I wrote this forever ago and forgot to post it. Here you go, world. I'm not dead.
I've started to realize that Jace Wayland will never love me the way I need him to. This is not to say that he doesn't love me at all, but I love him long-term, while he only loves me in the moment. And I think that's beautiful, in a heart-shattering kind of way. It's so tragic, but I remind myself that experience is the most brutal of teachers, and I've learned so much from this disgustingly pernicious relationship. God, I learned.
I learned the hard way, but is there really any other way to learn? I watch him with Clary, and I know that she's the one he will end up with. I was never going to be Isabelle Wayland. I am an experience, but she will be his lifetime.
She's the one who is marriage material, and I am the one Jace is wasting some time with until he is ready to go back to her. He's using me for the experience—I am practice, and yes, he's failing the final test. But it doesn't matter if you fail a practice test, as long as it helps you get a passing grade on the actual exam.
I remember one occasion where Clary asked for a cigarette, and Jace was so angry that I gave it to her. I was going to corrupt her, and he wanted to keep her just the way she was, so he could eventually say that he had the perfect girl. It's not true, but it feels like I was just the girl he went to because she wouldn't sleep with him before marriage. And I fell for him so fast, and so hard, but all he did was ruin me.
"What are you thinking so hard about?" Jace asks as he turns the steering wheel to the left. My neighborhood appears overhead, streetlights punctuating the night, drowning out the stars.
"You," I answer.
He smiles. "What about me?"
And then I do something I promised I would never do. Through my teeth, I lie. "Happy thoughts."