Chapter 2

Clary felt herself involuntarily shift forward on the chair on which she was perched. Luke stopped his incessant tickling and stared her down. The two of them waited.

"He's going to be here in two hours," she said, "Well actually more like an hour and a half now."

Clary immediately threw herself off the chair and screamed, "What? Look at the house! It's a mess! How are we going to have it clean by the time he gets here?"

She was panicking and she knew she was only making a bigger mess, but she desperately wanted to impress the little boy.

Luke snatched her up and told her to calm down, they'd get it clean enough.

It didn't stop Clary's inner turmoil, but she slowed down on the outside. Luke always knew just what to do to cheer her up, calm her down, anything. He really was like her father and she loved him like he was.

An hour and a half had passed and the house was, as Luke had said, sufficiently cleaned. Now, four anxious people (Clary had called her best friend Simon, filled him in, and he came over as quickly as he could) sat outside anxiously awaiting the arrival the boy.

Clary and Simon were playing tic-tac-toe on Simon's arms, Luke was tapping out a beat on Jocelyn's back, and Jocelyn was constantly checking her paint-splattered watch. Everything was silent except for the scratch of the pen, the knocking of fingers against a body, and the tick of clock.

Suddenly, the faint sound of a car engine could be heard some way in the distance, and those some four anxious people shot their heads up and stared at the road.
Within a few seconds, an old black '65 Mustang pulled up in front of them. Out of the drivers seat came a woman of about 35.

Clary's mom immediately jumped up, shook hands with the woman, and said,

"You must be Madeleine. The one I was talking to on the phone right?"

"That's right, I'm Madeleine Bellefleur," the woman, Madeleine, said with a polite smile.

Then, as they all looked around for the boy, Simon asked, "Umm, I don't mean to be rude, but I think you may have forgotten something when you left."

With a laugh, Madeleine shook her head and said, "No, no, he's just asleep in the backseat. He hates being vulnerable, but he put up a huge fight when we told him we were moving him again. He thinks he should just be able to live on his own, but since he's underage we just can't do that."

At that point Clary became confused, after all why would a little boy even think of living on his own? No sooner had she wondered that when the boy finally stepped out of the car.

The first thing Clary thought when she saw the orphaned older boy was that he was beautiful. Beautiful like nothing she'd ever seen before. Beautiful like a cloudless, warm, exciting summers day. His hair was a perfect blonde that shone in even the dullest of lights. His eyes were similarly colored and appeared to be molten gold. Everything about him seemed to be sculpted from the finest of stone, and although Clary was yet unable to tell for sure, she thought his underneath was just as tough and unbreakable.

Then she thought that he was no "little" boy. Not even close. He was tall, at least 10 inches taller than Clary, and he had broad shoulders, and muscular limbs. She could tell, even with his shirt on, that his stomach was toned and that his hips were narrow.

With a scowl, he said in masculine voice, "I wasn't asleep."

Madeleine just sent them a look that said, 'See I told you.'

Clary's mom was the first to recover from the shock of seeing a teenager step out of the car and said, "Hi, my name's Jocelyn. This," she said pointing to Clary and the others in turn, "is Clary, Luke, and Simon."

He looked at all of them as she spoke, and Clary thought self-consciously that his hard gaze lingered on her for just a bit longer than the others. She quickly looked herself up and down to check the nothing was wrong and felt her face as well.

After Jocelyn spoke, everything was silent once again.

Simon, once again, took the initiative and asked, somewhat more rude than he usually was, "Are you gonna tell us yourname?"

He appeared to think about it for a minute, then smirked and said, "No, I don't think so."

Clary realized what Madeleine was talking about when she told her mom on the phone that he was difficult. It seemed to frustrate Simon, but then Clary grabbed his hand and squeezed it once, tightly. She saw the boy's eyes follow her movement and thought she might have seen something other than anger in his eyes, maybe longing, maybe sadness. Clary felt bad for him when she realized he probably never got to experience simple affections like holding hands.

It also appeared to anger Madeleine, and she said, "Come on now Jace, you should be grateful to these people for taking you in."

'Jace, that's a pretty name,' Clary thought.

Jace simply threw a bored expression over to her and made no acknowledgement to her telling them his name.

"Well, Jace," said Luke, "we're glad to have you, do you want to see the house?"

Jace looked over to Luke and said, "I can see the house right now."

Luke, instead of getting frustrated like everyone else, simply chuckled.

Madeleine, however spoke up again, "Jace, give them a chance, just this one time give someone a chance."

Jace narrowed his eyes as he turned to her once again, "If you're asking me to love these people, you must realize that I've set a ridiculously high standard for the people I love."

"Oh and how high is this standard?" asked Jocelyn.

"Only perfect people. That, unfortunately, means I can only love myself." Jace said with smile like a poison rose.

Clary almost wished they had never signed up, but she knew, that more of that vulnerability she saw before was there, and if she could just find it, Jace would be who he really was.

I didn't remember if the books ever said how old Madeleine was, so I took a guess. Sorry if it's wrong :) xx