib, he loves me, and I... I would like to hug him like that!"

She turned to Huib. They embraced each other, for minutes in silence.

"Welcome home," Huib whispered then.

"Yes..." Margreet sighed, "that's how it feels, like home. That seems impossible, but it’s just what it is. This is home, for me too. Maybe you should..."

She thought of the desk he made for her, that he might as well put it here right away, but she didn't dare speak it out, her thoughts and her heart clashing badly again.

"What should I possibly do?" wanted to know Huib.

Margreet detached herself from his embrace and looked around the room.

"Just leave it for now, it feels a bit crazy, a bit very crazy. I want to think about it some more first. Can I see all of your house all the way tonight? I already love the living room, so cosy."

She looked around, discovered a moss-green rug under the coffee table. She felt with her hand, it was so soft! The sofa and two chairs, all of wood of course, of a slightly darker shade than the wood outside, with cushions of the same color as the rug. Loose cushions in deep red shades were casually scattered over the sofa, inviting, to let yourself sink into them. A cupboard, clearly made by Huib himself, contained a computer, sound boxes, a rather large monitor, and next to it his guitar.

"This room is so really yours, you've set it up beautifully! And this little side room? Oh, a dining room, with a spacious kitchen behind it! Do you ever cook then?"

"Rarely, eating mother's pot actually still pleases me! And I had said the same to Erik, but he convinced me that I would need at least this kitchen once I had found my wife. And certainly when I became a father, I would rather eat at home with my family. Really, that's how he put it, just a few years ago. I laughed a little about that, said that maybe that would be true, but that I couldn't imagine it yet. He understood it, but he said that she would come, yes, he said it, she would come. And when I asked what he meant by that, he said, he meant it as literally as he had said. I wouldn't meet her somewhere else, I wouldn't have to search, she would come here. Boy, I had actually forgotten that, but it's suddenly coming back to me now. He knew..."

Tears welled up in his eyes.

"Dad knew... you... that you would come. He had that, knowing things you think no one could know. It wasn't the first time he'd known something in advance, so I was familiar with it. But yet at that time I thought it was a little bizarre."

Margreet put her arms around him, pulling him close and stroking his back.

"What a special family you are! And I get to be a part of that...I feel like such a lucky person!"

Huib hugged her hair, enjoying the fresh scent.

"You are my sweetheart, our princess! My parents wanted more children after me, also longed so much for a daughter, but Annerieke just didn't get pregnant anymore. When she got abdominal pain, she had herself examined. Her female organs were not in order, they had to have them removed. For a short time that was a deep sorrow, as if a loved one had died. But after that, when they had gone through that grief, they went on enjoying each other and me, living the life they had been given. And that's what Annerieke is doing again now. I know she cries in her house sometimes, that she mourns for Erik, but otherwise she chooses to live. At first I thought she didn't have time to mourn, but when I asked her about it, a few days ago, she said she did, in the quiet of her home. She has also quietly begun to look through his things. She came to me the other day with some of Dad's clothes, if I wanted any. I took quite a lot of it, this blouse was his too. And the rest she took to the thrift store. His tools were almost all in the big shed, and that will stay there. And so she goes through all his stuff. I think it's brave of her, she also started it quite quickly, but yes, so she has learned to grieve before. And she also told me that grieving is not necessarily connected to his things. She can easily call him up in her mind, see him, and then the emotions come naturally, joy and sadness, all kinds of things..."

Huib led Margreet into a large room behind the living room.

"I didn't expect this," Margreet remarked, "that there would be another room this big behind, you don't see that when you walk up to the house."

Huib chuckled, "That's right, it's hidden so nicely behind it, with the view to the woods behind there. This room was also Erik's idea. Intended as a hobby room, nonsense of course, I hobby in the barn, but he thought ahead, to my unknown lover who was still to come. He knew that there had to be many windows, it had to be a light room, and spacious, so that she could practice her hobby here. And he also saw children playing here. So a hobby and playroom in one. So the mother-to-be will have to store her sewing materials high up in a cupboard every time, otherwise the children will start making each other into pincushions!"

"Ah gosh, creepy!" exclaimed Margreet. "But you're right. Then there will have to be another cabinet along the wall here, where I can put away those sharp things..."

"You know what you are? Amazing! You're already seeing it too huh?"

"Yes, it feels incredibly good, and so natural. I shouldn't think about it, because then I won't understand anything! Okay, then I'll tell you what I couldn't say before. It was about the desk you are making for me. I don't think you need to carry it up the stairs at the guesthouse. We can set it up here. I don't expect it will take very long before... before I live here. It feels so good, but it's also so incredibly thrilling! And I really don't know yet when... Damn, I feel like a scatterbrain!"

Huib pulled her towards him.

"Dear scatterbrain, don't rush yourself. Just let this be your walk-in house for now, you're welcome here, I'll give you a key, so you can come in here even when I'm not at home. If you want to do something at your desk here or something else, you don't have to wait until I'm home, you can just go ahead and do it. So yeah, then it's definitely convenient to put the desk here. We will do so!"

To chapter 43. Guided tour

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