Hello again! I'm back with a brand spanking new story!

Let me know what you all think- it will be considerably different to 'Till Divorce Do Us Part!'

This is just the first chapter, so knowing what you all think of it will be amazing.

Cassandra Clare owns all TMI names


Now

"Jace Wayland, don't you DARE slam the door on me! You get back in here right this minute and explain to me exactly what the hell is going on!"

A magazine, which bore the headline "Hollywood star's brawl with lover's lover" was clutched in the screaming woman's hand. The door, which had just been slammed shut by an angry Jace Wayland, remained closed and the woman was seething.

Never in her entire ten years in the business had she been this mad at a client. He had made her life difficult from day one and she was almost ready to quit.

What the hell had her client got himself into this time?!


Six months ago

"Clary Fray, please remain behind after class."

Clary looked up from packing her books away to stare at her lecturer in shock. Why was she being asked to stay behind? As far as she knew, her lecturer didn't even know her name!

"What's up Fray?"

Clary shrugged and shook her head at the boy sitting next to her. "No idea Simon."

Simon pushed his glassed further up his nose and sniffed as he stood up. Towering over her, he said, "Well, good luck anyway. I guess," before walking away.

Heart beating a little faster, Clary made her way to the front of the class. Her lecturer was a middle aged man by the name of Hodge who stared down his nose at his students. Clary didn't much like him, but she respected him nonetheless.

"Clary I'm guessing?" Hodge asked as she approached the podium he taught behind.

Clary nodded her head in confirmation and offered a weak smile.

"I have some rather bad news Clary. I am unable to pass your latest submission. I specifically said that the painting was to adhere to the idea of change. As I assessed your painting, I was unable to identify the representation of change."

Clary stared dumbly at her lecturer. So much for getting points for creativity. "I'm sorry sir, but I genuinely believed I was following the set instructions. As you may have worked out, I drew inspiration from Dante's Inferno and his idea of Hell. Personally, I view demon risings as a form of change," frowning at the fact Hodge hadn't caught on yet, Clary sighed. "I mean, a demon rising is a change from our idyllic environment; it is a change from good to bad, safety to danger, light to dark."

The look Hodge gave her was not encouraging. "Clary, to be honest with you, I could have simply failed you without giving you a reason. However for this situation, I felt that I had to talk to you about it. And unfortunately, I couldn't work out what your artwork was describing. I could not identify the transformation that you just described. The use of the charcoal was brilliant I will give you that, but myself and other professor's feel that it was not up to the par required by student's doing this course."

Clary's body felt like it was overheating and her palms got clammy. She had never screwed up an assessment piece before. If she failed this, then it would set her back a good credit point. "So what does this mean? I don't suppose I can resubmit it?"

"No, you can't resubmit it. It means I am going to have to fail you. I hope you take this on as a valuable lesson about following criteria."

Clary just nodded her head and meekly left the lecture theatre trying her hardest not to cry.


Shoving through the throngs of end of day workers, Clary grumbled quietly to herself. Her meeting with Hodge had been the last thing she had expected and it topped off a bad week. Never had she failed an assessment before, and over something as trivial as her idea of 'change'… It was pathetic. She knew she could take the decision to a higher authority within the university, but she wasn't sure if she would win anyway.

Personally, she had thought that choosing a demon uprising as a symbol of change was quite an ingenious idea. For many years she had been fascinated with Dante's Inferno, and she drew her inspiration for the art piece from what it would be like for Hell to be on Earth. She still couldn't believe that Hodge did not understand her symbolic use of demons to describe the change from Earth to Hell.

Halfway to the ferry that would take her home, it started to lightly sprinkle rain. "For God's sake, seriously?" Clary cursed out loud as she blinked up at the dark sky. She was still a good five minute walk from the docks and she didn't have an umbrella on her if it decided to full on pour.

Cursing her luck, Clary hastened into a fast paced walk. The after-five-crowd had dispersed around the Idris botanical gardens, and so Clary was left to trudge towards the Alicante River alone. Under the shelter of the big old trees, Clary managed to avoid getting too wet.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, Clary was knocked to the ground. The book that had been held in her arm thudded to the ground as she threw her arms out to brace herself from the harsh reality of concrete and her face meeting.

Looking up from where she was sprawled, she spotted a figure running away from her. From her vantage point on the ground, all she saw was a black coat and a mess of blonde hair. The figure didn't stop to apologise, nor did it turn to see if she was harmed. Rolling her eyes at the complete lack of concern in some people, Clary slowly picked herself and her book up and continued on her way.

Her day went from bad to worse when two things happened simultaneously. As she stepped out of the shelter of the trees to head towards the dock, the sky chose that exact moment to open up. Even as this happened, the ferry that she normally took home was arriving at the dock meaning that she needed to start running to catch it, lest she miss it.

Clary hated running with a passion but she needed to be home on time. Letting out a loud groan, Clary hugged her book closer to her body and worked her short legs into something that resembled a run. Thankfully, there was a queue for the ferry, and she managed to arrive in all her drenched glory just as the last few people were boarding. The boarding assistant gave her a look that screamed judgment at her water soaked clothes and hair as Clary stepped off the ramp. Glaring right back at the rain-coated woman, Clary stalked through into the cabin not caring if she was going to drip water onto the floor. It was a ferry; if the floors didn't prevent slips when wet, then the boat designer was an idiot.

Taking the first available seat without looking at the other occupant, Clary set her book onto her lap and chucked her bag onto the floor by her feet. From in front of her, the boarding assistant stepped into the cabin and made eye contact with her. Smiling at the sneer on the other woman's face, Clary grabbed her wayward hair and started to wring it out, shaking the water onto the floor of the aisle next to her.

It was the snort of laughter coming from her right that caused her to break eye contact with the boarding assistant and shift her gaze onto her companion. Up until then, she had completely ignored the presence of the person sitting next to her as any good person who takes public transport was wont to do. Raising her eyebrow in question, Clary locked stares with the man sitting next to her. Shooting him a small smirk as acknowledgement, Clary turned her gaze once more to the assistant ready to antagonise the woman again.

Much to her disappointment, the woman had obviously moved while Clary's attention had been distracted. Pulling her hands once more through her wayward curls to extract more moisture, Clary let out a sigh of resignation as her fingers got tangled in her hair. It was going to take her even longer now to get ready for her date with Jonathon. Her boyfriend didn't like it when her hair was curly, and even though she had straightened it to an inch of its life that morning, the rain had caused her hair to curl up once again. Taking a quick glance at her watch, she calculated roughly half an hour to get ready once she got home. Jonathon was rarely tardy when it came to picking her up and he hated having to wait for her.

The ferry ride normally took twenty minutes, so she settled back and opened her book up intending on giving herself sometime to relax. After ten minutes of uninterrupted reading, she noticed her seat companion leaning towards her as though he was reading the book as well.

Maybe he was a tourist and didn't know correct public transport etiquette, because much to Clary's shock, the man started to speak. "Michelangelo?"

Looking up, Clary once again locked eyes with her seat companion. With her eyebrows raised in surprise, Clary nodded but didn't say anything as she turned back to her book. People weren't supposed to talk to each other on boats.

"What is your interest in Mikey?"

Almost choking on her spit due to her surprise and ignoring 'etiquette', Clary looked up again. "Mikey?"

The man shrugged and nodded his head down towards her book. "Mikey sounds much cooler than Michelangelo. I mean, the orange ninja turtle was called Michelangelo right? And every one called him Mikey. He was my favourite."

Completely confused at the change of topic from famed artist to ninja turtles, Clary titled her head slightly to appraise him. "And your point is?"

The man raised his hands up with his palms facing her. "I have no point. Just you know, making conversation."

Raising her eyebrow in speculation, Clary drawled out, "Right."

Nodding his head, the man shot her a wink. "I'm new to town, so just meeting the locals."

Internally, Clary fist pumped the air. She knew this man had to be a tourist- or at least someone new- to strike up conversation in a place like a ferry where conversations with strangers were usually avoided. Out loud however she replied with a teasing lilt to her voice, "You ride ferries to meet the locals?"

Clary watched as the man next to her ran a hand through his hair. Unlike her, he was perfectly dry. "Nah, not all the time. Sometimes I use dating sites. It's hard meeting new people when you look like me."

Once again, Clary was in risk of choking. This man had to be pulling her leg. He was one of the most gorgeous men she had ever set her eyes on; meeting new people wouldn't be hard for him. Playing along anyway, Clary retorted with, "Yes, Idris isn't all that a friendly place. I've lived here forever, so I'm thankful I don't have to try integrating myself into this society."

With mock seriousness, her seat companion nodded his head. "You are the first person I have actually managed to talk to without being flipped off. It's rather annoying after the seventh time. Why, the person in this seat before you stuck his headphones in and pretended I didn't exist! Even while I was waving my hand in his face!" The expression of exaggerated outrage on his face made Clary giggle.

Glancing out the window behind the man's head, Clary noted that her stop was approaching. And that the rain had thankfully stopped. Not that she could get any wetter anyway. "Well, hopefully you make it through the rest of your holiday without being flipped off," she said while picking her bag up off the floor. "Can't guarantee it though," she added as an afterthought while grinning at the other man.

Chuckling, her seat companion shrugged his shoulders. "It does get rather mundane after a while. I suppose being flipped off means I actually exist to people."

Clary snorted. "If that's what makes you happy," she said as she stood.

The ferry was making a loud rumbling sound as it drew closer to the dock and Clary held onto the seat as the vibrations of the boat got heavier.

With a smile goodbye to her gorgeous seat companion Clary headed towards the exit of the cabin. The boarding assistant was standing to one side ready to help people off the boat and when she saw Clary, her face turned sour. Obviously the woman was going to be the one who would have to clean up the water that Clary had purposely wringed out onto the floor.

Once the boat stopped and the boarding ramp was lowered, Clary breezed past the assistant without a care in the world. She had an important night ahead and she had very little time before Jonathon came to collect her.

As she walked through the streets towards the apartment complex that she lived in, she reflected on her brief conversation with the man on the ferry. He had somehow brought some light to her crappy day and she had a new spring to her step as she walked. Who knew that talking to some random stranger could make her greet other random strangers that she walked by. The weird looks she received because of it only made her smile wider, much to the alarm of some people she passed.

She reached her apartment in good time and for once she chose to take the elevator up to her floor instead of walking. Jonathon constantly complained about her not being fit enough, and he had convinced her to take the seven flights of stairs between the ground floor and her floor every time she left and arrived home.

"Do it for me Clary," he had said to her after they had been dating for two months. "You want us to look good together don't you baby?"

Clary had agreed to his face, but behind his back she had continued taking the elevator. When Jonathon had found out that she hadn't listened to him, he had been angry. He had been waiting by her door ready to pick her up for a date and she had been running late after a lecture. The look of disapproval on his face when the elevator doors had slid open had said it all, and Clary didn't need the two minute lecture from him to know how he felt about her not listening to him.

From that day on, she had persevered with the stairs much to Jonathon's satisfaction. Clary didn't grumble too much about his insistence; he was her first boyfriend and she liked making him happy.

Personally she thought she was skinny enough without the added exercise. She had always been the smallest girl throughout school and even as a woman of twenty two, she was still small.

Guiltily stepping out of the elevator, Clary hurried to open her apartment door. Stripping off her wet clothes as she went, Clary ambled into her bedroom and sourced the dress she was going to wear and her favourite stockings. Laying them on the bed, she walked into her bathroom and made a start on dealing with her hair.

She was in a good mood and nothing would dampen her spirits tonight. It was her third anniversary with Jonathan and he had said that they had something serious to discuss. She was hoping that they were going to talk about moving in with each other tonight. They lived on opposite sides of the city, so it was more practical if they lived in the same place together. Especially since they saw each other at least four or five times a week.

With five minutes before Jonathan was due to arrive, Clary could be found sitting on her bed pulling on her stockings. Her boyfriend had indicated his dislike of her wearing dresses without stockings before, and Clary had worn them ever since. Unfortunately in her haste to pull them on, one of her rings snagged on the fabric causing the material to ladder out.

Not letting this one incident dampen her spirits, Clary just shrugged and tossed the stockings aside. One night without stockings wouldn't hurt. It was the middle of summer, so stockings would look stupid anyway.

Moments before the buzzer went off indicating Jonathon's arrival, Clary was preened and polished to an inch of her life, minus stockings. He had always demanded perfection from her, and tonight she was in the mood to give it to him. Letting him in her door, her boyfriend appraised her with a smile as he took in her perfectly straight hair and her figure hugging black dress. He frowned slightly when he reached her legs and Clary fidgeted a bit under his close scrutiny. Maybe should have worn another pair of stockings, she thought as Jonathon's dark gaze came back up to her face.

Bending down to give her a kiss, Jonathon gave her a heart melting smile. Her spirits were raised when he encased her within his arms, but she came crashing back to Earth when he hissed harshly into her ear as he drew away, "Put some damn stockings on Clary."


I wonder if it is obvious how much I don't like Jonathon. I write him as such a bad guy!

More to come soon!