Reply to 15 year old cousin ran away to my place amidst family drama... what NOW???

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[quote=Anonymous]OP back with update... it just gets worse

I told my cousin that we had to tell her parents where she is because it would be wrong to just have them worry, and would likely only make things worse. I told her that either she or I needed to get in touch with her parents, and then I needed to talk to her mother about her staying while everyone had time to calm down and we could figure this all out. She was strongly opposed to this, so I gave her options: 
- text one of her parents
- call call one of her parents
- call one of them with the phone on speaker and me right next to her listening in
- I would call her mother
- I would text her mother

She said she would call them if I promised to stay and listen. So that's what we did, and now I know why.

She told her mother. And it was bad. She said "Mom, after that fight you don't want me at home and I don't want to be there either. I'm at [my name]'s, and she said I could stay for now if"

and that's as far as she got because her mother started screaming at her. Aunt said "What the f*** do you mean you're f****** at [my name]'s house? How dare you, you little [homophobic slur] b****? Get your a** home"

Which is when I took the phone, and took it off speaker. Because I know my aunt is upset right now, but that was not okay. No kid needs to hear their mother swearing at them. So, cousin is understandably hysterical, now I know roughly what the fight was, and I feel awful for not getting more detail before making her contact home.

I said something along the lines of "Okay, hold on. Aunt __, it's ___. I know you're upset right now, I'm sure you were worried. But __  is safe with me, and right now it sounds like everyone needs a while to calm down. She's too upset to talk now. I'll keep her with me at least for tonight, we'll grab dinner, we'll talk. I want to help. But I can't send her home tonight.  I'll call you again tomorrow around this time and we can figure out something. You're angry and you're swearing at your kid, and she's upset and scared and crying. Everyone is safe for now, but nothing is going to get better until everyone has some time to calm down and think. You have my number? Okay, call anytime to check on her. I'll look after her and we'll figure everything out tomorrow."

Oh great. So, on one hand I probably shouldn't have said anything at all to my aunt about her language (maybe not my place?) but on the other hand that was REALLY not alright and I wish I had directly told her she was out of line. One thing is for sure, I'm not sending my cousin home while tempers are that high. Also, as long as she agrees, I'm keeping her phone tonight and screening her calls so she doesn't have to talk to her mother yet. Not sure what we're doing now. Cousin is in the bathroom crying and freaking out, I'm about to go sit outside the door and try to talk her into coming out here so I can hug her and feed her and talk to her and just generally try to fix this.

Any advice would be appreciated. Sorry about the implied language and content of the above.[/quote]

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