I "woke up" and asked her what happened. She said she'd been startled by a raccoon and slipped and fell in the mud. It was a convenient excuse not to ...ome near me and to throw her clothes straight into the washer. Now I was sure she was washing off evidence, and she'd explain away any bruises by her "fall."The next day, Willy put in a special request chit for a duty swap on Saturday, four days away and my next duty day as well. Nothing unusual about that - you remember, guys did it all the time. I set my tablet to lean against the headboard of my bed, pressing onto his chat window on the tablet and quickly started the phone call. The dialtone only rang once before it fell quiet and he appeared on screen. He must've been waiting, for him to answer my call so quickly. He smiled and so did I. I only needed a second to adjust the camera, making sure I was in screen before I sat back down again."I'm sorry, I fell asleep." I said with a slight chuckle. He just smiled as he leaned back into. ”“But even if I could prove that Laura was my daughter Beth, I would probably feel the same way.”“Right,” Beth replied, “that’s my point. Jerry feels more responsibility for her as a parent.”“But I can’t understand that he would take off just like that without even talking to Laura. She’s going to be crushed.”“I don’t know about that,” Beth said. “I’ve gotten the feeling that she was uncomfortable that her father would be here. She never said it, but she never was as enthusiastic about it as I. "Traffic?" Yeah," he replied, attempting to prevent a sarcastic tone from seeping through. He couldn't be sure what it was with Elle, but he had a negative reaction to her every time she spoke to him. His bad mood wasn't helping him any right now of course, but even in the best of spirits her inane attempts at conversation and her almost constant babbling grated on his every nerve. Not that that stopped him from fantasizing about what it would be like to be with her, of course. He had a very.