rippingbutterflywings: Hi, guys! So, this is my first collaboration, which I'm really excited about. The lovely clarissadele brought up the idea of writing a story together, and I've always wanted to write something with someone else, so we went for it. It's been awesome, to be honest. (We only have one chapter, but I feel like I can say that already.) I really am looking forward to exploring different themes with this story and stuff, so yay! I hope you like this chapter, and thank you for reading!

clarissadele: Hi, I'm clarissadele, previously 4everallways! I'm really exciting to be collaborating on this story and hope you all enjoy it! Reviews would make our day! Thanks!

**The characters in this story belong to Cassandra Clare**

And oh, oh, how could you do it?

Oh I, I never saw it coming
Oh, oh, I need the ending
So why can't you stay just long enough to explain?

She felt the grains of sand dig into her bare thighs as she shifted into a comfortable position, looking out into the horizon. The sky was painted of the most vibrant colors, shades of purple and pink and orange that were so unbelievably beautiful she couldn't bring herself to paint them. She could only stare.

Clary's hair, which was the shade of the deepest shade of red in the sunset, continuously slapped her face as the wind blew it into different directions. Annoyed, she tied it up into a bun, wishing, for the first time, that it were shorter. She looked out as the sky became more blue and purple than its previous colors, saw as the darkness painted over the day and the moon hung itself up in the sky.

She wanted to move, but she couldn't. If she went inside the house, her mother would just bombard her with questions, and she couldn't take any more questions. She'd already taken enough from the last week of her senior year, with the furrowed brows and the overly concerned teachers who, despite everything, did not cancel finals.

Because a student's death is not, apparently, a good enough reason to stop testing.

She heard footsteps approaching, and her head snapped up as if it had a life of its own. It was just one of the boys who lived in one of the houses; she'd seen him many times before. Jace Wayland. Blonde and tall and so very beautiful. She knew that he had been friends with him, too.

She still couldn't bring herself to say his name before fearing that she would fall apart into a million jagged pieces.

She bit her lip and stood up; she'd been out for too long. Clary slipped her jacket back on and made her way inside the house, where her mother, brother, and stepfather were waiting for her.

Jocelyn Fray was the first one to look at her when she walked into the house. "Are you hungry?" she asked her daughter, wearing a too-tight smile on her face.

To please her mother, Clary nodded. "Did you make dinner?"

"The day Mom stops making dinner will be the day I move out," Jon said. "Hey, Clary. Where were you?" He gave her the Mom was going crazy, so why didn't you come back earlier? look. She rolled her eyes at her brother and took a plate from the cupboard.

"I was just outside, a couple of houses down."

"Can I talk to you?" he asked.

She finished serving her food and nodded, following him into his room. Her mother used to be strict about the kids taking food to their bedrooms, but, since one of Clary's best friends died, Jocelyn decided that whether her kid ate in her bedroom or not was not exactly the most important thing in the universe.

Still, Clary snuck a glance at her, and she did not look pleased. Knowing she would not get scolded, though, she walked after her brother anyway, waiting for him to shut the door. She sat at his desk, setting her plate down on her lap. "What's up?"

"Mom is really, really worried."

"She asked you to talk to me, didn't she?" At his hesitation, she let out a sigh. "Jon, seriously."

"Clary, look, you're doing fine, in my opinion, but the truth is you haven't seen your friends outside of school, so that's slightly concerning, and you've been studying way too much this week."

"Would you rather I spend that time bawling my eyes out?" She gave him an incredulous look and, after taking her plate from her lap, stood up. "I'm going to my room."

"Clary—"

"Shut up, Jon."

She left the room in a hurry, angry tears forming in her eyes. She could not believe that her brother, of all people, was lecturing her on how to deal with feelings. This was the guy who punched a hole into the wall of his room when his girlfriend cheated on him.

She locked herself in her room, taking deep breaths. Calm down, Clary said to herself, taking deep breaths. She took her iPod and her headphones, clicking play on her classical music playlist.

Ever since she was little, music was the only thing to calm her down. Whenever she needed to relax, or to study, or to disconnect from the world, she just listened to her favorites and took a deep breath as she lay down on her bed and looked up at the ceiling or closed her eyes. Two hours of Yo Yo Ma awaited her, and she didn't care whether her food was going to be cold by the time she reopened her eyes. She didn't care, she didn't care, she didn't care.

She just breathed.

His funeral was the next day. There was a great turnout; over half of the school attended. It made sense; he was well liked and friends with most of the senior class. Clary caught sight of her best friend, Simon Lewis, across the parking lot. Next to him was his girlfriend, and one of Clary's other friends, Isabelle. Isabelle Lightwood was drop-dead gorgeous; with her incredible fashion sense and perfect makeup, she usually had the boys all drooling, despite the fact that she was with Simon. Today, however, she looked the exact opposite. Her face was practically bare, her hair tied back unceremoniously, and her plain black dress was hanging from her shoulders. On a normal day, she wouldn't have been seen outside of her house that way. But this wasn't a normal day.

Clary looked back and saw her brother and parents walking together. Her parents claimed they had come for him and his parents, because they had known him too, but Clary could see their true motives. They were there to make sure that she was okay. And she absolutely hated it. She hated that their presence was so overwhelming and annoying and that they asked her are you okay every day, like anyone would be okay after one of her best friends passed away. They were always looking over their shoulders to check that she was still there.

And she understood, but she really, really, really hated it.

Isabelle and Simon met her halfway, their faces grim. Clary didn't know if she looked quite as bad as the two of them, but she felt a thousand times worse on the inside.

"Hi," she said to them, feeling like she needed to say more, but the words couldn't form themselves in her mind. There were too many things she needed to tell the two of them, too many things she hadn't mustered up the courage to say during this past week and a half. She hadn't seen them outside of the school's too-crowded halls, and here they were. Her two best friends.

"Hey," Simon said, wrapping her in a hug. She squeezed back, growing scared of letting go. Despite the two of them being her absolute best friends, she'd known Simon longer. He was there when she learned to ride a bike and ended up with scrapes and bruises all over her body. He was there when she twisted her ankle in the first grade. He was there long before Isabelle, and, because of this, he would always be her primary source of comfort.

When he let go, it was Isabelle's turn. The two of them hugged, and Clary closed her eyes. She'd asked herself what she would have done if either one of these two had been the one to go, and it was the only thing that resonated in her mind. It could've been you, she wanted to say, but the thought made her eyes water and her chest feel like it was far too heavy for her body to hold. She didn't say anything, just walked with them the rest of the way.

His family wasn't very religious, so they had opted to hold the funeral in the cemetery, not at a church. Clary sat next to Simon, who had Isabelle on his other side. Her parents were sitting a few rows back, and as much as they were still scrutinizing her, at least they weren't hovering. The service was short; the speaker stumbled over his words, and in Clary's opinion, did a pretty bad job; but she knew he would have laughed. She could almost picture him sitting by her side, snickering at the speaker's nervousness and the cheesy words he read from a crumpled up piece of paper.

But, when she turned to find him, she saw Simon.

She almost felt like bursting into tears in the middle of the service. There were so many things that she wanted to say to him about everything—about the big moments and the small ones, about how much she loved him—but all she had was empty space and a coffin that felt all too close to her.

In it was his body. Or what remained of it, anyway.

She caught Jace Wayland's eye as he surveyed the crowd. They lingered on her as she met his gaze straight on, not looking away. He was another of his best friends, though they mostly spent time together because of football. She looked away after his mom went up to the front of the coffin to say a few words.

She wanted to look at anyone but his mom. She looked so broken, so utterly devastated, that her entire body hurt after she looked at the woman standing in front of her. She looked like she'd aged ten years in the past week and a half, like she gained all the years he lost because of a single, fleeting moment.

Clary didn't want to hear her speak.

But she had to do it. She reached out to hold Simon's hand, and he squeezed tightly enough that she felt her fingers might break. She tried everything to ignore the words stumbling out of the lady's mouth, the same woman who loved to bake and was there for him even with a 9-to-5 job. But they were too strong and too fast, and she caught parts of it, like the initial "thank you" at the people who showed up, and the fact that he was a good boy, and a great son, and a nice friend, and an example. Clary wanted to block her out as she started to cry in front of the hundreds of people at the funeral, but she couldn't tear her eyes away from the scene.

"I'm gonna be sick," she whispered to Simon.

He wrapped his arm around her shoulder, bringing her close. "You're gonna be okay."

She shook her head as the woman's husband helped her back to her seat. She didn't know what to do. She felt bad when, a week earlier, she told his mother that she couldn't speak at the funeral. His girlfriend was about to go up; Clary was supposed to go after her. She felt sick—physically sick—as she heard person after person speak about the person he was, the person he wanted to be, and what he did for them. She wanted to run until her lungs burned and she couldn't breathe.

But she couldn't move.

So she just stayed right there. His coffin was lowered into the grave, and she watched. Almost everyone left for the reception and she watched them leave. The rest of the chairs were put away, but the workers left her be. She caught their understanding and sympathetic looks, but she didn't care. She just sat.

Eventually, she walked over to the banquet hall where the reception was being held and joined everyone inside. She walked over to where her friends stood. Isabelle, Simon, Jonathan, Aline, Helen, Isabelle's brother Alec, his boyfriend Magnus, and Maia. But not him.

Jordan Kyle was the life of the party. Nothing would ever be the same.

Let us know what you think!