Chapter 55 – Dropping the Poison (Jacquie POV) *a couple of days later*

I get home after working knowing Tahlia and Mel would be out doing some grocery shopping and the only person who would be home would be Andrew because he didn’t want to be in his house. I open the door and the house is in complete darkness except for the glow of the TV in the distance. I close the door and sigh and continue walking closer to the glow. I find Andrew watching TV and drinking a beer. I shake my head, take the beer from his hands and go to the kitchen to pour it down the sink. I don’t get it. the guy has had a near death experience with this shit and what is he aiming for? Another round to with the reaper?

“Why’d you do that?” he asks slurring his words attempting to walk to me but sliding against the walls.

“No more of that shit okay” I say.

“You're not the boss of me” he says trying to stand tall and proud but almost falling over.

I shake my head.

“No, I’m not but you're not here to bury yourself in your grave” I say “You’re here to calm down and take it easy”

“Well beer calms me” he replies.

“But all alcohol belongs to Me, Tahlia and Mel” I say.

“So” he says.

“Okay that’s it bed” I say walking to him.

“Oh Jacquie” he says with a grin.

“To fucken sober up” I say getting really annoyed with him.

I put his arm over my shoulder and we SLOWLY walk to my room and I sit him on my bed and make him lay down. He falls asleep almost instantly, I shake my head and leave the room.

I walk to the phone, dial Tahlia’s number and sit on the couch.

“Hello” she answers.

Hi” I say.

“Hey” she says, “What’s up?”

“Andrew's drunk again” I say with a sigh “I think it's best we either have no alcohol in the house or we hide it in, like a safe or something”

“A very cold safe” she says.

“Maybe we should just have no alcohol it would be easier” I say.

“I guess but what about us?” she asks.

“Well our livers will thank us” I say.

“True” she says “Well now we have to get all these bottle out of the trolley BAH!”

“Oh well” I say “Anyways see ya’s”

“See ya” she says and hangs up.

I think of my little stash in my room, and walk back into my room finding Andrew looking through the drawers.

He looks at me and I shake my head. I go to the closet, reach up and grab my big bottle of baileys and my large unopened bottle of vodka. He sees them and begins walking to me. I walk off leaving him slowly making his way to me. I walk out of our room and go to our neighbours and knock on the door. An elderly woman opens the door with a smile.

“Hi Wendy” I say.

“Hi Jacquie” she replies.

“Would you like to take this bottle of vodka off my hands?” I ask showing her the bottle.

“Do you mean to drink or look after?” she asks.

“It’s yours” I say with a smile.

She smiles and takes the bottle from me.

“Thank you very much” she says.

“Your welcome” I say “I’ll see ya later”

“Bye” she says and closes the door.

I walk back to our room still carrying the baileys.

Wendy wasn’t an alcoholic or anything … just liked her Vodka and Coke.

Andrew is leaning against the wall and attempts to walk towards me but gives up.

The baileys bottle had about two glasses max still in it, and since I wasn’t going to be doing much I felt I would drink it all.

I sit on the couch and watch TV and drink the baileys. Andrew decides he WILL come and get me, and walks in my direction slowly making sure he wasn’t going to fall over. I drink the last of the baileys as he reaches me and steals the bottle off me. A drop hits my chin and I wipe it away. I give Andrew an evil, angry look. He drinks the now empty bottle and gets mad when none reaches his tongue and throws the bottle against the wall. I let out a scream when it hits the wall. I get up and push him onto the lounge.

“Listen here Andrew” I yell at him “You're living here as a guest, so you're supposed to be nice, we could just kick you out if we wanted to and believe me its come up once or twice amongst us, I know Anna has left and is long gone but that doesn’t fucken matter, I know it hurts and it can take a while to heal but you don’t have to drink yourself into another bloody coma, if I catch you one more fucken time I’m kicking you out of here and sending you to fucken rehab. I am sick of having to clean up after you just so Mel and Tahlia don’t think you're sickly drunk all the time and breaking everything. You are going to sit here watching TV HOPEFULLY sobering up”

He was about to say something but I didn’t care. I just walk in the other direction to get a vacuum cleaner to clean up the bottle. I clean up the botle, put back the vacuum and walk back into the living room. I see Andrew siting there crying.

I think to myself ‘I did that, that is my fault he's crying, I should go help him’ but I just couldn’t go over to him, I didn’t want to. I shake my head and go in my room closing the door. I fall onto my bed and my eyes stream tears into the fabric of the covers. I felt so bad, but he deserved it … didn't he?