AN: Hello everyone! First of all, I laughed so much writing this chapter, partially because I Co-wrote it with Mads Hatter (she is amazing and talented and awesome!), but also because this chapter is, in my opinion, is one of the funniest I've written so far. Okay now I'll stop talking and let you get to reading it :D

Enjoy

Cruel Reflections

All characters belong to Cassandra Clare

Chapter 25.

Alec's point of view

"Alec really loves peaches," Magnus had said, and from there things generally went downhill for Alec. It had been one embarrassing remark after another. "He's got really lovely arms," Camille had said, which had made both Lydia and Alec blush wildly. Magnus had enjoyed it way too much. He'd sipped on his milkshake, licking his lips seductively, and then as soon as Lydia would look at him he'd merge into the picture of innocence. He was one slick bastard... One insanely seductive slick bastard. All too late Alec had sighed and stated that him and Lydia were going home, which Magnus obviously turned into some kind of dirty remark and had Camille laughing in fits and Alec burning with embarrassment. Magnus had thought it was adorable. "Bye, lovelies," he'd called. "It was a pleasure to meet you Lydia."

"Yeah, y-you too," Lydia had called and looked down at her red Converse shoes.

The car ride home was also very interesting. Lydia smiled in the weirdest way and tucked her messy braid back into order. "So your friends are pretty interesting."

"Uh huh," Alec nodded and tapped his fingers on the driving wheel. It was getting dark and he had to concentrate on the road.

"I mean, the blonde one, Camille, she was a bit scary…actually intimidating, but Magnus, he was super nice," Lydia said and looked out the window, gazing at the lights that flashed by.

"Yeah," Alec snorted and smiled to himself. Magnus was really nice, when he wasn't trying to embarrass the life out of Alec.

"It was very nice of him to invite us to eat with him and Barbie," Lydia remarked and sighed in a dreamy manner.

"Mhm," Alec noted and tried to squint his eyes to see the street sign at the end of the road. "Yeah, very nice."

"I don't know if this is really inappropriate, but fuck it…um you don't happen to know if he has, like, a girlfriend or something…because I was wondering if I should ask him out. It's just… you know it's been a long time since I've met someone who made me laugh like that. I know I'm probably getting over excited, but I just thought…I mean he's probably taken because all the good ones are, but…"

That right there snapped Alec out of his haze. "W-What?"

"What?" Lydia asked and looked around innocently.

"M-Magnus?" Alec asked. "Y-you like Magnus?"

"Well, he's attractive and funny and I'm new to town," Lydia explained. "Besides it's been a while since I've instantly felt a connection with someone."

"No!" Alec exclaimed.

"What do you mean no?" Lydia asked. She looked frazzled and a bit taken aback by Alec's sudden burst of emotion.

"I-I mean he's taken," Alec spat out. "Very, very taken."

"Oh, who's he seeing? Are they cute? Is it Barbie? Barbie's too blonde for him or no?"

"I- no I don't I mean…." Alec stuttered.

"Because I get the feeling he's into blue eyes and black hair."

"Wh-wha-what do you mean? I-we- Because we never…" Right now, Alec was cursing whatever genetic flaw it was that caused his awkwardness in situations like this one.

"Why so defensive?" Lydia asked while raising her thin eyebrow. "You know the more you deny it the more you know it's true."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Alec muttered and tried to avert his eyes back to the road in front of him. It would be a shame if he crashed the car into a ditch. Although, right now a ditch didn't seem too bad of an option, if it would get him out of this.

"So you're not seeing Magnus?"

"I- I mean it's...It's complicated," Alec sighed and scratched his neck. He felt his face become hotter; he was most positive that it had turned a lovely shade of tomato soup.

"It's not complicated. Tell me this," Lydia began and turned to look at Alec with her questioning gray eyes. "Do you want to ride him like a bad, bad pony?"

"First of all, what does that mean? Do I even want to know? Second, it's still complicated. Just because you want something doesn't mean you can have it. And yes, maybe I do."

"Meaning your parents don't know that you're gay." The way Lydia said it made it sound like an observation, not a question, like he had just confirmed something she already knew. He didn't know if he liked that he was so easy to read.

"Considering my mom was hoping for you to become my possible love interest, I would have to say no," Alec answered, compelled to honesty. Something about Lydia's eyes just pulled the truth out of him. It felt rather liberating and left him exposed.

Lydia didn't say anything, just nodded as if she understood. The lights continued to flash by as they drove in silence. It wasn't the comfortable silence that they'd shared when they'd made the drive up, but it was a suffocating one instead. Alec must have opened his mouth to say something a thousand times, but just couldn't find the right words. Finally he gathered the courage to ask what he'd wanted to know since the beginning of their conversation. "Lydia?"

"Yeah?" She answered, like the silence had never been there.

"Why...Why do you care?"

"Why do I care about what? I care about a lot of things, you know, like polar bears, melting ice caps, wars, famine, the new fall collection by Michael Kors."

"You know," Alec began. "About me being...you know, what I am."

"You're gay, Alec. Not Lord Voldemort, you can say the word," Lydia said and laughed lightly, "Besides friends care about their friend's lives. It's what they do."

"So we're friends now?" Alec asked, not sure of how to proceed.

"I'd like that very much. You've proven much more interesting than my father made you sound. So scandalous with secret lovers and all."

"He's not a secret. I mean, I don't want him to be a secret. I- I think I'm in love with him," Alec said his eyes locking on a set of headlights now coming towards them.

Isabelle's point of view

It had been too long that her brother had been getting away with being all mysterious and sneaky. Isabelle was not a stupid girl, she had plenty of assets, both physical and mental, to work with. Maybe she didn't get A's in algebra, but honestly, who the hell did. Still, she knew that something was going on with her brother and she was hell bent on finding out what it was. No brother of hers was going to get away with anything. It was in the sister rulebook. (Literally. In 6th grade her and a few friends had made one. It was rule #5.) So it was time to take things into her hands and do some investigating. First things first though, she had to pick a good investigating outfit. With a quick scan of her wardrobe she opted for black leggings and a cozy black polo neck sweater. Unfortunately she didn't have a jewelled ear piece.

Making sure Maryse and Robert were nowhere to be seen, she sneaked into Alec's room and gently closed the door behind her, making sure it didn't make too much noise. The first thing she noticed was that his dresser drawer was partially open while the rest of his room looked to be in immaculate order. Very suspicious. She walked over to it and decided to cross the line between respecting her brother's privacy. There was no such thing as privacy in this house anyway. She opened the drawer and peered in. It was full of shirts and sweaters. Old man sweaters. Sweaters that had perhaps once looked beautiful and bright, but had been worn so much that they looked like a bland mix of blandness in the shade of bland. "Seriously, Alec, we need to upgrade your wardrobe. I can't have people thinking we don't give you money for clothes." With a sigh she continued looking through the rest of his room. It was surprisingly disappointing to know that he had nothing of interest in it. Feeling like this whole expedition to Alec territory was pointless; she let out a frustrated growl throwing herself on his bed. As she hit the soft mattress something hard crashed against her head. "Ow, what the hell." She reached out and pulled Alec's computer from under his pillow. "Oh," she gasped. "This could be interesting." She opened his computer and was faced with his password inquiry. "Hmm… Let's see. Dead hamster? No, okay…let's try mom's maiden name. No, let's go with…oh no? Aha! I've got it," Izzy exclaimed in a triumphant whisper. "Coffee."

Izzy squealed when the lock screen moved out of the way and made way for Alec's desk top. "Honestly, so predictable…" Izzy muttered as she went through Alec's computer. His wallpaper was a picture of a sandy beach with palm trees swaying on each side. It was nice to know she wasn't the only one dreaming about an escape to warmer regions. She opened up his folders and looked through what was mostly school work; essays, novels and oh look at that…A strange folder caught Izzy's eye; it was titled GK.2013. Last year. Wasn't the person Alec had been talking to called Glittery Kitty on his lame app? Maybe they had been in contact for longer than she thought. Could Glittery Kitty be the reason Alec hadn't really dated anyone? Whether intentionally or not, Alec had sparked her curiosity with the name of the folder. And she was damn well going to find out just what was in it. Ensuring her descent into hell (and possibly a grounding if she was ever found out) Isabelle opened the file to find smaller folders all in alphabetical order, just named A, B or C. "Typical Alec," Isabelle sighed. "How boring does a person have to be to alphabetically organize their folders?" She randomly clicked on one, her cursor landed on the letter H. Under the letter H she found pictures. They looked like screen captures from text messages. Isabelle bit her lip. She knew she was crossing a whole other kind of line, a line so important that crossing it could bring down the entire Lightwood facade of a picture perfect family. Maybe she was just a horrible person inside or maybe she was a junkie for gossip, but she opened up one of the screen captures and devoured every letter it held.

"Jace: Who died in 1916?

Alec: I don't know, a lot of people I presume.

Jace: Lol, you're stupid.

Alec: Then why are you asking for my help?" Ugh, this was not what she was looking for. She could just invite Jace over if she wanted to hear this. It was inevitable the two start bantering. Just to make sure that Alec hadn't tried to outsmart devious little sisters with misleading file names, she clicked on another one.

"Jace: So, which one did you think was cuter, Kaitlin Abbot or Carter Rose?

Alec: Ha-ha, very funny

Jace: I'm just saying, one of them has a magnificent ass and I was wondering if you had observed.

Alec: Obviously I have. It's hard to miss.

Jace: Fair enough. (Cut the shit, I saw you looking earlier)

Alec: Idk what you're implying.

Jace: I'm not. I'm insinuating. There's a slight difference.

Alec: I'm buying you a dictionary for your birthday

Jace: Don't think I haven't noticed the evasive tactics. You're trying to redirect.

Alec: Can't I just be worried about your English grade?

Jace: No

Alec: Well that's comforting.

Jace: Freud would say that that word choice means that right now you are uncomfortable and need your mommy to tuck you into bed.

Alec: Freud also was an addict

Jace: Uh huh, Just answer the question

Alec: What question?

Jace: Kaitlin Abbot or Carter Rose?

Alec: FINE, Carter. Are you happy now?

Jace: Very pleased. So on a scale of one to ten how would you rate him?

Alec: Good night Jace." Question marks were almost tangibly trying to claw their way out of her brain she was so confused. Him? They were rating guys? Well, Izzy wouldn't put it past Jace to do it as a joke, but Alec wouldn't objectify his mates that way. Maybe they were drunk. Who knows? Izzy exited the folder and sighed. She had gained nothing but more questions. She was about to give up and retreat to her nail polishes and hot chocolate, but decided to try her luck once more.

Pictures 2013/14. That sounded about as dull as everything else she'd found. She clicked the folder anyway. Maybe he had secret porn photos of himself on there. Alec was smart. Like scary smart. She wouldn't put it past him to try to outsmart others with seemingly innocent file titles. But then again, did she really want to see secret porn shots of her brother? Oh well, she was going to hell anyway. She'd booked the tickets two weeks ago. Porn or no porn she started going through the pictures.

At first the pictures were mostly pretty basic stuff, family shots, a few screen shots, a couple memes, some landscape pictures and for some reason Chris Evans, which Izzy didn't mind at all (hello Mr. Abs). But then a cat that was captioned "the chairman" began appearing. Then a face Isabelle remembered smirked through the cat's fur. She was sure she knew him from somewhere. The man holding the cat had the most mesmerizing eyes she'd seen. They were emerald green, rimmed with black eyeliner. She felt as if they saw right through her even from a computer screen. More and more pictures of this strangely familiar man started to appear. One of him eating cereal, another of him and his cat again and one of him lying on his bed without a shirt smiling to the camera. What the hell? What the actual hell?

"This is beyond bizarre," Isabelle muttered. Alec's pictures of hot men were way hotter than the one's Isabelle had on her computer, and that just wasn't right. Not being able to stop she clicked to the next frame and was once again faced with a screenshot of a conversation. It definitely didn't help her confused state one bit. She was as lost as a polar bear in the desert. She wanted to go back to the North Pole.

"Glittery Kitty: My favorite colors are black and blue. For two reasons.

Peaches: Oh really? What would those reasons be?

Glittery Kitty: Well forget the obvious and think of the devious.

Peaches: Ah, I see. Should've known.

Glittery Kitty: Don't worry, you'll find out sooner than later.

Peaches: Don't know whether I'm excited or terrified." Isabelle shut her mouth after reading the messages out loud. "What the hell is this?"

Was Alec sexting? Maybe not. Maybe the conversation was completely innocent, maybe they were talking about winter colors? Maybe Alec was finally taking an interest to fashion…although that would support the conclusion Isabelle was coming to. Was her brother…attracted to men? Alec, golden boy, momma's favorite, Alec. Could he really be…Gay? At first it seemed like an absurd thought, but the more she mulled it around, the more sense it seemed to make. Alec had never gone out with a girl, not willingly anyway. He'd never even looked at girls, Isabelle knew because she'd noticed it. She'd always just pegged Alec as the polite type. She never thought to check if he was checking out guys instead of girls.

"I can't believe I've never noticed," Izzy whispered.

"Noticed what?"

Isabelle's heart jumped to her throat as her brother's familiar voice startled her. Okay, this could be bad. She turned around to look at Alec and discretely exited his picture folder. Alec had tousled black hair and red cheeks from the cold wind. His blue eyes seemed tentative, looking for an answer.

"I can't believe I've never noticed that you can use avocado instead of butter," Isabelle blurted out.

"Okay…why were you on my computer?" Alec asked suspiciously.

"Um," Izzy mumbled and smiled innocently, "My charger is lost and my computer's battery is empty. I just needed to check Buzz feed." She was aware that her excuse sounded like a complete load of bullshit, but that was the story she was sticking with.

"Right," Alec stated, looking like he didn't believe a word she said. "Do you still need to borrow it or…?"

"No, no," Isabelle said and got off Alec's bed. She straightened her top and patted Alec's laptop. "You um…you go do whatever you…um do on it and I'll go do my homework."

"Right," Alec said again. "Homework."

"Exactly, just can't get enough of that Algebra," Izzy said and laughed nervously.

Alec scrunched his eyebrows. "I thought you were failing Algebra."

"Well, unless I do my homework I will. So I gotta go do it now…"

"Right," Alec repeated for the third time. "You go do that. Also you might want to start sounding lucid again or mom and dad will think you're on something stronger than Sweet 'N All."

Izzy laughed harder than she should have, the sound coming from her mouth ringed in her ears. She needed to get out of Alec's room. She needed to think. She needed to clear her head and she could possibly benefit from some retail therapy…or real therapy. "Yeah, that's funny. It's probably just low blood sugar."

"Well go eat a banana or something. You're acting like a lunatic."

"Yeah, I'll um…do that. Thanks for the advice. Bye," She said and slipped out of Alec's room, closing the door behind her. "Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit," she whispered to herself. She couldn't process all the information she'd gathered, but she knew it was coming at her in a thousand different ways. Memories from Alec came to her and she analyzed them in a completely new perspective. She couldn't stop it even if she wanted to. She didn't know how to deal with this news, nor did she know if she was supposed to deal with it. All she knew was that if her parents found out about this, all hell would break loose. They'd have a picnic with it. That thought scared Izzy to the core. Suddenly, fear for her brother overtook the state of confusion she lingered in. "Oh poor Alec."

AN: Oooh, sneaky Izzy, Blunt Lydia and what the hell are we going to about Izzy looking through Alec's screenshots. That was not good folks, not good. Well let me know what you thought of this chapter, leave a review, because Maddy and I would very much appreciate them :D

Love Always Alexandra...and presumably Mads Hatter as well.