𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐎𝐄𝐒 • Luke Dunphy

xl . good grief

this is literally chapter 40 oh my god. u guys r about to love me. also oh my gosh i forgot to write a year anniversary chapter and it's too late now bc i already did the lake trip so summer is OVER but it's okay i think this chapter will end up making up for it.

"Oh my God," Amy said. She was on the phone to someone, an unknown number, and she now seemed... upset? Relieved? Tiana couldn't quite tell. "Okay, thanks for calling. Bye."

"Who was that?" Tiana asked, not taking her eyes off of the Vogue magazine she was mindlessly flipping through.

"Grandma Angie."

Tiana hated her Grandma Angie. She was her fathers mother. Aware of the abuse Tiana endured, she did nothing to help her. Her maternal grandmother was different. She constantly scolded Tiana's mother about the man she married, but unfortunately died when Tiana was fairly young.

"Ew. What did that bitch want?"

Amy sat down next to Tiana on the couch. "Tiana, put the magazine down and sit up properly."

"You sound like mom."

"Tiana."

"Fine, geez. Why are you being such a weirdo?"

Amy took a deep breath in and held onto her sister's hands. "Mom and dad are dead."

"I wish."

"I'm serious. They died in a car accident. They were both drunk. The police think they may have been arguing before it happened."

"So they died as they lived. Drunk, angry and pathetic. Good to know."

Tiana picked the magazine up and began to head to her room. She wasn't sure how she felt right now. Sad, happy, relieved, angry? Many emotions were running through her brain, but she couldn't tell which was the strongest.

"That's it?" Amy asked, "Good to know?"

"I have multiple scars, physical and emotional, from our father. Mom didn't care. She sat and watched it happen. Hell, she even helped sometimes. Are you really gonna scold me right now for not caring that they're dead?"

"I wouldn't be mad if you didn't care, Tiana. But you do. It's obvious. I'm not sure what you're feeling right now. If it's something negative, you can talk to me. If it's something positive, well... that's a little different from most people grieving, but that's okay, you'd be completely justified."

"I don't feel positive or negative. I feel nothing. I don't care if they're dead, and I certainly wouldn't care if they were alive. They're just another road safety statistic now."

"Tia-"

Tiana didn't stay to hear another one of Amy's lectures on grief. Instead, she left the apartment and drive to Luke's. On the whole drive there, her face didn't change. Perhaps she was trying her best to free herself of all the emotions she was feeling.

Of course she was happy. The people who'd abused and neglected her for eighteen years had died. Who wouldn't feel at least the tiniest bit happy at that?

But they were still her parents. They didn't love her, but other family members did. Amy did, her maternal grandparents did. It was her parents that brought Tiana into the family that she loved most members of.

She was angry, too. It could be argued that they killed each other. Her father was drunk driving, but they were arguing. Every time they argued, it was because of her mother. Her father never had the energy to start arguments. It was more than likely that her mother started it, and made her father lose his focus in the road.

Finally, she felt relieved. Ever since her father came back that one Thanksgiving, Tiana lived in constant fear of history repeating itself. Perhaps one day he'd come back and finish the job that she was sure he was going to do back then. They had a restraining order on him, but still, it wouldn't be the first time he'd broke the law.

When she got to Luke's house, she let herself in and walked right to the kitchen, where Luke sat at the island. Alex and Haley were in the living room.

"Hey, Tia," Luke said, getting up from his seat and walking over to his girlfriend. She leaned up and grabbed his face, kissing him fairly passionately. He pulled away quickly and looked over at his two sisters, who luckily hadn't noticed anything. "God, careful. You wanna go upstairs?"

"Okay," Tiana held onto Luke's hand and led him up to his room.

"This is a little sudden," Luke said, as Tiana pushed him into his now close door, "Not that I'm complaining or anything. Are you okay, though?"

"My parents just died," Tiana said nonchalantly as her fingers tucked under Luke's shirt, ready to pull it off.

"Woah," he said, gently pushing Tiana off of him and hiding her to sit down on the bed, "What?"

"It's not a big deal, Luke, they were assholes."

"It's a big deal to you."

"How would you know?"

"Because you've never in our year of dating came to my house just for sex, and you just almost made out with me in front of my sisters, and you very clearly have tears in your eyes."

Tiana blinked her tears back. "I don't. I'm an eighteen year old girl, Luke. Can't I have hormones?"

"Yeah, and those hormones make you emotional around death. I think. You know you can talk to me, right? I have no idea how you're feeling, but you can tell me. I'm not gonna judge."

"I'm confused. I don't know if I'm sad or happy. I mean, they can't hurt me anymore, and that's great, but they were my parents. They're the reason I have Amy, they're the reason I'm alive. If I wasn't alive I wouldn't have met you, right?"

"You can be both."

"Simultaneously sad and happy? Over death? It just seems weird."

"I'm gonna pretend I know what simultaneously means and disagree with you. It's not weird to have mixed emotions, Tia. Your parents were young, you didn't expect them to die. It's shocking. If anything, it's way more normal to have mixed emotions over this than to solely be just sad or happy."

"Thank you, Luke."

"Anytime."

Luke lay down on the bed, and Tiana soon lay next to him, placing her hand on his chest and tracing the pattern on his shirt.

"I think I'm just relieved," Tiana said, "That's it. Just relieved."

"Glad we figured that out. I don't know if my opinion on this matters, but I am, too. Relieved, I mean. I was always scared they were gonna come back, hurt you again, but now they can't. No one's ever gonna hurt you again."