Last night was a blur of junk food, trash bags, countless bottles of water and bile. I'd been sitting in the dark the entire day, the only source of light coming from my laptop. Online television shows played in the background in hopes of canceling out the noise.

Around 10pm, my father calls. I'd just finished off my third trash bag and I could hardly breathe. "Hello?" I answered.
"What are you doing?" he questioned.
"I'm in my room studying." I lied. First off, I never study. And secondly, I was not about to confess that I'd been making myself sick. "You're brother just called me. I guess there's stuff going on over at the house." My mother and father had been divorced for a good ten years. Mom is dating someone new and every day is drama with it. She's mad at him one day and the next she's in love again. It's exhausting.
"Yeah, I know. He called me earlier and told me that she'd been mixing her pain meds with alcohol again. I told him to call me back and let me know what had happened."
"Your brother said that he was in his room and Mom kept coming in asking him if she needed to make dinner. He kept telling her no, that he was fine, and after about the fifth time he said no, she got pissed."
"What?"
"Yeah. So your mom was yelling at him and almost hit him, and he told her if she hit him, he'd leave." This was not the first time this has happened. My mother is an awful drunk, and I don't mean in the sense of violent (normally), but she gets obnoxious. Loud and dramatic. My brother has threatened to leave before, to go live with Dad.
"Again?? What happened?" I asked.
"Well then your brother called. He said he hadn't been doing anything, just stayed in his room, and she kept coming in asking about dinner. Lisa had to come over and try to calm her down."
"Did you talk to Lisa?"
"Yes, she said the same thing. She said your mom had been mean to her earlier and that she would try to separate them and calm things down. I told her I would come pick him up if I needed to."
"So...now what?" I asked. I was worried. My brother is just a kid. He doesn't need this kind of shit in his life. I mean, look how fucked up I am.
"I think he needs to come live with me. We need to get him out of there. And we need to get your mom help."
We talked a little more, about my brother and Mom's alcoholic tendencies. I thought this shit was over, stuck in the past. Stuck under my bed, shoved in my closet. My brother doesn't need to go through this either. And Mom timed it just right; I'm moving home for the summer in a week. I just hope I can help my brother.