This Is The Moment (9-1-1: Lone Star)

Chapter Eight

It has been a few days. Avery is in her room reading when T.K. walks in. As he does, he sees Avery is crying and has her hand over her mouth. Concerned, he sits on the edge of her bed.

'Hey, what's wrong?' He asks. Avery looks up from her book and removed her hand from her mouth.

'They killed her off.' Avery sobs.

'Jesus, Ave.' T.K. laughs as he rubs his forehead. 'You can't do that to me.' Avery puts her bookmark in her book, closes it and places it beside her before wiping her tears away.

'Sorry,' she laughs, 'but the pain is real.' She adds. 'You're gonna have to get used to me crying over books and fictional characters.'

'I will keep that in mind.' T.K. nods laughing. 'Anyways, to the reason I came up here, I'm about to head to the gym with Carlos, do you want to come?'

'Sure.' Avery nods. 'Give me half hour to get changed and ready.'

'Sure.' T.K. smiles. 'We're going to be meeting Carlos there anyway.'

.

It's been an hour and a half. Carlos, T.K. and Avery are at the gym. Avery is on the treadmill whilst Carlos and T.K. are lifting weights opposite her. They both stop for a break.

'How's Avery doing?' Carlos asks his boyfriend.

'She doing good.' T.K. nods. 'I think she's finally settled in and things are so much better between her and dad.'

'That's good.' Carlos smiles.

'Except, she hasn't really spoken about her mom,' T.K. adds, 'and I get it. Her mom stopped her from seeing us and lied about it. I'd be the same way if my mom did that.'

'She's doing therapy right?' Carlos queries.

'Yeah.' T.K. replies. 'A psychiatrist has made a formal diagnosis of PTSD. Her therapist has said that she's doing well but she's worried that Avery is repressing her true feelings. If it gets bad, like super bad, her psychiatrist and therapist are concerned that with her previous history of psychosis and the PTSD she'll have a psychotic break and try to kill herself again.' They look at Avery who is still running. 'How long has she been running?'

'Forty-five minutes.' Carlos responds looking at his watch. 'She hasn't stopped.'

'She's going to tire herself out.' T.K. sighs. He stands up and walks over to where Avery is. 'Hey, why don't you take a break?' He suggests.

'I'm fine.' Avery shakes her head, not slowing down.

'Ave, you've been running for forty-five minutes.' T.K. tells her. 'You need to take a break.'

'I'm fine.' Avery reiterates, shaking her head.

'Avery,' T.K. states more seriously, 'take a break.' Avery huffs, slows down and stops. She steps off the treadmill and T.K. walks round to her. He picks her water bottle up from the floor and hands it to her. 'Take a drink.' Avery takes the bottle and takes a sip. 'You were running at the same pace for nearly an hour, you can really hurt yourself doing that.' Carlos joins them.

'I've done it plenty of times before.' Avery shrugs. 'I'm not going to hurt myself.'

'You can't be running that much without taking breaks or at least slowing down for a bit.' Carlos says. 'Trust me, I know. You will end up pulling a muscle or doing some serious damage sooner or later.'

'Let's take a little break.' T.K. tells her.

'Okay.' Avery nods. The three of them walk over to one of the benches and sit down.