Just Friends [ m. arguello ]

11) Halszkaraptor

xi : Halszkaraptor

Avery giggled as Zachariah helped her with her math homework. "7+5 is 29, right Avery?" She shook her head no and grabbed the older boy's hand. The 11 year old watched as the 6 year old straightened his hand out to hold up 5 fingers. Then she held up seven of her own fingers. "It's 12, Zach." "Oh! You're so smart, Avery!" 

The girl grinned at the compliment and went on to the next question. "10-4 is.." She grabbed Zachariah's left hand to show ten fingers before pausing at the sound of her mothers gasp from the room over. "Mama?" Zachariah slowly stood up as Avery watched confused. Was everything ok? Did another squirrel get in from the dog door?

"Arlo!" Zachariah waved at Avery to stay where she was as he ran into the next room to see what was wrong. 

Soon enough Avery was the one gasping at the sight in front of her. Her father was getting carried towards the kitchen with his skin covered with violet bruises and drops of red that steadily dropped from a cut on his shoulder. 

Despite the fact that her father was only a mere accountant at a law firm, he came home beat up a lot and most times it left Avery worrying and panicking about the possibilities of what happened. However, usually Zachariah or Rosabella would rush to get Avery away before she could see much - like now. 

"Is Papá ok?" "He's fine," Zachariah slipped into speaking in Spanish - something he immediately regretted once realizing he mostly only did so when stressed. So he immediately changed back to English, slowly speaking so he wouldn't resort back to his first language. "He just tripped on his way up the steps," Zachariah lied while pulling the girl into his room. He glanced down at her and nodded once seeing how she seemed to calm down almost immediately. 

She looked around at all the dinosaur themed items. At that age the boy was obsessed with the animals and could recite about a dozen facts on it, something that Avery found absolutely fascinating. "Wanna hear about the Halszkaraptor?" (Hull-shka-raptor)

A grin spread over Avery's face as she jumped onto her brother's bed and hugged a t-rex stuffie. The dinosaur was the closest thing he could think of to a duck, so Zachariah sat beside her and started reciting the limited knowledge he had about the now extinct dinosaur. 

"It's named after its founder.." 

Within seconds Avery's worry was washed away and she was simply left grinning and joking with her brother.