As far as allnighters go, Daniel set the record for the longest time spent awake and simultaneously working on a thirty six page essay at six days. Granted, intermittent naps and coffee breaks were allotted, but rare.

In the back of Daniel’s mind, he thought about scrapping this crappy idea and rewriting an essay about why no one should ever stay up this long. Or better yet, why procrastination was the only real sin in this world.

Daniel rubbed his eyes. His brain was fogging up with undeserved sleep as he stood to brew another pot of shitty coffee. If he had known double majoring was going to be this hard, Daniel would have stayed at home like his younger brothers.

Once the coffee machine was doing its job, he popped the fridge open and peered inside. Daniel hadn’t eaten food in quite a while. There was no time to waste eating. With drinking coffee, he could type one handedly at the same time. Eating? No such luck. He spotted his roommate's energy drink in the back corner, and muttered darkly to himself as he pulled it out.

The coffee machine dinged to alarm Daniel it was finished doing it’s duty for humanity, and Daniel poured himself half a cup in an old mountain dew bottle, and then cracked the energy drink open and poured the other half into the bottle.

“If I die, I die.” Daniel shrugged and quickly downed the coffee-energy drink mess. There was truly no taste like it, but Daniel was too tired to taste anything but the bitter black coffee. He missed those stupid sugar coffee drinks he couldn’t afford anymore. After chugging an entire bottle of the forbidden mix, Daniel felt ready to sit down again and continue hating ever word he added to this stupid essay.

Daniel checked the date. It was officially May 6th, 4:22. It was due in four hours and he still needed another four pages to meet minimum requirements. And Daniel hadn’t even edited or read over a single word written yet. This teacher was going to have a field day with his paper. But turning in whatever crap he wrote was better than getting a zero for not doing it at all. At least, that’s what Daniel told himself.

His phone rang and startled Daniel off his chair. It was so loud in the silent dorm room that he had jumped out of his skin because of it. On the way down, he cracked his forehead against the arm of his chair, and let out a string of unprotected cuss words. Daniel grappled for the phone as he helped himself up.

“Andy? It’s four in the morning. Are you okay?” There had been a few times in the past that Andy or Ryan had called and needed a place to stay. Usually they called Matt though. He was much closer than Daniel was. It would always be alarming for his youngest twin brothers to call him at such an hour. Daniel had college friends who called him at all hours of the night, but none would worry him like this. Daniel knew their father, and knew their history.

“Is Matt not picking up his phone? I can come and get you.” Daniel really couldn’t come get them, but he’d call Matt until he picked up the damn phone. He was probably staying over at Patricks… Daniel shook the thought from his mind.

“No…” Andy’s voice was shaky. “It’s dad. He-” Andy sniffled a bit. Daniel shot up from his chair. It was partly fueled by anger, but most of that energy came from his crazy coffee concoction.

“Did he hurt you?” Daniel practically bellowed into the phone. Personally, Daniel had never been hit by his father. But all the blood drained from his face when he remembered how his drunk father beat up Matt for being gay. Or Jamie… for being a she instead of a he.

“No, Daniel,” Andy said almost exasperated. He was talking through tears now. “He’s dead. He died and mom doesn’t want you to know. Or Jamie, or Matt even.” Andy was whispering into the phone now, like he didn’t want anyone to know he was talking on it. It clicked in Daniel’s mind.

Andy was calling his older brothers to tell them what happened because their mother wouldn’t. Daniel wasn’t sure how to take this news. He was numb, really. What else was he supposed to feel? He stared at the unfinished essay that had stolen six nights of good rest from him. Was God finally taking pity on him?

Once off the phone with Andy, Daniel formatted an email to his professor saying he was unable to finish the essay because of his father’s death. He requested a week of extra time and promised to finish it by then.

And then, unceremoniously, he closed the laptop and passed out in his chair.