I'm new to fanfiction so I would really appreciate some constructive criticism! So please read and review and I hope you enjoy! =]
Disclaimer: Unfortunately for me, I don't own Mortal Instruments or any of the characters used here. Cassandra Clare has that honour!
When Clary had first come to stay with Luke she had welcomed her rooms familiarity compared to the impersonal institute, but now she was home sick. Being home sick felt a lot worse when you didn't have a home to go to and even worse still when all that remained of the life you had lead for over fifteen years was the empty shell of an apartment- which may or may not be filled with some left over forsaken and which smelt like a cross between a sewer and a mountain of decomposing bodies. To make it worse everyone Clary had ever thought she knew had changed in the short time since her mother had been kidnapped.
Her life had been turned upside down and inside out. When her Sight had started coming back it had let her see far more than demons, downworlders and Nephlin; Clary saw things about her loved ones true identities that she would never have imagined in her wildest dreams. Not even after watching a blood curdling horror movie and eating an entire block of cheese before bed. Some parts of their new personalities she admired, but others things she had learned about her loved ones filled her with treacherous resentment. Things were not going well for Clary, to say the least.
As Clary lay awake in bed she threw a glance to the digital clock on her bedside table. Tauntingly the red screen flashed 04:21. No matter how hard she tried Clary just couldn't get to sleep. She tossed and turned and adjusted and readjusted her pillow but it was pointless, she was already perfectly comfortable and it made no difference. It wasn't the beds fault that Clary couldn't sleep.
She had taken to joining Isabelle training most days. She hadn't realised until recently how much effort went into being a shadow hunter. She had always just taken it for granted that they were naturally skilled. That may have been partially true but they still pushed themselves beyond their limits every day in the pursuit of perfection. Now that she was part of the family they weren't complaining about her getting involved anymore. Isabelle was the most accommodating and Clary had found an unexpected friend in her. She simplified what she was doing so Clary could do it too and she always knew when to ease up. Even so, it was always a gruelling session and the following morning Clary's muscles would scream in pain and rebellion. Clary welcomed this! "No pain; no gain" she told herself masochistically.
Nights after one of her work outs with Isabelle, Clary would return to Luke's house, have dinner, and then curl up in her bed and let exhaustion pull her under. Today Clary had not been to the Institute at all. In fact she hadn't done anything physically exerting what-so-ever. It was nights like tonight that Clary really suffered. Luke had wanted her to go with him to visit her mother and of course she couldn't refuse. Clary was so worried about her mom that it was driving her towards the brink of insanity; she wanted to see her just as much as Luke wanted the company. Even so, she knew she would pay the price for her easy day when night time fell. No, it definitely wasn't the beds fault that she couldn't sleep.
Clary didn't know who to blame really… Herself for not exhausting herself or maybe for being such a twisted human being? Jace for existing, for being so perfect? Valentine for playing his mind games and making the situation worse? There were too many things about her life these days that she didn't understand and only two things were absolutely certain. One was that sleep would not come to her tonight. And second, that she was completely and irrevocably in love with her brother, and it was tearing her apart.
Nights like tonight only one thing was on Clary's mind. It was not her unresponsive mother, not her old destroyed life, not her psychotic father. It was Jace. Jace Wayland- an overconfident, sarcastic, shadow hunter. He was the person whom she dreamed about every night and his was the face that shone like the sun behind her eye lids every time she closed them. His perfect face, his butterscotch hair, his toned muscely body, lightly tanned and adorned with beautiful faint white scars, all of these things were imprinted in Clary's mind as if they had been burned there by a stele. And they blatantly refused to fade! She was alone in the dark with no one but herself for company and despite her best efforts to change the subject it seemed all she wanted to talk about was him.
Clary's mind ignored her wishes in these situations and flooded her with memories of the boy she was so desperately in love with. Vividly it recalled how his hands had felt locked in her hair, how his lips had crushed hers passionately, how they had melted into each other as his lips parted hers and their embrace had intensified. She remembered everything about the few brief moments they had shared like that. She remembered the reaction her body had, tingling where he touched her as if he was passing an electric current through her skin. She remembered feeling her stomach flutter uncontrollably and how she had felt so complete. Passion had taken possession of her body and she had succumbed to it, feeling nothing but joy.
It was unbelievably cruel that the one thing that Clary wanted most in the world, the one thing that would make anything else bearable, she could never have. She knew the love they shared was wrong and she knew that if other people knew they would be upset and repulsed. She was filled with shame because of it. Clary knew that her feelings were wrong, that they were completely unnatural and inappropriate. She wasn't supposed to love Jace this way. But there was nothing she could do about it.
Clary had made the decision to tell Jace she wanted to be with him. She had decided that their love was too strong to ignore and that trying to do so would be far too hard. She psyched herself up for the fateful moment when she would tell him she didn't care what anyone else thought. She imagined it a thousand times. She imagined him being overjoyed, kissing her, maybe saying something romantic and then, of course, living happily ever after. But, nothing was going right for Clary and this was no exception. Just as she worked up the courage and started he dropped a bomb that exploded in her chest and slashed wounds so deep in her heart she didn't know how it still managed to pump blood around her body. Surely the excruciating pain of heartbreak she felt was enough to kill her?
Jace had told her he that he agreed with her, what they had between them was wrong. He looked her in the eyes, and promised he was just going to be her brother from then on. She hadn't even got her confession off lips and the dream was shattered. Clary had tried desperately to hide her inner turmoil from Jace, adopting the steely blank expression she had often seen him wearing. She didn't want him to know how much she loved him when he clearly didn't feel the same anymore, not if he was able to give it all up so easily.
Now, every night when Clary thought of him she felt not only lonely and ashamed but she felt her crushed, mutilated heart twist and contort in her chest and she felt the wounds he had carved tear open and ache afresh. It was when she allowed herself to really think about it, to accept that he could never be hers that Clary really crumbled. Her beautiful memories quickly morphed into torturous acidic ones. Her mind would bombard her with images of Jace's face when he had first realised that Clary was his sister, the horror she had seen in the depths of his eyes tormented her as much as her own pain. The moment Jace made that dreadful promise replayed in Clary's head like as if it were on a loop, and unbelievably, each time it played its impact grew stronger and the pain grew worse.
Lying in her bed staring at the dark ceiling Clary made a mental note to call Isabelle in the morning to see if she minded her joining in with some training! As the red LED screen changed to read 04:22 tears fell silently down Clary Fray's cheeks and rolled onto her already damp pillow. She surrendered to despair and prepared herself for a long, painful night.