Joao Has A New Love Interest On 'Below Deck: Mediterranean'

João Franco, bosun aboard the Sirocco, spent Season 3 of Below Deck: Mediterranean embroiled in a love triangle with Brooke Laughton and Kasey Cohen. At season's end, he finally chose Brooke, but by the time the reunion rolled around, the pair had split. Now, it would appear that he's found love again, but viewers may be wondering who João's girlfriend is on Below Deck: Mediterranean. As it turns out, they met on the day the Season 3 reunion show filmed, under some very vulnerable circumstances.

In a July episode of Bravo's The Daily Dish podcast, João explained that a dentist had reached out offering to bleach his teeth for the reunion show. But when João arrived, the dentist who made the offer wasn't available, and so a dental hygienist named Michelle Dicu stepped in to cover.

"My girlfriend now reluctantly took it on because she wanted to leave to do yoga or something so she was rather upset that I had took her time up," he said. "She fed me a lot of happy gas [so I couldn't] talk anymore."

The pair didn't get together right away, which, considering that he had spent a lot of time in her presence under anesthesia, makes sense. But somehow, he managed not to make a total fool of himself and, when they reconnected a few months later, sparks flew.

João told The Daily Dish:

I went to the reunion and myself and Brooke had issues that the reunion show. I hadn't spoken to [Michelle] for many months after that and I had seen that she was coming up to Fort Lauderdale when I was around. Yeah, we got together. She said that she wanted to go paddle boarding and I had taken her out and it was very mutual, very mutual to start off with. Things grew from there.

In fact, that first paddle boarding trip made it to João's Instagram back in November of 2018. It was hashtagged "#friends," but, like he said, things obviously grew from there.

Michelle's Instagram is set to private, but, according to her LinkedIn profile, she's worked at the same dental group in New York for nine years. She also went to college in New York, and, in 2017, she eventually worked her way up from dental assistant to dental hygienist. Even though they don't live in the same city, João says that being in a long-distance relationship hasn't caused any stumbles just yet.

"We spend as much as we can together. It's worked out well so far in terms of getting a break and coming down," he told The Daily Dish. "It's almost every second or third weekend that I make plans to try to come up."

And from what João posts on Instagram, the pair appear to be pretty close. Exactly a month after that #friends paddle boarding post, João posted another photo of them with the hashtag #love. So it seems like things moved fairly quickly. Since then, he's been posting a steady stream of photos capturing the pair on tropical vacations together, canoodling in Central Park, and even posing together on the step and repeat at his Watch What Happens Live appearance earlier this month. Michelle and João seem super blissed out for now, but we'll have to wait and see if they can make it to the Season 4 reunion show.