Annelies, after starting the day rickety three days in a row, developed suspicions that she was pregnant. If her suspicions were correct, Jan would have a little brother or sister next August.

She simply went to work at the print shop, as she had done the previous days. She made sure, however, that she took some extra rest in between, that she rested more consciously, especially.

After Jan's birth, and actually before that too, she had been afraid that something would not go right, that Jan would experience unpleasant things. Like an eagle-eyed jailer, she had protected him, which he had not always thanked her for. And she could imagine that now. She had put him in a kind of prison.

Since Maurice and Jacqueline's visit, she could soon notice that this no longer bothered her. There were still occasional thoughts of worry or old habits, but she recognised them better and better and could let them go. After only a few days, she had stopped using contraception in consultation with Bert and now, so soon, she seemed to be pregnant.

Bert also had his suspicions. He recognised it from her first pregnancy. She was a bit more introverted and taking a rest in a different way. He decided not to say anything yet, but hoped that what he thought was right!

Finally, it was Cynthia who opened her mouth about it. She took Annelies aside for it and asked, "So, and now tell me, what is wrong with you?"

Annelies tried to react with great surprise at first, but the way Cynthia addressed her made her laugh and unable to ignore the truth.

"I don't know anything for sure yet, but I suspect I'm pregnant," she whispered. "I haven't talked to Bert about it yet, nor have I taken a test, I just feel uncertain about it."

"On this one, there's no need for that anymore, neither that uncertainty nor that test, because you are pregnant, of a girl, a type of 'still waters have deep grounds', or in other words, a thinker, a philosophical female. OK, this is new to me, that this just suddenly surfaced. To be honest, I hadn't thought of anything about this beforehand or anything, I just wanted to know what was going on with you, to see confirmed that my suspicion that you were pregnant was correct. Just arrange something nice for tonight, something together with Bert, and tell him! I think he already suspects something too, I see him looking at you so inquisitively sometimes..."

Cynthia stood up: "I'm going back to work, otherwise my boss will hit me on my bottom!"

Annelies burst out laughing: "Oh yes, that would be just the thing for Bert!"

It took a while for her to get back to work. She had a plan to come up with first. She would like it best if they were together all evening. So she decided to call Bea and ask if Jan could stay with them. Bea was fine with it, but thought it was important that Jan would want it too. She promised to talk to him about it.

She found Jan at a table where he was working on his latest hobby. He had a paper in front of him and a stack of cubes next to it. He was making up his own sums, writing them down and trying to figure out the answer with the cubes. She had told him this morning, that children from the schools wrote the sums in special notebooks, in notebooks with boxes. She had shown one, but Jan had resolutely shaken his head, saying he wanted to find out how those sums were put together first. And when he got the hang of it a bit, he might want to work in a notebook. She saw that he was trying hard to write the numbers clearly. She sat down next to him and waited for him to finish the sum he was working on.

He looked at her: "I think I understand how it works. But I wonder how you do it with bigger numbers, I mean with larger numbers, of a hundred or a thousand. I can't start counting that many cubes every time, can I?"

"No, that's right, that's not doable hey," Bea replied. "I expect that in a while you will know by heart the sums you do with cubes now. And what you know by heart, you can then use with larger numbers. Don't worry about that yet, I learned it too, so you will succeed too!"

"Yes, but you are a kind of teacher, a companion, so then you should know those things!" said Jan indignantly.

Bea chuckled, "Yes, it's handy that I know them now, but I had to learn when I was six, step by step, exactly as the teacher said to do. And now I'm bloody jealous of you, because you get to discover it on your own! Lucky you! But Jan, I came to ask you something... would you like to stay with someone for a night?"

Jan looked at her in surprise. "Staying over?" He thought... "That actually seems quite nice, I would like to stay with Sjaak and Lisa and little William. Sjaak is also a gardener, just like me!"

"That might be a nice idea too! If you want, you can also stay with us sometime," Bea told them.

"No, yes, maybe another time, but if I were to stay over now, I want to stay with Sjaak and Lisa first!" He looked pleased, but his face narrowed almost immediately. "I don't know if they would like that..."

"Shall I call them to ask?" suggested Bea.

"Can I do it myself?" asked Jan.

"You can, and if they're OK with it, just ask if it can be done right away today!"

Jan looked at her a little puzzled, but then agreed with her. Deal with it right away! He tapped on Bea's mobile what she pointed out to him and listened as the phone rang.

"Hey Bea, it's Lisa!" it sounded.

"I'm not Bea, I'm Jan, but I do have Bea's mobile," he told her.

"Oh how nice of you to call, Jan. Are you at the discovery centre?"

"Yes, I'm doing maths, with cubes. That's going pretty well already. But I want to ask something now. Can I stay at your place tonight? With you and Sjaak and little William?" asked Jan.

"Stay at our place tonight? What a cosy idea! Let's think, I do have a spare bed, with clean sheets and all, so yes, that's fine! But how are we going to do that? Will you go home first to pick up some spare clothes?"

"Yes, I think so, and my stuffed rabbit, he really doesn't want to sleep alone in my bed at home."

"No, of course not. He wouldn't sleep a wink if you weren't there!"

"Yeah, I think I'll pick up my bag first then, put stuff in it and such. Bea, why am I actually going to stay over? I like it though, but why?"

"Shall I tell that to Lisa, then you can hear right away," Bea said.

"Lisa, Bea comes to the phone for a moment..."

Jan handed the mobile to Bea and listened with his head tilted.

"Hey Lisa, it's Bea. What exactly the reason is, I don't know, but Annelies just called asking if Jan could stay with us, the next night. Annelies has a surprise for Bert, no idea what, at best I have an inkling. Anyway, Jan said he would like to stay the night, but would rather stay with you. Logical, with the gardener of course, right Jan?"

Jan nodded eagerly.

"Yes, is good, I will do so and then I will let you know!"

Bea ended the conversation and told Jan, that she would call Annelies first to ask if she also agreed that he should not go to Bea but to Lisa. Jan nodded and waited. Meanwhile, he wondered what kind of surprise Annelies had for Bert....

Bea talked to Annelies briefly and then already closed the conversation.

"Annelies is fine with it! She'll pick you up later and take your bag of stuff. Then she'll take you to Lisa and Sjaak herself."

"I can go there myself, can't I?" protested Jan.

"Yes, you can, but I suspect Annelies would like to go with you for a while, since it's your first sleepover with Lisa. Have you ever stayed with anyone before?"

"No, just at home, but that's not staying over, is it?"

"No, that's just living, sleeping in your own house," Bea smiled. "Well Jan, do you want to continue calculating for a while?"

"Yes, I want to get the hang of it completely, so I'm going to figure that out some more!"

"Fine, and if you want more sums later..."

"... I'll come and ask. I do know," he said with a mischievous smile on his face.

"I'm proud of you, Jan, you're doing incredibly well here!"

He nodded, imagined the next sum and started counting it out with the cubes.

.

It finally came down to the fact that Jan went to Lisa's house by himself with a backpack, while Annelies sent a message to Lisa saying that he wanted to go to his lodge alone and that he was on his way. She further reported that she could just ask him what he was used to at night, that he would tell her. He usually went to sleep around seven.

Lisa sent back a thumbs up, wishing her a good evening!

.

Annelies walked home, feeling a bit strange. On the one hand, she was happy for Jan, and was looking forward to the evening with Bert together. On the other hand, it felt quite strange that their son was so suddenly away for a night.

She smiled, no longer feeling overprotective. And she was happy about that! Her feelings had more to do with the newness. It was still a bit uncomfortable.

She focused her thoughts on the dinner party she was about to prepare. Bert was still at the print shop, thinking that she was going to pick up Jan and that he would soon find them together at home. After all, it was always like that? So not today, he would probably find her in the kitchen, preparing a simple yet somewhat luxurious meal. She would initially skirt around it a little, just saying that she just felt like spending another evening together.

.

And so she did, but Bert was no fool and neither was he shy.

"I think it's a super sweet idea of yours, cosy an evening just for you and me. Now it's still possible, in about nine months' time it will be a bit more difficult, don't you think?"

Her mouth fell open in surprise. "What do you mean?"

"That I'm actually pretty sure you're pregnant. I suspected it for a few days, and I'm sure now. A girl this time, Annelies, a girl who will be quiet, but will know exactly what she wants, and what she thinks and likes. A child who draws lines, makes plans, helps people along the way by listening to her soul. She knows what is right, she knows it for herself, she knows it for others."

Bert pulled a crazy face, amazed at how everything suddenly came out like this.

Annelies grabbed his wrist loosely and stroked his skin with her thumb. "I was disappointed for a moment that I couldn't tell you myself, my suspicion. But now I can only be happy. I see how happy you are about it, and that makes me happy. We are having a baby daughter, a very special one!"

They agreed, waiting to see if Jan would ask anything, doubting whether they should tell him now. It was still so long, and there was nothing to see about Annelies yet.

"If we are going to give Jan another room, and prepare his little room for the baby, will we include him in everything?" asked Bert.

"Yes, like at the discovery centre, that living together, making decisions together, finding solutions together. That's how I want it more and more, even here at home. Would that be possible, do you think?"

"Oh yes, definitely! I think that's actually how it's meant to be. That we did things so differently until recently was purely because of our injuries. Things are already so much better, with both of us. We are starting to live more truly together, dear! How are you feeling these last few days, by the way?"

"Not really bad, I feel change, I don't really feel fit especially in the morning, but actually I'm doing much better than when I was pregnant with Jan!"

.

Bianca had felt it. As Karel lovingly brought her to ecstasy and they had become physically one, she had felt that things were different from usual. It felt like something had exploded inside her. It had felt strange, not nasty, just only strange, unfamiliar. At the time, she hadn't known what it was, but a few days later, when she noticed she was a little nauseous in the morning, she realised, in that strange moment, she had become pregnant.

It amazed her that she knew with such certainty that it had been that conscious moment. She had never heard of anyone being able to feel that at the very moment of conception. In fact, it seemed impossible to her.

She thought of the click of recognition she had had with Karel when she first saw him. Could this be the same, that she had felt not so much the coming together of seed and egg cell, but the arrival of a new soul?

The more she thought about it, looked at the issue from many angles, the more she felt certain that it must indeed be about the arrival of a new soul.

"Then it can't be otherwise either or it's a soul I connect with," she thought aloud.

"Did you feel it too?" asked Karel, who appeared to be closer than she suspected.

"Felt it? Felt what?" she kept herself silly.

"When we made love recently?"

"What did you feel then?"

"Such a similar click as I felt when I saw you with Huib and Margreet. A click of recognition, a click of 'I know you from somewhere'. A new soul... are you sure, like me, that you are pregnant?"

"Are you sure?" asked Bianca in surprise.

"Yes, very sure! The little boy I saw in my mind, in a kind of vision... He is a dreamer, a boy who always seems to be listening, seems to hear things. A musician, guitar player, and for a moment I also thought he would be a singer, but it seems like something else, like he is humming or something, singing wordlessly. He sings his heart out, his emotions, or things he experiences in the world."

"Does that make me feel so floaty? As with Julian, I do feel a little nauseous in the morning, nothing serious, at most not pleasant. But what is new is that I feel floaty. Not dizzy, I'm not afraid of falling, but I feel like I'm half walking and half flying, something like that..."

"I have no idea, but I do know that I am extremely happy about it! A baby of ours together, conceived by two people, expected by two people, longed for, looked forward to by two people. A baby that two people are already happy about. No longer alone, Bianca, this time you are not alone in your joy with all the uncertainty and woes surrounding it. We will enjoy this together, prepare together. How does that seem to you?"

Bianca had no words, only tears, tears of joy...

.

Karel asked her if she would like to call Jacqueline and Maurice, to share their joy with them.

"Wouldn't you like to do that then? They are your parents..." Bianca responded.

"Oh yes, I want to do it, but I feel you can do it better. I'll tell you what I suspect afterwards." He gave her a kiss on her nose.

"Okay," Bianca smiled, as she grabbed her mobile and sought contact with Karel's parents.

"Good morning Bianca, it's Maurice!" echoed a moment later.

"Ha Maurice," Bianca replied, and before she could tell what she was calling for, Maurice continued.

"I felt it coming this morning, that you would call. I just told Jackie, that you would call. And then my phone rang, I saw your name on the display and I said to Jackie, "I told you that!" Tell me girl, what are you calling about?"

Bianca laughed: "What a lovely couple you are! I am calling to tell you that we are expecting a baby, sometime in the first half of August."

"Fantastic Bianca! I can hear the joy in your voice, so that's all right! And this time you are not alone, expecting together, preparing together, being happy together... and because you share it with us, four are happy. Yes, Jackie has already understood what you just said. Hahaha, I clapped my hand on my tummy a few times and pointed at my mobile phone. You should see her face, she's beaming! And that little guy you are expecting will look like Karel externally, but be a completely different guy internally. Just prepare to let go of him when he is mature enough to let him travel the world. He's not going alone by the way, he's going with his soulmate, a blonde woman, who will sing her soul out, while your son plays guitar and sings a counter voice, without words. They are going to bring a lot of good into this world, Bianca, and you and Karel may prepare him for that. A guitar with only metal strings, such a western, can be electrically amplified, but he doesn't think that's necessary. He sees himself as the support for his wife, accompanying her, completing her in his music. So say, that doesn't often happen to me, that I get such clear impressions. Well, I have to say, Jackie has been poking into my wounds regularly in the last days, she is really good at that... and that has taken me a lot further in my healing. So in itself, it is understandable that my soul can express itself more and more strongly. But Bianca, does my story click with you?"

"Yes, absolutely, not that I had gotten any impressions myself, but Karel did, he also mentioned guitar playing and wordless singing. So that fits your impression perfectly. I don't think it will be easy if he will go around the world, but I feel we will be OK. I wonder who that young lady will be!"

"That young lady?" joined Jacqueline, " she lives near you, in your own village or in a village very close by. He is going to meet her very young. At school or at the discovery centre, or even earlier. And furthermore, I want to tell you that I am extremely happy with this new little life! Especially when it is already apparent that he is going to be such a special person. And I agree with Maurice, that it is nice that you are not alone now, that you can go through this period together. How is Karel under it?"

"Silently happy, silent in wonderment or something, but absolutely happy, hahaha he's nodding violently here! Would you like to speak to him for a moment?"

"Of course!"

Karel took Bianca's mobile and had another delightfully cheerful conversation with his parents.

Afterwards, he asked Bianca what his parents had said to her about their little son. With a dreamy look in her eyes and a wide smile, she told him everything.

"It feels strange, Karel, the idea that our son, not even the size of a pea in my belly yet, will be such a musician, with a singer by his side who is his soulmate. It is still so far away, but time flies, and soon he will be flying out. I would expect to be sad about that, but I can picture it and am happy about it. I also have a feeling that we will recognise his soulmate as soon as we see her, however young she may be..."

Karel took her in his arms and hugged her.

"You are already the best mother he could wish for!"

.

Fiona was awake early, lying relaxed on her back. She saw that Alexander was still sleeping soundly. She smiled, letting her mind wander over the weeks they had been together now. It was almost mid-September that they had first met, at Bloemenhof. That lightning bolt they had both felt when they had caught sight of each other. And now, almost three months later, she had felt that lightning bolt again, last night, one of the few times when she had had no blockages while making love. And as she thought back to that coming together, she knew that that lightning bolt she had felt now had been a different one from the one she had felt last time. Then it was explicitly about Alex connecting with her. Tonight, a new soul came in, clicking with her in that same intense way.

'I'm pregnant, got pregnant last night,' she thought with a beaming face. 'How special that is, to know it so for sure at this stage!'

"What are you beaming at?" whispered Alexander, running his hand over her belly.

Fiona looked at him: "I thought you were still asleep. Did I wake you up?"

"Yes, that beaming face made the air in the whole bedroom vibrate, and that woke me up. Really, it was really like the air was sort of swaying against me, like waves. When two souls come together, what a swell that can cause! Two souls, coming together last night, here, under my hand. And a new soul came in. She is so happy, so longing to touch the world. She will sing, Fiona, sing the stars from heaven, high and low and everything in between. And most of all, she will sing from her soul."

"She won't be alone," Fiona replied, "not alone, as she goes around the world singing. Her soulmate will go with her."

"Yes, a man who accompanies her, on guitar, and he hums along with her, sort of a second voice. It will be a special duo!" complemented Alexander. "I'm curious to know who that young man will be..."

"Me too, I have no idea who it is yet, but I do know we will recognise him as soon as we see him," Fiona concluded.

"What a special start to the day!" laughed Alexander happily. "Pregnant Fiona, how are you feeling?"

"Just radiant so far!" she laughed back.

"Hopefully we'll keep it that way! It's the first time I've ever been sad that we don't really have contact with our parents. Too bad they can't share in our joy," Alexander thought.

"Yes, it is, but... they would think we are crazy if we shared with them all that just came up!" chuckled Fiona.

"Yes, without a doubt..."

"If you want to share it with someone else, you could call Johan and Marieke, and Marianne. And now that Ellen has found her soulmate, we can tell her too. I don't expect it will hurt her. I understood from Marianne lately that she is incredibly happy. And Marianne no less! It all happened so fast, didn't it? First us, and then Marianne and Ellen in a few days' time one after the other."

"Yes, it certainly went fast... And I think it's a good plan. I'll give them a call later on."

.

Alex didn't have much work to do that day, had just completed an auction, and now had all the time he needed to let their happy news sink in, enjoy it with Fiona and also alone.

A little singer... He smiled, it seemed wonderful, a singing child in the house. But maybe it would drive him crazy in the long run. Then he would turn her bedroom into a soundproof room. He chuckled at his thoughts. He couldn't imagine much about it yet, but could already feel joy about it. Yes, he was looking forward to it.

This morning, he had had Marieke on the phone first. Her genuine joy had been so heartwarming. She had urged him to tell Ellen himself too, upon which he had been able to thank her for her confirmation. She had been happy that he was already planning to call her.

Then he had called Marianne at work, around coffee time, hoping he would not keep her from her work too much. From her response, it appeared that she was indeed on break, at Johan's room. Thus, he had hit two birds with one stone. They both had also advised him to call Ellen as well. He had laughed, saying he was already planning to do so, and they too had been happy about that.

He had still found the step of actually doing it a little tricky. And when, as it turned out in retrospect, he had interrupted her in the preparation of a trial, making her sound a bit irritated when she answered the phone, he had briefly felt inclined to end the conversation in advance. Fortunately, he had not, because as soon as she had noticed that he was the one disturbing her, she had sounded completely different. And how happy she had been for them! Incredibly, he hadn't expected that at all! She herself had never wanted children, which he had always found difficult, but now she told him that Eric and she also wanted children, but both experienced that they had to finish their work first. They assumed their souls would indicate when it was time to stop contraceptives. Alex had been happy for her that she was happy now, and had said so. He could, now that he was able to follow his own inner voice better and better, understand how their 'planning' worked.

Ellen had surprised him: "You are having a daughter hey, a child who will go through life singing."

"Yes, that's right, we had gotten that impression too," he had replied, to which Ellen had concluded the conversation with: "I'm happy for you two! When the group of friends get together again, not only us or only you should go there. Let's all go. It's good the way it is now!"

"I'm glad you are so happy, Ellen. See you at the friends group! I think it's cool to get to know Eric and Jeroen too!"

Joyfully surprised, they had both ended the conversation.

To chapter 99. Passing the police corps

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