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Friedrich was raised on poems about soulmates and hearts by parents who found each other by happenstance. His mother, a young lady who helped nurse soldiers during the Napoleonic wars, checked the pulse of a scholar from Munich and found her seelenverwandter.
They were married within the year.
He never felt the second heartbeat his parents so frequently expressed gratitude for.
“Does this mean I do not have a soulmate, Papa?” he asked one night while reading with his father by the fire.
“No, most likely they have not been born yet,” his father explained. “Do not worry. It will mean less distraction in school.”
He winked at his son, clapping him on the back, and leaving his son with his books.
It did not bother him, even when the other boys began to whisper which girls they wanted to marry someday, and who their soulmates could be. Everything his friends said was spoken in a cool, unconcerned tone, Friedrich understood was meant to convey a lack of care, but he saw the way Hans stood up straighter when their teacher’s daughter brought in something he left at home, or when they went to market Peter lingered by the milliner’s stand hoping the apprentice with hazel eyes would be there.
It wasn’t as if Fritz didn’t have crushes or admire the girls, but he never understood the extra nudge that the promise of a soulmate built to. He wasn’t the only one who didn’t hear a heartbeat, some of the others said they didn’t hear a second one in their heads either.
All these were schoolboy fancies anyway, and none of it mattered, not really when there was philosophy and literature and history to focus on.
So Friedrich dedicated himself to learning.
It wasn’t until university, already graduated and teaching and studying more in effort to become a chair, Friedrich heard the heartbeat. Barely past twenty, he had advanced fast and was lecturing on early French philosophy to first year students when he heard a vague thump behind him.
“Whoever is doing that tapping, please stop,” he said, flipping through pages in a book to find a quotation. He glanced up and the room was still, but the sound persisted. Blinking, he looked back at the page and felt insane as the sound grew louder and more persistent, and slowly he realized he wasn’t hearing it, not really, but feeling the patter of a heart in his head.
“Sir?” a student asked and he looked back up at the concerned classroom.
“I apologize,” he muttered, coming back to himself. “Where were we?”
“Proto-scholasticism,” one student responded and Friedrich nodded.
“Yes. Abelard. ‘For not with me was my heart, but with thee,’” he quoted softly, marveling at the sound of the heart in his head. His soulmate was there.
His sister, Minna, was born with a soulmate, and by seventeen she had run off with an ambitious young architect to Paris. Nearly ten years his junior, he was fiercely protective of her and was skeptical of her lover, soulmates though they proclaimed to be. She was happy, he supposed, and that’s what mattered, until time passed and she had two young sons, her husband moved to America for better opportunities, promising to write when he had enough money for them to follow. To Minna’s shock, but not Friedrich’s, no such letter ever came, and she resolved to follow her soulmate, leaving her sons in Friedrich’s care.
With no alternative, he brought the boys everywhere with him. They came to the university with him, sitting quietly in the back of classrooms, or in his office while he lectured. They were still too young to really enroll, though Franz sometimes followed lectures. Unfortunately, they also followed the talk of the university boys they spent all day observing.
“Uncle Fritz,” Emil asked one day as they walked back to their small flat in Berlin.
“Yes, schatz?” Fritz glanced down at his young nephew. Emil was seven and growing quickly. Minna had sent a letter with some money the week before, and Friedrich wondered if it would be enough for a new coat for the boy.
“Mama told us that the second heartbeat we hear in our head is our soulmate,” the boy continued, dragging along a stick he had found, as Franz kicked a stone down the path that clattered ahead of them and then stilled until the boy kicked it again. Such was the way Friedrich thought of his soulmate, when a sudden spike jerked him into remembering her. She must be nearly twenty two now, he realized, a much more respectable age, and sank with embarrassment realizing that it had been two decades of hearing her heartbeat. A cruel trick of the universe to make him so much older than the woman he was fated to be with. And how unfair, if they did find one another, that he would likely depart the material world long before her.
Franz kicked the rock again. Friedrich blinked.
“Yes, she is right,” he said slowly.
“So,” Emil said, pausing as he gathered up his words, like a child slowly collecting flowers in a field. “So, the boys in your classes. Are they going to visit their soulmates at night?”
Franz coughed and flushed but Fritz raised an eyebrow.
“I do not understand,” he said, glancing again at his nephew. The young boys paid close attention to the university boys, sometimes Franz asked questions about their lecture topics, but Emil rarely was able to comprehend the material. It seemed to Fritz, this had something to do with casual conversation the boy had overheard.
“I heard them talking about visiting with girls tonight, when exams finish, and they said they could pick anyone they liked, and I thought you didn’t pick your soulmate,” Emil said slowly, screwing his face up as he tried to remember.
“Uncle,” Franz said, tugging on Friedrich’s sleeve.
“No, you don't, it is a blessing from God, from the universe,” Friedrich said. “Yes, Franz?”
“I think, well, I think Emil misunderstands,” he muttered. “The boys were talking about–”
He stopped talking, face dark red.
Friedrich raised an eyebrow.
“They were planning on visiting… a house of ill repute,” Franz squeaked out and immediately Friedrich understood and stopped where he stood.
“Ah. No, Emil, those are not their soulmates.”
It was that day when they returned home that the letter sat waiting, a black spot on the memory of the scholarly trio, rerouting them to New York, upon receiving news of Minna’s death from a worker at a poorhouse, who found the address from a letter in Minna’s pocket.
In those days, Friedrich could not bear to hear his soulmate’s heartbeat. It taunted him, a false promise offered to Minna who died alone, and a vague path to his future with the silhouette of a young woman who deserved someone more than him waiting at the end.
Sometimes though, in the dark of night in the hull of the ship, it comforted him to know that there was someone out there for him. To have someone who understood him from the moment they saw him felt wistful to a man leaving his home, uncertain of what waited on the other side of the ocean.
A friend from University had the name of a land lady who accepted foreigners and gave it to Fritz, leading them to the kindly Kirke family in New York. Fritz sent applications ahead to all the prominent colleges in New York, then in New England, then along the entire East coast, but few responded, and those who did were not looking to hire a German. He found some tutoring positions, but it did not fulfill him, and rarely did he have a pupil truly eager to learn.
After a year in New York, a dulling Fritz was illuminated again by a new arrival in the boarding house. A Miss Josephine March, a writer Mrs. Kirke said, from Concord, to be a governess for her daughters, and publish her writing.
“She’s the daughter of a friend of mine,” she explained to Friedrich one day, when he saw her preparing a recently vacated room.
“I’m sure she will fit in nicely here,” Friedrich said, not thinking much of it until he met the lady.
He came down for breakfast one day and there she was, sitting in the sunlight, eating porridge and reading a newspaper. She was fair, with pale skin and hair that he thought was brown from the front but was closer to spun gold when touched by the sun. Friedrich’s heart jumped to his throat and he felt a tender tug towards the governess as his soulmate's heartbeat, usually so fiery and wild like a raging fire, beat steadily, like a warm glow in a lamp, guiding a way home. He smiled to himself and sat down near her. She looked up, curious at the newcomer and returned his smile.
“Hello, I’m Friedrich Bhaer,” he said, reaching out a hand. She hesitated for a moment then took his hand and gave it a firm, practiced shake.
“I’m Josephine March,” she said. “The governess.”
“Yes, Mrs. Kirke told me we were to expect you,” he said, opening his mouth to say more, when Mrs. Kirke appeared behind him.
“Josephine, I see you have met our professor! Professor Bhaer, Miss March,” she said, setting a cup of coffee in front of him. “I’m sure you two will get along very well.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Kirke,” he said, as she bustled away. His soulmate’s heart rate spiked gently.
“A professor?” Miss March asked. “Christopher Columbus, I’m jealous. My deepest wish is to have gone to college.”
“It is a shame that it is not more accessible. I believe everyone should have an education who wishes to,” he said.
“Yes, I agree,” she said, nodding. “My friend Laurie, he just graduated and I think it was all wasted on him, but if I had gone–”
She stopped, wistful for a moment, and a bit sad.
“Laurie, he is…?” he couldn’t help the gentle probing question.
“A family friend. A brother really,” she said, then took a sip of her coffee. “What do you teach?”
“Philosophy,” he said, welcoming the change in topic. “I was a professor at the university in Berlin, but I came here with my nephews, and well, I hope to find a permanent position soon.”
“I’m a writer,” she said. “That’s why I came here.”
“I wish you much luck, Miss March,” he said, standing and taking his coffee back upstairs.
In the following weeks Friedrich observed Miss March from afar.
While she was not especially refined or graceful that did not matter to him, and she carried herself with the air of confidence and passion that Fritz admired.
She seemed an excellent teacher, patiently explaining to Kitty and Minnie how to solve arithmetic, and welcomed Franz and Emil into her schoolroom. Fritz worried Mrs. Kirke would not have her children raised alongside his boys, but she said that they were kind young men and that perhaps some of their French would wear off on the girls.
Josephine March seemed filled to the brim with eagerness to learn and teach, leading her students around the world in their classroom as she showed them maps and taught them history. One day she and Mrs. Kirke came to him after dinner, and asked if it would be alright if Miss March brought all the children on a walk the next day, to get some fresh air and to view some of the historical sites in New York as part of their lessons.
“And perhaps, Professor, if you would not mind, going along with them?” Mrs. Kirke asked.
He agreed, and it soon became a routine for the sextet to go out together on educational walks, which transformed into errands Mrs. Kirke sent only Miss March and Friedrich on.
To begin, Mrs. Kirke did not want Josephine, as she said, to walk the streets alone, and if Friedrich did not mind, would he accompany her?
He obliged with a pretense of needing some more things himself, which was not wholly untrue but was not the absolutely honest answer either.
He met Miss March by the door, where she stood basket and purse in hand, ready to go. The light caught her from the window and he felt his heart do a small flip. She blinked, hand brushing against her forehead before looking up at him.
“Miss March,” he said, holding his hat and gloves. “Shall we?”
“Yes, but please, call me Josephine, or even better, Jo,” she said as they set out.
As they walked, Friedrich stayed mostly quiet, letting Jo do most of the talking as they walked, and he listened, carefully observing her.
She was tall for a woman, and lean, and animated. Her face was a clear view into her heart, always telling exactly how she felt.
He asked first about her family and she lit up. Meg was married but should have been an actress. But she’s happy. Amy was the artist in Paris, living the life of a debutante. Beth was the pianist at home, and evidently her favorite.
They moved through the city in sync, in time with each other as they checked items off of lists, and continued the gentle conversation.
Friedrich prayed that he was not as transparent as Miss March was, because he realized soon how dangerously close he was to falling in love with her. His heart beat steadily, and the one in his head clipped on briskly like the woman beside him, slowing as they stopped at the corner, speeding up as she spoke animatedly, nearly hitting him with her purse as she gesticulated wildly. Friedrich watched, and compared, and dared to hope that this was not a terrible coincidence. But she was young and in the city to publish her writing, and did not need to be preyed upon by a poor professor who could not even find real work.
Once, a carriage rounded a corner sharply as they were about to cross the street and in her surprise, Miss March gripped his arm, stepping back with a gasp as the horses whipped past them. It was then he decided that he must always agree to go on errands with her.
“People should not drive so recklessly,” she muttered, then glancing up at him. “But imagine how fast you could go down these streets if no one were here. It’s almost a straight shot. You could get from one end of Manhattan to the other in no time at all. And how thrilling it would be.”
Friedrich’s eyes widened and he could help but smile, desperately hoping the racing beat in his mind matched the one that whipped up inside Miss Josephine March.
He found himself seeking her out. Reading in the evening, meals, their outings, and if he was lucky, she would sit with him and some of the other men and university boys while they drank wine and smoked cigars after dinner. Her opinions riveted him, when she shared them, and he made sure the rest listened when she spoke, watching as she gloriously pulled apart their arguments and set them ablaze with her wit and cunning.
Like a log turning over in the hearth, his devotion for her was lit, and he was helpless and reluctant to put it out.
One night, he had lost a tutoring job and been declined another university position, and all that seemed left was to leave New York entirely. He stormed home in the blustery weather, snow and ice sticking in his beard. He arrived home, muttering to himself about the ignorance and injustice around him, when a voice interrupted him.
“Are you alright, Professor?”
He blinked, and startled, gazing at Miss March mending in the sitting room. He pulled at his gloves, hesitating before responding.
“I am quite fine, Miss March, thank you for asking. I just had some trouble today, but it will be alright,” he said, simultaneously wanting nothing more than to disappear and to lay his problems before her. To his surprise, she asked him if he would like to talk about it.
“I do not want to bother you with my boring life.”
“It will not bore me to help a friend ease his mind,” she said, putting down her sewing and giving him her undivided attention.
“I suppose I will give you the short version,” he sighed, grateful to rant for a moment. “Would you mind if we sat here, by the fire? It is very cold out and I am still warming up.”
They moved the sofa toward the fire, though not too close, remembering the time he had to put out her flaming skirt. He read somewhere that women’s skirts and fire were a leading cause of death, and it made him nervous, especially with someone like her who always lived half in a world she had yet to create.
What happened next nearly killed him.
“We do not want another scare,” he said, glancing at the fire.
“I can always trust you to look out for me,” Jo sighed, raising a hand to touch his arm, but she stopped. Friedrich held his breath, and he felt both hearts skip a beat as she held her hand aloft, then start again when she dropped it without touching him. It would have been inappropriate, he told himself, yet he could help but feel disappointed, then chastised himself for being so desperate.
Eventually, a spark popping ended the moment, and she spoke again, prompting him to speak as she sat down.
He told her about the moving West, and to his surprise she protested, clenched fists resting on her knee.
“I try to not let it bother me, and I do not want you to feel angry on my behalf,” he said,
brushing a hand over hers. He blinked. “I cannot change the views of others. I only wish more people who spoke German here. I have Franz and Emil, obviously, but it is not the same.”
“If you would teach me, I would learn,” she said, eyes wide. His heart leapt and he was certain he imagined her leaning in a bit toward him. “You don’t have to, of course. I don’t want to be a burden-”
“No! I would love to teach you,” he said, unable to help the smile that spread across his face. “I imagine you will pick it up very quickly.”
Jo shook her head, “Oh, no. It takes me ages to learn a new language and I forget it in half the time. I am very impressed by you, and Franz and Emil, for speaking English so well.”
“We had lots of time to practice on the boat,” he said.
“Was it a long journey?”
“It was almost two weeks of traveling,” he said. “But we went more slowly. I wanted my nephews to see Europe and know their home before we left. I am not sure when any of us will get to go back, or if they will even want to.”
“Do you miss it? I miss my home and I only live a little north of here,” Jo said.
“I do, but there are many things I was grateful to leave behind,” he said. “What do you miss most about your home?”
“My sisters,” Jo said without hesitation. “Especially my Beth.”
“Yes, I recall, the pianist,” he said and Jo grinned, delighted with his memory, though it was not difficult to remember any details about her sisters, since she spoke about them so frequently. He adjusted his jacket and remembered the book he had tucked away earlier to tell her about.
“I read something very interesting yesterday that I meant to share at breakfast, but my scattered brain forgot until I was lecturing,” he said, reaching into his pocket to retrieve it. “We were discussing the question of suffrage the other week and I had read an excerpt from Plato’s Republic. Obviously, the Greeks would never have allowed women to vote, but here, let me find the particular passage.”
He thumbed through the select essays version of The Republic he had, talking and pointing out interesting sections. She nodded, poking holes in his argument, leaning over to look at the small book. Eventually, he found a train of thought and was not distracted from it till he glanced over and a wave of sensations came over him. A rush and delight at the feeling of Jo all but leaning against him as she read over his shoulder. The smell of lavender from her hair and skin. The press of her thigh against his, skirt brushing against his leg. It felt like finding the center of a maze, a long puzzle or mystery finally resolved as he marveled at how wonderfully domestic the image was. Then disappointment of having what he knew couldn’t last.
“Miss March?” He asked, but she seemed lost in her own world. “Josephine?”
He never called her by her given name, he realized with a pang, as they pulled away from each other. She averted her gaze, ears growing red.
“Miss March, I’m afraid I have kept you here for far too long, and the hour is now quite late,” he said. “I enjoy our talks very much, but it is time to sleep, I believe.”
He stood up stretching, hoping if he remained neutral about it then it would not embarrass her any further. They were lucky no one was around to see.
She sat, blinking, and he offered her a hand. She took it without thought, and he held it for a moment, admiring the ink stains and the callouses.
“I could speak to you all night long,” she sighed, smiling up at him, and Friedrich nearly told her he loved her right then, but a sound from upstairs stopped him, and thank goodness for it, for she would rightly strike him for saying such a thing. She pulled back in a flash, gathering her sewing. From the back, some of her curls had come loose, framing her face and making her look a bit windswept and wild in the most mesmerizing way.
He was still gazing at her when she turned back around. She was loveliness itself.
“What is it? I’m sure my hair is a mess now,” she said quickly, taking a step toward him, and Friedrich smiled softly. She fidgeted and he huffed, catching her hand like it was a hurt bird, to stop her nervous fussing.
“It is nothing.Your hair is as lovely as ever,” he assured her, releasing her hand. “Goodnight, Miss March. Perhaps Mrs. Kirke will have a list of things for us to buy tomorrow.”
She smiled.
“I hope so. Goodnight.”
With that, she was gone, and Friedrich almost thought he dreamed the whole thing. He waited for the sound of her door shutting, then slowly climbed the stairs, wavering between confessing his devotion to her, as he longed to do, and pulling away forever, which he couldn’t help but feel was the appropriate answer. He could not continue taking advantage of her kindness and interest in learning as an excuse to talk to her, or to allow himself forbidden moments of tenderness, which he had taken with extreme liberty that night. He could not be certain that she was his soulmate, and until he was, it was wrong to act as though he had some claim over her. She had spoken before of a boy, Laurie, not with disdain, but something else. A betrayal. No, she could not be his soulmate, for there was likely a younger man ready to sweep her away to Europe in the refined way she wished to go, not back to a crumbling flat in Berlin with his boys.
‘That isn’t fair,’ a piece of him whispered, since he knew Jo would not resent the poor lifestyle of a professor’s wife, in some ways he was certain she would enjoy going to symposiums and lectures with him, and once she learned German, she would be very popular with his friends.
He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose as he yanked himself back into line. Such reckless daydreams would only lead to heartbreak. She deserved fine salons of society, not smoky backrooms after lectures.
He arrived in his room, undressing and washing for bed. As he splashed cold water on his face, he resolved that if she came to him, it could not be in his head. He laid down to sleep, but his heart, in his chest and mind, were racing, but somehow the hope that the other heartbeat was within grasp comforted him enough that he was able to fall asleep.
He had no idea what made him purchase the tickets, or, at least what made him purchase the second one. He liked attending the theater and sometimes went by himself when he could afford the ticket.
There was a production of Hamlet. The newspaper published a promising review. Josephine liked Shakespeare, he knew, and so he found himself at the box office, asking for two tickets to Hamlet. The seats were nothing special, but as he walked back to the boarding house, he could not help but feel he had done something wild and extravagant. He was quite worked up when he arrived back at the boarding house, her soulmate offering no help. As the heartbeat in his head sailed at breakneck speeds.
“Miss March?”
Now he stood in front of her, as if in a blink he appeared. He caught her mid pace, it was clear, a half composed letter abandoned on the chaise lounge behind her. He tapped at his pocket watch, clicking it open and shutting it again without checking the time.
“Good afternoon, Professor.”
“Good afternoon. I was wondering, well first I- that is, I purchased-” He fidgeted as he spoke, unable to look at her as he felt his face heat up. “Would you like to go see a play? With me?”
Her eyes widened and he could see the gears of her mind whirling, could feel her heart skipping beats.
“I would, thank you for inviting me,” she said coolly.
Friedrich tried to remain neutral. He did not expect her to jump up and down, swearing her love to him, but at least some enthusiasm about going to the theater.
“Very good. It is tomorrow evening. We will leave just after dinner,” he said, turning and hurrying away before he could ruin it.
The next night, they were nearly late. Jo’s scarf was not tied properly, and he could not find his gloves, and while she was helping look for them she misplaced her opera glasses.
They made it just in time, and luckily it turned out to be a moving performance.
During Hamlet’s rejection of Ophelia, as he rejected her attempts to feel his pulse and check if he was her soulmate, he heard Jo cough.
“Are you alright?” Friedrich whispered, leaning in close so he wouldn’t disturb the people around them.
“Capital,” she murmured, but her voice quivered slightly.
“Jo, we can leave if you’re not feeling well,” he said, brow furrowing.
“No!” she hissed, then sighed. “I’m fine. Please, I want to stay.”
Fritz nodded, and turned back to the players, not wanting to miss anything that Jo would surely turn over in depth on the walk home and in the coming days.
To his surprise, she was quiet afterward. It was very late and they walked back to the boarding house, it being too short a distance to necessitate a cab or to justify the cost. He offered his arm which she took, her thumb rubbing absent circles into his arm.
“It was quite a dramatic production,” he finally said after an unusually long silence.
Jo hummed her agreement but didn’t say anything else.
“Jo-”
“I enjoyed it. Thank you for bringing me,” she said, looking anywhere but him.
“Miss March, have I done something to offend you?” he asked, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. Jo pursed her lips.
“No, I had a lovely time,” she said, voice frosty. Friedrich’s heart sank as he scanned back through the evening, every word he said where he could possibly have upset her, and came up short, except if she found the invitation itself to be offensive.
“I didn't mean to be forward by asking you to go tonight,” he said with a cough. He could feel her looking at him, but couldn’t meet her gaze, afraid of what he would find there.
“Not at all! It was wonderful.” She sighed, “I’m sorry I’ve been distracted, Friedrich.”
Her voice, he resolved, which was usually enough to make him drop to his knees and ask her to marry him then and there, was throaty and low then. At the sound of his name said like that, by her, he stopped walking, all sense of self and logic gone.
Her face was framed by her bonnet and wisps of hair, lit by the street lamps and moon. All at once, the words of every poet whose word he dismissed in his youth came to him, and he understood and was reduced to ash by the magnitude of his love for Josephine March.
“Professor?” She arched an eyebrow. She must be teasing him.
“Josephine,” he whispered, but Friedrich could not find any more words, or at least not find words that would not make him sound like the most outrageous fool.
The bang that sounded in the alley made them both jump and Friedrich knew he should be grateful for the noise, but was only disappointed.
“It’s best we got home now, Miss March,” he said, and they returned home in silence.
Both of Friedrich’s hearts were restless in the following weeks. Jo was everywhere around him, but not close enough. He was nearly undone one night when she sat down to read beside him, long after everyone else had gone to bed, reading just out of his grasp.
His heart leapt as the clock seemed to wind itself forward deep into the night. Gradually Jo drifted across the sofa and against his side. It felt too right, too natural, as his arm slipped behind her, holding her up as she read, and he read from her page, his own book long forgotten. He was all but holding her against him, straining to keep himself from letting his cheek lay against her head.
And despite it all, his heart beat remained steady, calm, as if this were peace itself. His soulmate's heart was racing past, and Friedrich smiled as Jo looked up at him. She softened and his second heart beat eased a bit as he gently reached for her wrist, knowing what he would find.
There was a pause and a laugh as they each tugged at their sleeves, searching each other’s wrists for their pulse. Friedrich barely had to listen to make the two line up.
Their eyes met, then Jo had her arms around him.
He pulled her close, brushing a hand against her hair, and murmured, “My heart’s dearest.”
He’d known since he saw her that her heart understood his.