I peeked through the crack in the black door. I heard my dad’s soft voice as he nursed away his nerves with his gin and tonic. I heard my brother talking to himself as he flung books around a different room. I took a deep breath and crawled into the eaves off of my room. Emi was wrapped in her blanket snoring lightly. I stared at her sleeping form. Gently, I touched the glossy white scar on her cheek. She glanced up at me with her watery blue eyes. For a moment, I had forgotten what they looked like.

“Andy...” she began, I looked at her she was so wonderful, I couldn’t help but hate that she had to be in this family.

“Andy...where’s mom?” she asked me, like she did all the time. I looked at her. How do you explain to a four year old that mom isn’t coming back?

“Mom’s not here right now Em” I said. I pinched my arm hard for not being as honest. I watched as Emi settled back down under her blankets. And soon, she was asleep. I leaned against the wall of the tiny room and let myself slide down it until I was sitting. I let out a huge breath, unaware that I was holding it. I sat clutching the tiny leather notebook, that contained myself. I stared down at it. I had it memorized, its crinkled yellowing pages, tarnished black exterior, with it’s aged cover. My fingers traced the cracks and hollows in the leather. I flipped it open to a random page. It wasn’t so random.

May, 4, 2008
My birthday: I’m 14, not good. Mom’s dead. She died today. Alan darkened, Daddy is a drunkard, Emi...poor, sweet Emi, doesn’t have a mom anymore.

And neither do I
My mom died on my birthday. My world fell apart in my birthday. I stare at the page. It’s water stained and damaged. It’s yellower and more wrinkled than all the pages.

Alan darkened.

The words stare up at me and I think of my brother. my brother, alone in the living room, flinging my books off the shelves.

The notebook meant more to me than anything.
But not as much as Emi.

Angry, I buried my face in my hands and tried not to cry. She made it work. Why couldn’t I make it work. I heard voices rising in another room. I gently put headphones over Emi’s ears so she didn’t hear anything. I always did this when Alan got bad. I needed Emi to understand that music saves. It held me up when mom was sick, it got me through the drunken, hazy days afterward, and it needed to get Emi through her life. I held my breath, waiting for dad.
“NO!”Alan Screamed.

He was hysterical. I heard a nasty sound of a book hitting flesh, I knew he had hurt my father. Alan usually ignored my father, he mostly targeted Emi. That’s why I had her hidden most of the time. She didn’t question it.

“ARGH!” My father was yelling. I heard fighting and a crash of broken glass. I gulped, last time a glass broke Emi got her scar. My father and Alan were yelling, I heard fighting and contact of fist to skin as they beat each other. Alan the whole time screaming and throwing things.

Alan Darkened

I scanned the other pages. I felt a pit growing in my stomach. Today was May, fifth. Mom had been gone a year, that’s why Alan was so bad today. I listened more. I heard nothing but a slamming door and my father panting something about his gin.

Alan had left.
He couldn’t leave. I was afraid he would hurt himself.

Hurt someone else.

I crept away from the Eaves leaving Emi to the soothing sounds of The White Stripes. I peeked through the door and saw my father, nose bleeding, pulling out the bottles upon bottles of liquor. I had no idea what sort of deadly concoction today would bring upon him, but I knew it would be worse than usual.

I peeked through the curtains, looking.

Hoping.
Praying that I’d see him.
I saw nothing.
I clutched the curtain, and I fell, ripping the curtains away from the window. I then cried until I slept.

I wake up in time to get Emi up. Glancing up I see the curtains ripped away from the rod, they hang in tatters now, just adding to the apartments crummy facade. It all comes crashing upon me like a ton of bricks, and those bricks would slowly shatter everything I knew. I shake my head and crawl towards the tiny door where Emi is kept hidden. She’s already up and has gotten her clothes on for school. She smiles at me and it just makes my heart melt.

“What music did you listen to last night?” I ask, hoping she hadn’t heard the debacle of the night.

“Mostly the stripe band,” she says. She smiles and I love that she listens to music. I glance at the antique turntable with the White Stripes album still on the deck.

“Are you ready for school?” I ask her. She lets off a grin more radiant than any sun. After checking her outfit once, having me check her homework once, and giving me a satisfying nod, we stepped out of the eaves. I reached to turn the handle on the door but she stops me.

“I heard it all last night,” she says. I’m horrified. What could she have heard? What did she know?

“It’s okay,” she says. “Daddy’s gonna be asleep on the table, and I won’t look at Alan, just like always.”

Just like always.

I sigh as we make our way towards the bus stop. We walk along, Emi picks a bouquet of Dandelions, and I hold her hand across streets like Mom used to do to me.

Emi...poor, sweet Emi...

Doesn’t have a mom anymore.

The words shoot through my head as we see perfect little girls, with their perfect moms, hugging goodbye, getting kissed on the cheek, slipped an extra cookie, and just receiving lots of love. I see Emi looking at these girls wistfully. I lean down and say: “wanna give me a hug goodbye? Or is kindergarten too cool to hug their best sister?,” She grins and throws her arms around me.
“I will never be too cool” She tells me, and for a moment, I forget about everything.
Everything.

As I’m walking home, I see him. He’s standing with his back to me. I cut and run, doing anything I can not to see him. I run home, and when I get there, I see my dad, passed out. For once, I’m glad to see him. I can only imagine what Alan has up his sleeve. For a moment I contemplate hiding Dad in the eaves, but I think better of it.

Alan has the sense of a dog in some sorts. He can sniff out weakness like nobody’s business, and he can sniff out a victim even better. If I hid dad in the eaves, Alan could find out about where Emi and I hide and he could potentially hurt Emi.

I stand in the tiny kitchen and contemplate what to do. I see the broken glass on the floor and I falter. It’s the same kind of Vodka that hurt Emi. The vodka that hurt mom.

I waiver before I run to the other room and slam the eave door shut. Everywhere I look I see her. If she were here none of this would have happened. My mind travels to the night we got the call from the hospital. It would be dad. He would tell us that there had been an accident, he had been drinking too much and Emi and mom were in critical, but he was just fine. Only one half of the car had been totaled, it was like one of those catastrophic tornadoes that blew one house to bits but left the neighboring one fine. It just happened that it was mom’s half. Alan had watched me crumple away from the phone, just before going black in the eyes. It was my birthday, I was excited. Finally, I was fourteen, but everything happened. Alan and I had been on the couch, because before he got bad, we’d sit and watch any Hitchcock movie that was on Tv. Especially Psycho, that was his favorite.

I pulled myself away from my depressing reverie.

It’s ironic that he’d become the very title of his favorite movie.

I sat in silence waiting for Alan to come home and begin his revenge on my father. I slipped out of the eaves and double checked the locks.

As I came back, I pulled out my notebook. As I went to flip to the next clean page I saw that suddenly, there were only two left. I Couldn't waste it. I’d just read old entries.
After satisfying the locks, I slipped again into the eaves checking my watch. I opened the notebook to a random page. This time it was truly random.

March, 23, 2008
I’ve decided that middle school was invented by demons
to teach children that originality is a sin
and that if they want to go anywhere in life, they
think that it’s healthy to shove children into a pen and force them
to like each other is sane.
It is not sane.
It will never be sane.

I laugh a little at that. I realize that Alan hasn’t come home yet. I wonder where he could be.
I knew he was here before I heard the crashes. I held my breath and stayed hidden. Slowly, I crawled through the eaves until I was behind the kitchen. I peered through the crack in the tiny door that was always locked. Alan looked blank. He had a strange darkness in his eyes, that after a year I still wasn’t quite accustomed to. My father, my drunken, stupid father, was barely conscious, yet still aware that Alan wanted him dead. Alan wanted all of us dead. My fingers traced the scar on my cheek, similar to the one in Emi's, Alan had hit us both. I decided not to watch. I couldn't. I knew he had it. And I knew he knew how to use it. I felt a piece of my self sink. In books they say your heart sinks, or your stomach leapt. I think it's your soul. It would only make sense because your heart can’t sink. With shaking hands, I began to find a pen, and I started to write.

It can't be your heart sinking, because it's not felt in your heart.
It's felt deeper, somewhere where the light can't reach,

I heard rain beating on the windows. What had happened? We were a perfect, glowing, picture book family. And now...now who were we?

It can't be your heart because your heart does not contain you.
Your soul does.
As this notebook. And possibly my life
Comes to an end, I leave this story.
This story of how even the strongest ties can
Snap.
I hear a click. Somehow every noise in this house is brought up another level. The quietest sounds would be as deafening as a bomb, so these clicks are almost apocalyptic. I hold my breath and think about Emi. She’s not allowed to walk by herself home. What’s she going to do when she sees I’m not there? Every step is made louder. The seconds crawl by. I grit my teeth and brace myself, waiting for whatever is to come. I hear another click. I stay absolutely still, knowing about the tragically thin walls, any movement would startle him into hurting me.

I know what these clicks are, and I’ve heard it before. It was the first night I made Emi sleep in the eaves. I had walked by Alan playing with it. It was also the first night my father passed out. He used to only drink to numb himself, but now it wasn’t enough, it took more to numb him. As soon as I had seen Alan with it, I knew that we weren’t safe, and never would be safe again. After that night I didn’t feel anything. I couldn’t feel anything but sheer terror.
Who was this monster that used to be so good?

As much as I contemplated calling the police, they couldn’t arrest someone for just having it.
The next click is a little different, a little longer, a little louder. He’s ready. There are only two bullets. Him, my father, or me. He can choose two.

But who will he choose?

I think of Emi, and I turn my back away from the kitchen. So far, I think I know who Alan is going to choose. Emi is so smart, beautiful, and damaged. I need to be here for her.

I can’t let him control me.
I can’t let him control my future.
I can’t let him control Emi’s future.
I can’t let him make me snap.