CHAPTER 13: A Father Kneels in Public

Adrian knelt on the marble because standing felt dishonest.
He did not reach for the boys. He placed both hands open on his knees and looked first at Mara.
'I failed you,' he said.
Mara's face tightened, not with satisfaction, but with the old pain of hearing the sentence too late.
'Yes,' she said.
He accepted it. There was no defense worth offering in front of children who had grown old enough to ask why he never came.
Then he looked at Noah and Eli. 'I am your father. I did not know. That does not make the missing years smaller. It only makes them my responsibility from this moment forward, if your mother permits it.'
Eli hid half his face behind Captain Bear. Noah kept staring.
'Do you have dinosaurs at your house?' Noah asked.
A sound moved through the room, almost a laugh, almost a sob.
Adrian answered like it was a board oath. 'I will buy every dinosaur in the city if your mother says I may.'