Chapter 4

It was 20 minutes into dinner and all attempts at conversation had either been ignored, sarcastically dissolved into awkward silence, or otherwise futile. Jace seemed to take every question, every piece of information, swallow it up, and then regurgitate it into an annoying mess. Clary, and everyone else, was getting pretty annoyed, but Jocelyn tried asking one more question.

"What do you like to do, Jace?"

"Oh you know, break things, get in fights, normal kid things."

Clary had finally had enough, she was tired of him playing the tough guy with no feelings.

"Will you stop it, Jace! Just get over yourself! Is there a reason why you're so painfully adverse to any friendly human relationship? Can't you just try to get along with us? We've been trying all day and all you've given us it a bunch a crap!"

Jace looked over to her.

"You don't know me and I don't know you. As far as I can see, even if you did know me, you wouldn't understand me, so why don't you just leave me alone! I don't want to be here any more than you want me to!"

Clary was sad now, simply sad. She thought of how badly she had wanted this earlier, how she had dreamed of it, and now it was just garbage on the street. She wanted that little girl with the curly hair, or the little boy with the green eyes, not someone older than her (she had figured out earlier that he was 17, two years older than her, though she would be 16 soon) who was dead-set against any type of bond. But she knew, that once she got past his cold exterior, she would find a friend, and that was enough to keep her going.

She wanted to figure Jace out, and she was still going to try, but it was going to be a lot harder than she thought. What he had just said made her think even more that some bad things had happened in his past.

Then, Clary said, more quietly this time, "Can't you just let me try? It doesn't even have to be me, just someone Jace, just try to trust someone."

"Oh, but, little girl, don't you see? I have tried and even succeeded, and then, BAM there goes everything. Everytime. Eventually I gave up. It gets tiring, losing everything over and over."

Clary felt like she was finally getting closer to finding the answer to the complicated problem that was Jace.

No longer had she thought that, when Jace said, "And if you really want me to trust you stop acting like a freaking detective, or therapist, or something. Been there, done that, and I will never be doing it again. Besides, I have a feeling you're actually much more interesting."

God, how did he do that? With one sentence, one word, one he probably didn't even mean, he managed to flush her cheeks hotter than a frying pan.

However, Clary didn't know what to say, what he said was actually true. She had been treating him like a case to crack, a problem to fix, and though that was what she was trying, she wanted him to like her, because even though he'd been a jerk to her all day, she already liked him.

She didn't realize she'd been staring at him until he said, "Look, I know I'm devilishly handsome and all, but the enraptured stare is a bit much, so I think I'll just go."

Then, Luke interrupted. Clary had completely forgotten about her parents. He said gently, "Jace we don't know about your past because you won't tell us. We could call up Madeleine and ask her, but we want you to do it on your own. Clary's just trying to help."

"I don't need your condescending words. I don't need anybody or anything. All I do is destroy them anyway."

There it was again, the destroying things. 'What could have happened that made him think that?' Clary wondered.

"Well now that we've had that touching, straight-out-of-the-movies moment, I'm going to go get some get some beauty sleep. Not that I really need it," Jace said.

Jace swung out of the kitchen and when he was gone, the three left sat in silence. Finally, Clary's mom sighed and started cleaning up from dinner.


"Hey, look on the bright side! At least it beats out that dinner where I came over to your house to escape my parents after they caught me kissing that guy as the worst dinner ever. You know, the one they had already told me I couldn't date. What was his name? Meliorn? Yeah, that sounds right."

Clary just smiled dimly and rolled her eyes. That had been, before the one just a few minutes earlier, the worst dinner ever. Isabelle had climbed out her bedroom window, made her way over to Clary's house, told Clary what was going on, but made her promise not to tell Luke and her mom. Isabelle's parents had found her missing, figured she had come to Clary's house and marched right over. They had yelled and screamed, asking how they could just let their grounded daughter stay at their house. It wasn't until they Clary's parents could explain that they hadn't known (at which point they shot death glares at the two girls trying to look invisible in the corner), that they calmed down and took Isabelle home, with two weeks added to her previous one week. Clary had also been grounded, but only for a week.

That was just one of the good (bad?) memories Clary had with Isabelle. Other than Simon, Isabelle was Clary's best friend, and since Simon currently wouldn't pick up his phone, Isabelle was who she called.

"Anyway," Isabelle went on, "tell me more about him, is he hot?"

Now Clary full-out smirked, "Is that all you ever think about Izzy?"

"No, just most of the time. I can be serious though!" Isabelle said, getting just a bit defensive at the end.

"Oh yeah," Clary taunted, glad to be able to joke after such a horrible day, "prove it."

"I think you need to forget about asking Jace about his past and his current self and let him tell you when he's ready. However you should still try to be friends with him, I think he needs one. And it would be so cute if you two ended up together!" Isabelle said, and Clary could perfectly imagine her friends heart eyes as she thought about it. Clary was more focused on the advice though.

"That would never happen, Iz. A guy like him would never date a girl like me."

"So does that mean he is hot?"

"Why don't you just come over tomorrow and see for yourself," Clary suggested.

"Ooo okay! Well I'll see ya tomorrow! Love ya! Bye!"

"Bye Iz," Clary said with a smile.

Talking with Isabelle had made her feel much better. Plus, the advice she had given Clary was actually pretty good. Clary figured she ought to stop being surprised about that, considering how many times Isabelle's wise words had helped her a time or two. However there were also those times where her advice was the complete opposite of good and left you in more of a sticky situation than before. Isabelle was all extremes.

Clary did keep thinking about what she said, though. In fact, Clary decided she was going to do something about right then.


So, I introduced Isabelle! Don't worry, Clary will be going to school soon and then the rest of the characters will be introduced! Also, this has been my longest chapter so far! yay! xx