A/N: Thanks for reading! Here is the first chapter of season 2!

Please, please, please review what you think of the story!

Chapter 21 - Absence of Grief

~X~

Carol had been sitting in her dead husband's study for an hour now. The sun had just risen over the treetops, and she had been cradling a glass of whiskey. It had been Richard's favorite and she had never quite understood the appeal of it before.

She didn't understand it now either, even if the bottle beside her was almost close half empty. The last 24 hours of her life had been confusion and hell, and she wasn't ready to face the music just yet. Carol looked around the room and remembered years ago, when they had decided to redo the whole house 'for the last time', 6th time's the charm right?

Anyways, she kept thinking back to that stupid fight that day. Tyler had been crying in his stroller the next room over. Emotions and conflicts clashing into each other and suddenly he just snapped. That was the first time he had slapped her.

And she had stayed, for years and years and years. Not ever confronting him about his behavior. The young girls at his office didn't matter, the late nights didn't matter, his rage didn't matter. She had the life she had dreamed of when she was a young naive girl, and that girl had held such a firm grip around that perfect dream that nothing else mattered.

Tyler had been her saving grace, or so she thought in the beginning. Until she couldn't really focus on being perfect and being a mother at the same time. There simply wasn't time to be both.

Richard had ruined her, and now he was gone. And she had no idea of what to do next, she had to be strong. She had to find herself again, and also practise how to fake tears of grief.

~X~

It was a great wake, well, as great as any wake's could be. The whole town was there, grieving the loss of their great mayor who had burnt to death. It was a perfect day for a garden party, as the sun shined on the beautiful estate. Making it look even more grandiose. Harper and Tyler had been standing by the door, greeting and welcoming everyone into their home for solace and guidance. Carol was patrolling the house with great anxiety, hugging everyone that crossed her path.

"How are you feeling?" Harper asked, as she side hugged Tyler. He was dressed very casually compared to the outfit he had worn to church, but no one cared about it.

"Fine"

But Harper could see it in his eyes that it wasn't the truth. Despite the bastard that he had been, Richard had been Tyler's father and that mattered. She hugged him a bit tighter but then let him go, she knew that he was extremely uncomfortable about the whole event, much less the events following the 150th celebration. He too had felt the effects of the device, and had crashed his car with Caroline inside of it. Caroline was still at the hospital.

Harper had gone to meet her with Bonnie, and it had been just a moment of hugs and smiles as everyone got reassured that everything would be okay.

At that moment a car pulled up on the driveway in a very careless and hasty manner. Harper had never seen that car before and didn't really care about the asshole that owned it, but Tyler tensed beside her.

"Who is that?" She asked but he ignored her and walked out to meet the guy. With careful steps she followed.

"So the black sheep returns" Tyler grunted out, looking at the handsome man with hard eyes.

"Tyler?" The man scoffed and looked at him up and down.

"Yeah"

"What happened to you? In my mind you are 12 years old" The man smirked.

"Well that's two years older than the last time you saw uncle Mason" Tyler stated.

"Come here" To melt the iceberg between them Mason hugged his nephew, but no real warmth was rekindled. Mason then turned to Harper and smirked again.

"And you must be-"

"Harper.. my new sister" Tyler said and made Mason turn his attention back onto him. Something about Mason's gaze made Tyler wary and cautious. Not really trusting his long lost uncle just yet.

"Welcome to the family! Sorry we had to meet this way" Mason said, to which Harper smiled and softly blushed. The teenager felt embarrassed.

"Come on in" She said and turned to face the door, the guys followed her. And the feeling of Mason's eyes never left her.

~X~

Meanwhile

He had been sitting on his Harley Davidson bike for hours, driving. The gruff giant man had been in a haste to start this journey. To finally meet his daughter that he never knew he had, up until a month ago.

He had gotten the ominous call early in the morning, he was working at the repair shop like usual when his tiny silver flip phone had beeped. It was Sunny.. Sunny Bellrose. A woman he hadn't seen in years, but could never truly forget.

Least of all now, when she had told him the story about the girls he never knew she had had. To be honest it had been a summer fling between them, a hot and wild biker summer, and they had mutually parted ways in late August as he went back to his small town in Washington state, and she went across the country back to hers. He had saved her number, but she never called him. Nor for that matter did he try to reach out to her. He had been too old to hunt down such a wild and carefree woman like Sunny, and now he was truly paying the price for it.

He had said goodbye to his friends and family for now, emptied out the fridge and took out a lot of his savings for the gas for the bike. He had a plan, and he had started to forge it when Sunny sent over one of his girls' numbers after their call. Harper. Pretty name.

Of course he knew that he had sounded like a lunatic when he called her, trying to explain everything to her. She was just a scared teenager, oh how he hoped that Sunny had told some things about him to her.

Sunny hadn't called him back, nor texted or anything since she gave him Harper's number. He had cried when he learnt from Harper that her twin had died, murdered, she had said. He was raging. Not even after his own daughter died would Sunny lift her lazy ass hand to reach for the phone. She was a bitch, a horrible bitch.

He sighed, finally he only had a day or so left according to his GPS. He smiled, nervous as hell. But ready to talk to Harper, and tell her everything she needed to know about the parental side of the family.

~X~

Harper had been strolling around the house aimlessly. Trying to not be in the way of Tyler and Mason's reunion. She also kept a good distance from Carol, as she knew that her adoptive mother would never let her go for the rest of the evening if she stumbled upon her. She entered one of the many buffé rooms, this one for snacks and fruits. Some mild drinks and cute candies. A big part of Harper wondered how on earth Carol managed to create an event like this out of nowhere, but then again the woman lived for these kinds of things.

"Bonnie!" She saw one of her best friends by Damon Salvatore, and Harper's voice died fast in her throat. The vampire had the nerve to look at Harper with pitiful eyes, like he wanted to talk to her. But Bonnie was fast to move around him to hug her.

"Let's get out of here" Bonnie whispered into her ear, and so Harper nodded and took her hand. The girls went out on the porch looking over the lake. They met up with Elena, who was deep into her own thoughts. John had also been hurt and was in the hospital, but Harper had no idea it would affect her this much.

"Oh my god, Damon really drives me crazy" Bonnie sighed as they stopped by the brunette, breaking her out of her own thoughts. "He is walking around like he's some kind of hero for healing Caroline when it's his fault all this happened in the first place"

Bonnie looked at Harper who nodded mutely. Not really being in the mood to complain about one of Elena's vampire boyfriends in front of her.

"I'm sorry Bonnie, what Damon's done is just horrible" Elena said and looked with remorse at both of them. Which was weird, she had never cared about Harper in the first place.

"I'm sorry for your loss Harper" Elena then hugged her. Harper was in shock, not only from Elena's actions. But also from the flashes she got from being in contact with her. Several of them showed Elena but with veins and fangs. Making the teenager shiver in fear. Bonnie looked on as Harper's eyes turned back and forth from white to normal, realizing that she couldn't snap out of it without being released from Elena. Who hadn't let her go.

"Thanks" Harper whispered before walking away back inside. She quickly searched high and low for Tyler. Finally finding him in the 'forbidden' study. That wasn't so forbidden anymore. He was on the leather couch, holding a black flask hard in his hands.

"Hi" She rasped and sat down next to him. He immediately took a hold of her hand, which was ice cold to the touch.

"Breathe Harp… Breathe" He said in a low voice. Harper did as he said and started to come back down to earth. She had been up in the clouds, as Tyler now called it, more and more these last couple of days. Triggered by the smallest of things. William had to keep a distance as she would see his past over and over again without touching him. And yesterday she had been stuck for an hour with his past in the dark and zombie filled tomb. She was losing control, that was evident.

"I'm okay now" She said and put her head on his shoulder, confident that with him, she would be safe from all trouble out there in the real world.

That's when Jeremy Gilbert walked in too, probably also wanting an escape from the wake.

"Hey guys, I'm sorry for your loss" He said and looked around in discomfort, not really knowing what to do.

"Today there's been a lot of 'sorry' from people who don't give a crap" Tyler scoffed and looked at Harper, who nodded in agreement.

"I remember when my dad died, the house was full of strangers telling me what a great guy he was" Jeremy said, which Harper thought was very kind of him. It had to be hard for him to even be at this event, much less consoling a friend about the death of a parent.

"Anyways, I know how hard all of this is" Jeremy added and looked at both of them. Harper didn't want to butt in with her own sad stories. Tyler had acquired some liquor from Richard's fancy stach hidden in a bar globe, he seemed to contemplate if it was enough to get wasted when he looked down at the silver flask.

"Difference is that with your dad it was true, my dad was a dick" Tyler stated and uncorked the flask. Harper laughed in agreement before Tyler handed her the drink and she too took a sip.

"Yeah, yeah he was" Jeremy said and laughed a bit with them before Harper motioned her hand towards him. But Jeremy just shook his head in a 'no'.

"He won't notice, he is dead" Tyler argued and took the flask from Harper to give to Jeremy.

"Sure, why not" Jeremy said and took the flask from him, sitting awkwardly on the desk. The whole thing would've been rather cute and wholesome in Harper's opinion. As the three orphans, tackling the world through alcohol consumption. Not that they didn't have Carol, but she wasn't really his mother that day. Just, Mrs. Lockwood.

But alas, the moment was ruined by Mason, who strode into the office like he owned the place.

"What's going on Tyler?" Jeremy panicked and immediately ran away from the room. Harper sat in her spot, not caring about the adult at all. Even as he shrugged the rest of the flask like it was water. The guy was creepy, unknown, but Harper could handle him.

~X~

Later in the Evening

Harper trusted the key into the red painted door. It had been over 8 months since she stepped foot inside of the Bellrose estate. She hadn't had the guts to walk through the halls where she and Henry had run years before. She didn't want to walk up the steps of the staircase, which they had mattress slided down after watching the Princess Diaries 2 so many times that they could recite every line in unison. Harper had no bravery as she looked down at her feet, avoiding the pictures hanging proudly on the walls of her former home.

This was no longer her home, she thought. This was just a house. A house full of memories. But she knew why she was there. She needed to find more information about her powers, and this was the only place she had left to search through. The things her grandmother had sent just wasn't enough. Diaries of old Bellrose's told the history of the family, sure, but not nearly enough about using your powers or controlling one's psyche. And to be frank, what the hell was she supposed to do with a crystal ball? The diaries talked a lot about seer's history and how the art and powers of seering the past and a possible future crossed cultural lines. As any different cultures had many different ways to practise the craft. Just like witches. And like witchcraft, the practice of a seer has been updated with the times to various degrees depending on coven or family and also appropriated by the masses who don't have the gift.

Harper sighed as she avoided the stairs and went deeper down the halls towards her mother's room. They had been searched by the police as she had officially declared her missing. But nothing helped them find her. The room was spotless courtesy of the weekly cleaners.

So Harper started to turn the place upside down, every nook, every corner, every box and drawer opened and searched. She found a gold mine.

Diaries, of course her mother kept diaries. Several of them, dating back to long before she and Henry were even born. Tarot cards, her old deck she used for customers only. Shipped and bleak from use. And a big midnight blue box, with a silver lock and no key. It rattled when she moved it, and it looked way too important not to take with her back to her new home.

Harper smiled and closed her eyes. Finally, she hoped she would get some proper answers.