Here's a new, long chapter for you. We finally get to meet Murphy's parents in this one. I made a lot of big changes to my profile and I've posted all of the songs that I've mentioned, cars and OC's. So if anyone is interested, they're all up there.

I was really sad when no one reviewed the last chapter :( I went over a lot of stuff to do with family history and I'm not sure if I was super clear. When I don't get reviews, I assume that no one liked the chapter and I get discouraged and I don't update as often.

The song for this chapter is Passive by A Perfect Circle. It just shows that being passive can hurt too.

Chapter 17

Passive

After all I had been through earlier that day with Reid and the Books of Shadows, it was hard to transition into wedding mode. I had half a mind to turn back, but I knew that if we didn't start now, we would end up at city hall and none of us wanted that. Besides, I could see how much this meant to Rose and I wanted her to have something to be cheerful about.

I pulled into the circular driveway at Tyler's house and noticed that Rose's car was the only one there and I was glad for it. I knew that Tyler was still at Spencer, but it wasn't him who I wanted to avoid, it was Mason Simms. I hadn't spoken to Tyler's father since the night we had dinner together; the night that all of our lives changed, and I wasn't looking forward to our next conversation.

Rose opened the door before I made it up the front walk and waved me in enthusiastically.

"I have everything set up in the dinning room," she said as she hugged me in the foyer. "This is going to be a lot more work than I thought," she continued as I pulled away. "Are you sure you don't want to hire a wedding planner?"

"It just seems to personal to have a stranger do all the heavy lifting," I answered. To me our wedding seemed like it was much more than a wedding. It was going to be a bitter sweet moment that marked the rest of our life together.

"I agree with you, but I was just making sure that you're ready to put the time in."

"I'm ready," I replied as we sat down across from each other at the formal dinning room table. There were pamphlets and books full of flowers spread out all over the table, ready to be looked at along with a laptop that was prepped and ready to go.

"Is your mother going to join us?" she asked, glancing out the window as if my mother was was going to suddenly appear on the front porch. Rose had asked me to invite my mother to this little pow- wow and I promised her that I would, but it was a promise that I couldn't keep. I still hadn't worked out a way to tell my parents about the engagement and there would be no way to do it smoothly. It was one conversation that I wanted to put off for as long as possible.

"She said that she was sorry but she can't make it today," I lied weakly. Rose looked at me suspiciously.

"Murphy, do your parents know about anything that has been going on with your life lately?" she asked point blank. Color rose to my cheeks and I didn't know what to say. If I lied she would know that I was lying but she might let it go, like she had all those months ago when my parents never showed up at the hospital. She would have to know eventually anyway so the truth seemed like the best way to go. I exhaled.

"No. They haven't always been very understanding of certain things," I said, tip toeing around the fringes of my explanation.

"Tyler told me that you aren't very close with your family," she stated. I would have some words with Tyler the trader later.

"That's right," I clarified. "The only member I was really close with was my grandfather, my father's father, but he passed away about a year ago. I have a few cousins that I see during the summer in Ireland but I don't speak to them very often. I guess I haven't had a real conversation with my parents in a few years. In fact the last conversation I remember having with my mother she was drunk and I believe she called me a leach. She said I could have all the money they had to give so I could maybe make something of myself."

"That must have been hard for you to hear," Rose said sympathetically.

"It was at first because I believed her until I realized that she's the one that let me down. Maybe I screw up sometimes but I didn't do anything to deserve that. It took me a long time to figure that out and I don't really care to speak to my parents."

"I'm sorry that you had to go through that, but I don't feel right about you not telling them," she reasoned.

"I'm going to tell them, I just know that it will be bad."

"As long as you do it at some point." I nodded in response and tried to busy myself with a book filled with different flowers. I never talked about my parents to anyone. Tyler only knew what he had to know; that I had a credit card with my fathers name on it and that I couldn't put my finger on the last time we had spoken. Kate, Sarah and Allison didn't know anything at all. I could feel my eyes well up with tears but I pushed them back. This was a happy moment. I was getting married and I wasn't going to let the cloud of my parents darken my heart any longer.

Rose understood that I was done talking and she picked up a flower book of her own, flipping through it and marking the pages she thought were worth showing me.

"I think I found it," I said, getting her attention after about twenty minutes of browsing.

"Let me see," she said excitedly, moving to the chair next to me.

"This one," I pointed. "The Hydrangea. I really like the blues and the purples." Rose nodded her head.

"I think it's perfect. Hydrangea's represent perseverance and I think we all need a little bit of that right now." I nodded in agreement. They were perfect.

After we discussed a color scheme to go along with the flowers we decided to call it a night. It was late and all I wanted to do was get back to my dorm, lay in my bed and think about the Book of Ascension.

As I was leaving, I turned to face Rose.

"I think I'm going to take a ride and go see my parents tomorrow." A look of shock came over my own face. I had no idea where that came from. Fifteen seconds ago I had no intention of telling my parents anything. Ever.

"I think that's a great idea," Rose said, walking me to the front door. "Breaking news like this in person is always the best I think. It will be a lot for them to take in."

"I'm going to ask Tyler to come with me. I want him to meet them so he can see what he's getting himself into." It was a weak attempt at humor on my part considering there was nothing funny about my parents. Rose laughed anyway.

"Will I see you tomorrow?" she asked, hugging me.

"I think so. After we get back, maybe the three of us can talk about where we're going to do this thing so we can pick out a date."

"It's a plan then. Drive safe, sweety."

I turned and gave one last wave before getting into my car. Before I started the engine I took out my phone and sent a quick text to Tyler.

Meet me at my room at 8 tomorrow. We're going to see my parents.

I read it over, and then hit send. Leaning back in my seat I closed my eyes and tried to picture tomorrow, but I just couldn't. I wanted so badly to throw a tantrum like a child; to text Tyler back and tell him I was just kidding, but he would see right through that. With one last sigh I turned my key and took off to the dorms.

There was a knock on my door at exactly seven fifty- nine the next morning.

"I just need to get my shoes," I told Tyler. When I woke up I forgot that today was going to be hard, until I checked my texts and saw that Tyler had sent me a message.

"Do you still want to do this?" it read. The answer of course was no but I had to be an adult now. There were so many things going on in my life, a little meeting with my parents should have seemed like a piece of cake. I was getting married for crying out loud.

"I'll drive if you want me to," Tyler offered and I was grateful. I didn't really like driving long distances and I couldn't be distracted while I thought about what I was going to say when I showed up on my parent's door step.

"How long is it going to take us to get to Nantucket exactly?" Tyler asked once we were settled into the Hummer.

"About three and a half hours, and we have to take a ferry." Getting home was always a pain in the butt, but it was a beautiful pain in the butt. I grew up on Nantucket Island off the coast of Cape Cod. To me it was one of the most beautiful places in the world. I missed the beaches and my own room so much that a little part of me was actually looking forward to going back.

"I've seen where you grew up, and I want to show you where I grew up," I continued reaching for his hand. I want you to know everything about me now, even the bad stuff."

Once we were on the road, Tyler struck up conversation again.

"What kind of progress did you and my mom make last night?" he asked.

"We decided on the colors. Everyone is going to be dressed head to toe in baby pink." I joked. Baby pink was Tyler's least favorite color. His faced dropped until he looked over and saw my face.

"Very funny. I actually think I would look great in a light pink tux," he joked back.

"But really," I continued. "We picked hydrangeas."

"Okay," he answered, pretending like he knew what hydrangeas were.

"They're a purple-blue color," I clarified.

"I like blue," he agreed. "Did you pick anything else?"

"I didn't really feel like picking anything else without you." I knew that he wasn't really into all the girly stuff like flowers and dresses, but I wanted him to be involved. "It's hard to pick too many things without knowing how many people we want to invite. I never really thought about how many people I actually know."

"I think it's safe to say it will be pretty small." I nodded liking the idea. "I mean, it's our wedding so we really don't have to invite anyone we don't want to."

Thinking about it, I don't think I even know that many people, at least no well enough to invite them to my wedding. The only people I could really think of were some of my cousins and I guess Mel. Tyler saw my face and took my hand.

"I don't really want to invite many people anyway," I said. I leaned back in my seat and closed my eyes, gripping Tyler's hand tighter. After today, I'm not even sure my parents would be attending.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I just nervous."

"Is it really going to be that bad?" he asked. "You're getting married. So what? You're eighteen so you can do what you want. It's not like you have a drug problem or I knocked you up." I laughed a little, but my stomach was still in knots.

"I just have a feeling this is the last time I'm going to see them and I don't know whether to be happy or sad about it," I confided.

"What do you mean?"

"They always act like they're happy to see me at first, well, at least my mom does. I haven't seen my dad in a long time because he can't stand my mom. Then everything just goes bad. Like every word that comes out of my mouth is wrong. They try to use me to hurt each other. It's like a subtle slide from bad to worse." I didn't know what to say next. The story I was telling wasn't all that sympathetic; poor little rich girl can't get her parents approval, isn't exactly a huge deal considering what was happening in our lives. I needed to let them go. If they didn't want me around then I didn't want them around either. I was going to lay it all out on the table today and they could take it or leave it.

"I can't really imagine not having my parents involved in everything I did," Tyler reminisced. "I couldn't wait to move to the dorms when I was fourteen." He laughed softly at the memory. "I ruined my favorite shirt the first week of school because my mom had always done my laundry." I smiled as he continued. "I never admitted this to anyone, but I'm pretty sure I cried. My mom bought me the same shirt for my birthday that year. I secretly wanted to move back home, but I knew that would be lame no matter who my friends were."

"It was always strange to me that my friends would say I was lucky. I was a ten-year-old with no curfew," I said dryly. "At first it was cool to get a new limitless credit-card every year for my birthday, but I think I would have given anything to have my mom give me an ugly sweater I could pretend to like, or for my dad to give me birthday wackes. Instead I woke up every year in an empty house, an unmarked envelope on the cold kitchen counter with a stupid piece of black plastic in it."

There was a silence and I felt bad. There wasn't really anything he could say to that. I had clearly just made him feel bad for sharing a good memory.

"What exit is Hyannis again?" Tyler asked, glancing at the GPS.

"Exit six," I recited from memory. I always loved the ferry ride to the island, especially this time of year when the warm sea breeze was just starting to kick in.

We arrived in Hyannis and parked the Hummer in one of the lots near the ferry.

"We can walk to my house from the ferry," I insisted as we got out of the car. We ended up almost sprinting to the boat and made it on just as they were pulling up the ramp. After skidding to a halt, we dropped onto one of the benches that lined the railing of the ferry to catch our breath.

"I can't say I would have been that disappointed if we'd missed it," I commented as Tyler put his arm around me.

"I would never let you hear the end of it if the star runner missed the ferry," he said, tightening his grip around my shoulders. I smiled and leaned into him, closing my eyes as the boat pulled away from the dock. My eyelids felt heavy as the boat rocked. I was just resting my eyes.

I was on the ferry, but I was alone. There was only a dim light coming from the captain's cabin, casting ghostly shadows across the fog. Suddenly there was splashing in the water, and I crossed the deck as fast as I could. Grabbing the rope that hung on the wall, I gathered it in my hands preparing to throw it to whoever was drowning, but a hand stopped me. A man held my hand firmly back. He took the rope from my hands and flung it overboard.

"What are you doing?" I demanded. How could he let someone die?

"I'm putting things back in balance." The man was middle-aged; handsome in an aristocratic kind of way.

"What's out of balance?" I searched his cold gray eyes for the answer, but all I could see in them was amusement. The corners of his mouth tugged up as if he was trying to hold back a laugh.

"The Power of course. A life for a life." Without warning, I was hit with the truth. His clothes were from another time, and those eyes- I knew those eyes. But his identity wasn't a secret; he wanted me to know him.

"You're John Putnam," I stated. The terror wouldn't stay out of my voice. The man only nodded.

Suddenly I realized that the splashing had stopped. I folded myself over the railing, trying to see through the fog. What I saw made my blood run cold. The familiar hair; the sweater I had bought him for his birthday. It was Tyler face down in the water. Dead.

"How is this balanced?" I shouted. "Your bloodline survived. What good is it killing one of the others? If you kill one line, the rest suffer. Even you."

"You are not one of them and you never will be. You will never have a son; the Simms line is ended."

"You're wrong," I shot back childishly.

"How can you be so sure when you don't even know where to start." His smirk grew wider.

"Where is the Book of Ascension?" I demanded, taking a step closer to him. I was ready to wrap my hands around his neck and choke it out of him.

Before I could reach him, his eyes turned black and I was frozen. Putnam vanished before my eyes.

"Maybe you should have asked Chase before you tried to kill him," a voice whispered in my ear. Then, an unseen force slammed against my chest. I closed my eyes as the wind was knocked out of me, waiting to be submerged into the icy water, but the impact never came.

"Murphy." Someone was shaking my shoulders. "Come on, wake up. We're here." Slowly I opened my eyes and saw Tyler, alive and as well as he could be.

"Sorry for falling asleep on you. You could have woken me up, you know," I said as he helped me to my feet.

"You say that, but you don't really mean it," he joked. I slapped his arm playfully.

"I'm not that grumpy," I protested, but I knew he was right.

We got off the boat, hand-in-hand and headed away from the docks, down the main road in the village. I pulled out my phone and shot Reid a text to meet up later before I forgot about my dream.

"It's about a half-hour walk, but it's a nice one," I told Tyler as we made our way down the street with all the little shops that I'd always loved. It was just after noon, and there were tourists all around, stepping into the small restaurants to taste some famous Nantucket chowder. We walked in a comfortable silence as we passed the familiar landmarks of my childhood.

There was the lighthouse where I kissed my first boyfriend when I was nine. The tree I refused to come down from when my parents were fighting. The fire-hydrant where I 'accidentally' crashed my first car in a stupid, rebellious cry for attention. Before I knew it we were at the front gate. Without hesitation I flipped open the key-pad and typed in the code; I knew they would never change it. The gate swung open to reveal a sprawling, perfectly manicured lawn, and a house that could modestly be described as 'roomy.'

"So this is where you grew up," Tyler stated. "It suites you; it's a classic beauty." He squeezed my hand, encouraging me to walk toward the door. We reached the door and my finger hesitated over the bell; I curled my hand into a fist.

"We can leave if you want," Tyler offered. He wanted me to do this, but he didn't want me to suffer.

"We came all the way here." I rang the bell before I could think about it anymore. A few moments later, a woman in a house keeper's uniform answered the door.

"Can I help you?" she asked. She seemed like she was trying to place me; like she knew she'd seen me somewhere, but she couldn't put her finger on it.

"We're here to see my mother," I told her. "Is she in?"

"You must be her daughter. Mary, is it?"

"Murphy, actually," I corrected.

"You must forgive me, I'm new," she explained.

"Don't worry about it," I assured as she led us into the parlor where my mother liked to receive guests like she was the Queen.

"Murphy, what brings you here?" My mothers voice drifted over to us from the main staircase as she descended. Her Irish accent was carefully disguised; I could only hear it because I knew it was there. She always tried to fit in with the country club women; all of them could trace their ancestry back the the American Revolution. Depending on who you asked, so could my mother.

"I was in the area," I lied. I was testing her to see if she could tell I was being sarcastic; she couldn't.

"Wonderful," she said dryly, walking toward me. She placed her hands on my shoulders and leaned forward, pressing her cheek against mine. She made a kissing noise as her heavily powdered cheek brushed against mine; I could smell the gin and it was only noon. Slowly, she pressed her other cheek to my face, in a stiff European-style kiss, careful not to show too much intimacy.

"Well, sit down." She gestured to the barely broken-in French-style love seat and delicately lowered herself on the matching one across from it. "Andrea!" she called shrilly to the housekeeper. "Bring us some tea."

Tyler moved to take the seat next to me, and my mother jumped back in her seat a little as if he appeared out of no where.

"Who is this?" There was nothing friendly in her voice, almost as if she thought Tyler was some bold criminal who was attempting a home invasion in the middle of the day. This was it, I was going to tell her.

"This is Tyler," I started but she cut me off.

"It's impolite to invite strangers over the house without first informing the lady of the house," she started. "In fact, Murphy it's impolite to drop by uninvited. I have quite a few things that I need to do today. You can't just come here and expect me to dote on you."

"I came here to..." I tried again, but was cut off.

"Your father will be here any minute and I don't think he'll like a stranger in the house." This was unbelievable. It was hard to hold back the horrible things I wanted to shout at her, but I knew that would be counterproductive. I couldn't act like a spoiled brat to get back at her because there was no way I could win that way. I wanted to leave here with self-respect. I took a deep breath.

"He's not a stranger; he's my..." A car door slammed in the driveway and my stomach knotted.

"Your father's here," my mother stated. She picked invisible lint off her shirt. "For goodness sake. Sit up strait, Murphy! You're gone for a little while and you've forgotten all your manners. It's like you traveled here just to spite me." I didn't move.

My mother was the face that I dreaded seeing because I didn't think there was really a chance that my father would be around. He was prone to talking "business trips" that span months. I couldn't even remember the last time I saw my father. Is could have been last Christmas, or it might have been the summer before that when he was in town for a golf tournament. It was even harder to place the last time we spoke. It might have been the time I crashed my car two summers ago, if that could be counted as a conversation; it was mostly him yelling and me trying to pretend like it didn't hurt. I guess I hadn't really spoken to him since I went off to Spencer. I promised that I would do my best, but I guess he never really cared if I did well or not as long as I wasn't around.

As much as my mother pretends, everything is perfect, the truth is my parents hate each other. It's been that way since I can remember. They were too wrapped up in their own misery raise me right and I was too pissed at them act decently. It would be ignorant of me to say that there was nothing I could have done to make it better, but I shouldn't have had to do anything.

As I got older I started to look like them. My father couldn't look at me without seeing my mother's bone structure, and my mother still couldn't look me in the eye because they're the same shade of green as my father's.

My heart dropped as the front door opened and his footsteps sounded in the marble foyer. The tell-tale tinkering of ice hitting the crystal whiskey glass from the sidebar next to the main staircase. I held my breath as he rounded the corner and stepped into the parlor. His eyes widened slightly when he saw me.

"You didn't tell me our daughter was coming by today," he said to my mother.

"I didn't know she was coming, Patrick." They were talking about me like I wasn't in the room. Tyler was standing behind me and I could only imagine that he was too terrified to move. My father was imposing; all designer suits and creases.

"You were probably too drunk to remember. God only knows what goes on when I'm not here, Carol." This was familiar. They had been having the same fight since I could remember. Like clock work, my mother answered.

"Well, I can only imagine what you get up to while I'm here doing everything for you." The fight would go on in a vicious circle if I didn't step in.

"Mom, dad," I interrupted. This time I was going to say what I came here to say even if I had to talk over them. "This is Tyler," I continued. They stopped for a second and looked at Tyler like they hadn't realized that the stranger would come up in conversation.

Tyler moved toward my father, hand outstretched and my father took it, more out of habit than politeness.

"We're getting married," I stated bluntly. There wasn't any other way I could phrase it to skip around the truth for a few more seconds. It was what it was; we were getting married and now they knew. Instantly the panic that had been clutching my chest released.

Silence.

"Don't be ridiculous," my mother said after a few moments. "If this is some kind of cry for attention..." she trailed off. My father still had Tyler's hand in his, too shocked to move.

"You can't get married." My father finally dropped Tyler's hand. He backed away from him as if he had some sort of infectious disease. "You're only seventeen and I won't let you."

"I'm eighteen, dad. My birthday's in February, it's April." I wasn't all that surprised that he'd forgotten how old I was. "I can make my own decision."

"You can't so this. I forbid it." He took on the tone that made my blood run cold when I was younger, but now I didn't really care. I didn't have to do what he told me anymore.

"I didn't come here to ask for permission; I came here to let you know."

"I didn't pay all this money for you to get one of the best educations in the country, just so you could throw it away, marry some boy, and become a clone of your mother." I looked over to my mother who cringed at the comment, but said nothing.

"Look, you can come to the wedding, or you can stay here, but I'm doing it." I looked my father dead in the eyes, challenging him.

"If you do this, I'm cutting you off," he said slowly, as if I would ditch my fiancée for a credit-card.

"Fine," I said. Pulling out my wallet from my purse, I removed my black American Express and tossed on the floor. "Anything else?"

"I hope you realize exactly what you're doing," he said while looking at the card.

"I do, but since you've made your feelings on the matter very clear, I don't think I need to explain my reasoning to you." My father's eyes hardened.

"Get. Out," he said coldly.

I wasn't about to let him control me like he controls my mother.

"The Save-the-Date will be coming in the mail. By the way, I got into Harvard." With that I grabbed Tyler's hand and led him out the front door. Wordlessly we walked down the long driveway and out the front gate. Once we were off the property, I let go of Tyler's hand and leaned against the stone wall surrounding my former home. I put my face in my hands and exhaled slowly, trying to make sense of the way I felt. Relief was flooding through me and despite everything, I couldn't hold back the smile that was spreading across my face.

"I think that went pretty well," I said, answering Tyler's confused look.

"Did you just get disowned?" he asked, like he couldn't believe what just happened.

"I think so." It was over. They didn't matter anymore and I didn't owe them anything. It was over.

"Are you okay?" I could tell he wanted to smile with me, but he wasn't sure if I was actually happy, or if I was in the middle of some terrible breakdown.

"Really, it's okay. Everything will be fine." I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my forehead to his. I could move on now and focus on my new family; Tyler was my family now and all of the people we have in our lives. We had so much to deal with, and this was one less thing I had to stress over.

"I love you," he said as he moved to kiss me sweetly. We parted and I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him closer.

"I love you, too," I whispered in his ear. "So much."

We stood there for a few moments, relaxed and happy, until my phone buzzed in my pocket. I broke away from Tyler and pulled out my phone. It was a text from Reid.

'Meet at my house at 8?'

I typed out my reply and hit send.

"It's just Reid," I said we have to work on our history project later tonight for a little while." I wanted to kick myself. Here I was, feeling relieved to be free, and then I turned around and lied right to Tyler's face.

"Let's get out of here."

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