Mary wasn't ready for Joseph to know. She had been with Elizabeth for months. Confiding in her cousin over her predicament and what she was to do. She was married. She had a husband. A baby was not supposed to come yet.

And yet here she was—pregnant—riding on the back of a wagon, heading slowly back towards Nazareth where Joseph would be waiting. What would he think? What would he assume? That she had been attacked, or that she had purposely been with someone else?

Mary would never. While it was true she did not want Joseph to be her husband, she just…wasn't ready to be married. She was young, still, and her mother needed her help at home with her siblings. She didn't think it was time to leave her and live with a man she barely knew.

Joseph was kind. He spoke to her often. He talked about the house he was building for them. How it would be nearly ready when she would return from Elizabeth's. How when the law had concluded, and the one year was up, they would move in together and Mary could make the house her own. He said all those things with such pride and a smile. His smile was nice—Mary admitted. He smiled with his being. He smiled with his eyes, his nose, his lips. Even his body. Oftentimes, he would cross his arms and stare at whatever made him happy as his white teeth glistened in a grin. Sometimes that was the house. Sometimes that was his field. Sometimes that was her.

Mary didn't know why Joseph had chosen her. She was nobody special. There were better girls out there for a man like him. He deserved someone better. Someone better than her, whom was pregnant with the Son of God.

The Son of God. Jesus. Emmanuel. She couldn't believe it. Wondered if all of this was made-up. False. She remembered the visit with the angel like it had been yesterday.

"Let it be done to me, according your word."

So had that been her reply, and immediately after she felt different. Filled. It's like she been empty for fifteen years of her life, and now no longer.

She'd gone straight to her mother after that encounter. Joseph had tried speaking to her, but she was too distracted to comprehend what he had been saying. Afterwards, she asked her mother about visiting Elizabeth, and both her parents had agreed, as long as "you returned to Joseph."

And she'd planned to. She'd always plan to return to Joseph. He was her husband after all, and she wasn't going to leave him.

She just hoped he didn't leave her after this.