Stone Circle fragnaam

The breath whooshed out of him when she began yelling - he felt bad for snapping at her at once, but he still wasn't happy about the dirty look she'd thrown him, or the way she'd been avoiding him. And yeah, he thought it was pretty unfair of her to be mad at him for visiting family, but she was young, so he didn't expect her to understand and couldn't hold it against her.

But he was still upset, and when she'd finished her tantrum, he was still fighting all the knee-jerk reactions that were clambering on his tongue.

"You're not the only one with missing family, babe," he said to her. "I had the chance to reconnect with mine, and I took it. I'm sorry that took so long, and I'm sorry you couldn't come with. But I'm here now, and I'm not going to apologize for going to visit." His eyes remained narrowed, his expression quite obviously hurt. "Now, I've been back home for more than a week, and you haven't come to see me even once. I've been all over, doing my best for this pack, and if you'd looked for me at all, you'd know that. So you can stand there and stay angry with me all you want, but don't act like I'm the one that's been avoiding you. I wanted to talk to you when I first got here, and you just walked away. At least I wasn't trying to hurt you."

He stood across from her, not walking away, but not getting any closer, either. He still hadn't forgotten that she'd called Poppy a bitch - Murdock didn't even know where she'd learned that word - but it didn't really matter at the moment.