DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything. Also, as a heads up, I'm aware that technically some of the later characters are connected across the Infernal Devices and Mortal Instruments – but for the sake of the story, they're simply friends unless I say otherwise, which I won't (:
Magnus' POV.
As I stand there and look at them, my first thought - after a string of awe-inspired curse words - is 'God, they are perfect'.
Perfectly formed beings with perfectly placed features and skin. Perfectly long legs with perfectly flawless demeanours and perfectly chiselled jaw-lines and cheek bones. And as much as I admire perfection, as much as I am literally admiring the perfection in front of me, I shake my head quietly with a sad smile. Nobody, nothing, nowhere is physically perfect. If it isn't physical, then it's mental, and vice-versa. Everything has a flaw, a weakness, some sort of vice. As stunningly beautiful as these people are, their perfectioned façade shattered as soon as they appeared in my line of sight.
However perfection is rarely attainable in my opinion, so it's a minor accomplishment at best, for they are beautiful if not perfect. And if you happen to stumble across them, I'm sure time would move slowly as they walk, everyone would listen as they spoke, and they'd all be posed like the hot-stuff in the manga comics that instantly makes you fall head-over-ass in love. Perfect? Doubtable. Beautiful? Undeniable.
The men more-so in the tall-dark-and-handsome way, the females more model-esque. The fair haired male seems slightly out of place, but is still God-like with a classical greek finish to his frame. I imagine there's plenty of muscle under his clothes. And the youngest, a boy, not yet fully grown but still, I image he's the tallest in his class.
I finish putting the cat treats into the cupboard, sneaking looks at them from behind shelves. You see, normally, I just volunteer at the animal shelter which is backed onto the vets. However today, which is Sunday, they are short staffed and the receptionist fell ill the night before. I wasn't doing much at the shelter side of things so I was happy to help out the vets as well. I'd just finished giving the pets their treats when they'd walked in, happy, glamorous and beautiful.
I know them, vaguely. The Lightwoods. They go to my school, but even if I weren't aware of them and their glass-roof popularity, their uniform would've told me their educational status. Black trousers, burgundy skirts for the girl. White shirts, long or short sleeved depending on preference, topped with a V necked burgundy jumper or button-down blazer, again, depending on preference.
The two boys have the same coloured tie on, a plain black, showing their status as seniors. The girl has a grey one on; still a junior. The younger boy beside them, a child no older than ten, is dressed in black trousers, black shoes, a white short sleeved crisp shirt with a burgundy tie around his neck, his grey jumper tied rebelliously around his small waist. He's evidently still in primary school – the feeder one to the high school and college his older siblings attend.
But yes, the way they walked, practically glided into the vets, was truly angelic and of course no different to the way they normally behaved. Superior but modest. Even the way they stand emanates something else. The husband had held the door open for everybody; the young boy had rushed in, followed by the girl known as Isabelle, the Junior, followed by her brothers, Alec and Jace, the two seniors, who stood as close to her as body guards would. Then the mother of the bunch stepped gracefully through the door, her husband closing it behind her before they linked arms so fluidly I almost missed it.
The young boy rocks up onto his toes and rings the bell at the desk. I wait five seconds, hearing no move from anyone else to rush to the aid of the beautiful people, before I secure the final small box of treats on the shelf and walk around to greet them. Behind the glasses, the young boy has eager baby blue eyes – which is very cute. I give him a smile.
"And what can I do for you today?" He gapes at me a little and then curiously looks around me.
"You're not Marie" He observes suspiciously.
"Max" Isabelle hisses with a parental frown on her perfect little face. Perfect? Upon further inspection, as I caught her icy-blue eyes, I suddenly thought her doll like, too pretty and polished. She isn't perfect. She offers a rehearsed smile in my direction. "I'm sorry, usually Marie runs the desk"
"It's fine" I shrug it off and flip through the book on the desk, looking for L's. "Do you have an appointment?"
"We're here to pick up Church" Max rocks up further on his toes, growing a couple of inches to see the book on the desk. "You didn't lose him, did you?" I almost laugh at the genuine concern and worry that the young kid is drowning his eyes in. "We're the Lightwoods. L-I-G-"
"I know" I quirk an eyebrow, running over the family in front of me. Jace, your typical jock, looks straight back. The cutie known as Alec, stood awkwardly next to him, blinks and looks away. "Church. White, fluffy?" Max nods eagerly. That cat is a demonic, unsocial, broody, fur-ball of cotton-wool. "I'll bring him out to ya'. One sec'" I turn and head into the back, past the cats roaming free in large pens and to the ones in the finer section. I find the Demon Cat. He's scowling, lying on his stomach overgrown with so much fur I can't find his face. "I'll make you a deal. You can go home, if you don't come back. Or at least make some friends and cheer up a bit" Somewhere in the fluff he meows, unfurling himself and coming closer so I can grip him. He squirms in my arms and I carry him back to the desk. Max grins. "Do you have a cat-pen to take him back in?"
"Church doesn't like it" Jace says matter-of-factly.
"He's ok on my knee!" Max reaches forwards to take Church from me but Isabelle stops him. "Why?" He questions.
"He's too heavy, you can't carry him"
"I can" Max protests, a frown on his face. It's amusing how the family can be so outwardly perfect, yet so out of tune with each other. Why not give the cat to the kid? Church meows over my shoulder and crawls around the back of my neck.
"He likes you" Mr. Lightwood steps forwards, holding his arms out. Church leaps awkwardly from my shoulders and into his arms, purring like a throttle on a car. Mrs Lightwood steps forwards, pulling a designer purse out of her designer handbag. I smell the new Gucci perfume, too.
"How much do we owe you?" I head back to the desk and check the book, finding the Lightwoods name along with church's and the bill totalled up beside it. She slides her credit card into the machine and pays. My eyes fall back to tall-dark-and-handsome over there. I don't' really talk to him much considering he's in my classes for a lot of things, but then again, there are social boundaries. He's one of them and I am one of me.
"Thanks" I tell her when it's finished. She pulls out her card, puts it back in her designer purse which falls back into her designer handbag. "If there's any problems or concerns, feel free to ring or pop back in" She smiles a practiced smile. It's weighed with worry, insecurity and something else. A tiredness?
"Thank you" She turns and walks away, Mr. Lightwood already at the door, holding it open with Church cradled in his other arm. Isabelle leaves first, then Max, who strokes the cat on the way past, then Jace and Alec, who offers a quick smile in my direction before their mother passes through the door and it closes behind them all with a jingle of the bell. I grin to myself. He smiled at me. I bite my lip, unable to contain my excitement. He smiled at me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of their fanatics. I acknowledge their existence and their beautifulness and their perfect perfectness that is fake, but I don't worship the ground they walk on. But he smiled at me. And for that, I might just start paying more attention to those ocean-blue eyes and that adorable smile.
I don't mind school. I can see why it's necessary and what-not, I just disagree with the timing in which they place you into the main educational system. I mean come on, when kids are growing? Changing? Developing? Exploring? What better time to stick a bunch of different, confused kids (who feel the need to be someone else in order to fit in and be normal) into a system where you're either the lion or the prey? If you ask me, someone got that seriously wrong, but as it doesn't seem to be changing any time soon, I put up with it.
After meeting up for a few minutes with Camille, Tessa and Jem to discuss homework notes before my lesson on a Monday morning, I head to my English Lit class alone; it's the one class I don't have with any of them although I thoroughly enjoy it. However, my mood brightens when I realise that I do in fact have it with Alec Lightwood – Mr tall-dark-and-handsome. Now, please bear in mind that I never paid much attention to him before, or any of the Lightwoods. I passed them in the corridor, acknowledged their superiority and greatness, I may have picked up on their stunning features at some point, but I didn't really care about their weekend escapades to other countries, their latest trends which flooded around the school within days, or which car they turned up in at school. The only way I can describe it is that feeling you get when you need a new hair cut or style, you want something different and you're not sure what to go for – so you start picking up on everyone else's hair styles. Or when you've not done your eyeliner as perfect as usual, so you spend the day scrutinising everybody else's. It's something you inadvertently start doing because subconsciously, you feel the need to. I'd never engaged with the Lightwoods of my own accord, other than some of Jace's solid-beef friends which was most definitely not of my own accord. I never felt the need to. However once they'd appeared in the vets, I seemed to pick up on them a bit more, which made me slightly uneasy. As if they might notice me more as well. I pushed the thought to the back of my mind. It's unlikely.
I walk into the room, uncaring of the eyes that pay me unwanted attention or no attention at all. Either suits me just fine. My hair, in all its glory, is spiked, glittered and gelled. I had to do something to brighten up the dull school uniform. I glance at Alec for a second, but he's with some of his other friends and doesn't seem to notice. Nothing new there – we never used to mingle and a demon cat isn't going to change that. I put my bag on my desk and wait for the teacher to begin her class as I pull out my pencil case and note books. We're doing Shakespeare, first sonnets and then a play. And that's fine by me too.