I can get there on my own. you can leave me here alone.
He knows that she says it only to appease him.
To appeal to some sense of fatherhood in him.
To make him feel like, despite her loathing, the girl belongs to him, too.
The child has not smiled, at least not that he’s seen, and he doesn’t suppose that she could possibly know if there is any piece of him reflected in it. The child balks and recoils when Adna says this, as if she has only just realized why he is here, why he has refused to go.
She is just a baby. She does not know how the world works. She does not know that it takes both a mother and a father to make a child. But when her mother speaks, it occurs to her that he helped make her, too. That he gave her something like his smile and it nearly takes the heart out of her. How she despises it! How she wants to throw herself on the cold, hard ground and wallow. He is nothing! And her mother is everything! How dare she let him touch her!
But Bethlehem, he smiles that same patient smile and he allows himself to believe it, if only for a moment. The child has his smile and she will carry it with her. She will carry him with her. And her with him.
He does not hesitate before he plunges himself back into their orbit again, settles into the space beside her so that she might lean against him. So that he might help hold her up. Because he cannot imagine the effort or the pain or the desperate panic that must go along with bringing a child into the world. He kisses her head, her neck, settles his mouth on her poll as if to encourage her to duck her head into his chest.
And the child stands there, removed. Bites her lip until it bleeds. Stifles the cry that swells in her throat. Hates the tear that snakes down her cheek.
BETHLEHEM
I'm just tryin' to do what's right. oh, a man ain't a man unless he's fought the fight.
