Chapter 18: Two Separate Lives
Hello everyone! Thank you for coming back for another chapter, I hope you're enjoying the story so far. I've been reading all your reviews (thank you very much by the way!) and I'll focus a bit more on the other characters in the future. But on with this chapter first...
Jace had the press tour for 'A Hero of Two Worlds' coming up in the next few weeks. Originally they'd planned for Clary to go to a few premiers with him, knowing that they'd be able to travel and sight see in between everything. Now, she wasn't even sure if she was welcome.
It was a Saturday morning which they usually spent going for a long walk to get breakfast somewhere, and then walking back and just relaxing for the rest of the day. It was meant to be a no work day - Jace wasn't allowed to work on his movie, or Clary on her music. She'd ignored this rule for Jace last week; they had still gone for their walk and breakfast, but after he came home he told her that he needed to work on the script some more. She got it - he had possibly the biggest meeting of his life coming up and she thought that everything would go back to normal afterwards. But now she wasn't so sure.
When Clary got out of bed on Saturday morning, she wasn't sure what she'd find in the rest of the house. She thought there was a possibility Jace would still be asleep - he had been working too hard for the past couple of days, but the bed in the room he'd been sleeping in was empty.
He wasn't in the living room either, but his wallet and phone were both on the kitchen counter, so she assumed he hadn't left the house. She quickly went and checked his office and a few other rooms before deciding to give up - if he didn't want to be found, then she wasn't going to keep looking.
There was something more going on - something a lot more personal. Clary had worked hard before, spending all hours of the day, and much of the night working on and perfecting an album, but she'd never pushed away those close to her. Jace had worked hard before, but it never seemed to come at the cost of giving up her.
He kept bringing up her travelling - how it wasn't fair that she left, that he never wanted her to go. And while that may have been true, Clary didn't leave until he'd told her he was okay with. And he seemed to get over it quickly enough after she got back, so she wasn't sure why it should be a problem now.
Wanting to get away from the house and Jace for a little bit, she decided to go for their walk alone, just thinking things over and trying to figure everything out while she did. She ended up walking a fair distance further than they would usually go, so decided to run back and try and find Jace and just talk this whole thing over.
Even if it meant fighting - yelling and crying, she knew it would be worth it. Because it seemed their other option was just ignoring each other, and she could only see that going on for a little while longer before one of them just decided to call it quits and leave.
How plans were stopped before they could even get started however, as Jace wasn't home when she got back. She didn't know if he'd only left for a little while, so she stayed in the living room for a while, not bothering to shower or get changed. She didn't want to miss her opportunity to talk to him.
She lost faith that he was coming home any time soon, so she finally went to shower and get changed out of her running clothes. When she got out of the shower and went back to the living room, Jace still wasn't home. Clary desperately wanted to talk to someone about what was happening, but didn't know who to call. Magnus and Alec had just gotten engaged and she didn't want to interrupt their happiness. Kit had never been too good at the whole relationship thing - even though Kit liked Jace, he would probably just tell her to leave him. And although she loved Izzy, she was too close to Jace. She knew Luke would want to drop everything to come to L.A. and help her, and she really didn't need that right now, so in the end she called the person who had loved her the longest.
She picked up the land line and sat on the back deck. It took her a few minutes to actually call Simon - she didn't want to break down the moment he picked up the phone; she really just needed his advice on what to do.
She dialled his number, and her plan broke down straight away.
"Hi Simon," she said, her voice already breaking.
"Clary, what's wrong?" Simon answered straight away.
"I need your help?" she replied, taking deep breaths to try and calm herself. Until now, she'd never admitted there was a problem. Some part of her felt that if it remained between her and Jace that it wouldn't be real.
"Are you okay? Are you in danger?" Simon quickly asked.
"Oh no, sorry. Nothing like that," Clary said. "I need your advice on something."
"Finally recognised my wisdom?" Simon asked, but she could tell his heart wasn't really in it.
"It's about Jace," she said, "I really don't know what to do."
"What's going on?" Simon asked gently. Although they were friends now, Simon had once greatly disliked Jace, and she didn't think it was going to take a lot to remind him of that.
"He's just so angry. And he's pushing me away and I don't know how to get close to him again," Clary said, silent tears finally falling.
"Why's he angry?" Simon asked.
"I think because I went away, but I'm not sure. He told me he was fine with it, and he seemed okay when I got back, but… he keeps making these comments, and he's focusing so much on work now… I don't know." Clary said, wiping the tears from her cheeks.
"Are you sure it's that big of a problem - I mean Izzy's been really busy with everything as well. She's been working early and late and the rest of it - why don't you just give him a little more time?" Simon asked. She was surprised how level headed he was being about this; once upon a time he would have warned her off Jace in a second.
"Yeah but Simon, you and I have been busy before. We would work fifteen hours and day constantly be jet lagged… and we never pulled away from each other. If anything it made us closer."
Unknown to Clary, Jace had come into the house and seen her on the phone. He knew it was wrong, but he so desperately wanted to know what she was thinking that he picked up the other landline.
"Jace and I haven't slept in the same bed for over a week now," he heard her say. "I don't remember the last time we had a pleasant conversation. It's like he's a whole new person."
"So what, are you going to leave him?" Simon, he assumed, replied. Jace held his breath waiting for Clary's answer. He watched her from a distance, trying to read the set of her shoulders, her slumped posture.
"I don't know," came her reply, and he felt his world come crashing down. He quickly hung up the phone and went back to his car, knowing he couldn't face her now. Not when he felt like this.
Clary turned, thinking she'd heard something in the house, but no one was there, so she kept talking. "I don't want to. I still love him, so much. But if he doesn't love me anymore…"
"Clary, I don't see a world in which Jace Herondale doesn't love you. I think you need to find him, and just talk everything out - it's going to be hard, and probably painful, but you need to do it," Simon tells Clary. "Leaving him isn't the right option."
"Yeah… thanks," Clary says, knowing it's true, but having no idea where to even start.
"And," Simon says, "if after that, you still aren't sure, come over to my house and we can talk some more - you know you're welcome any time."
"Thank Si, I love you," Clary tells.
"I love you too, " Simon replies. "Now go talk to your husband."
Clary did want to talk to Jace, about so many things. But that was pretty difficult to do if she didn't know where he was and he wasn't answering any of her calls. She figured that he had to come home at some time - even if it was just to get a change of clothes or something.
She sat back down on the couch and stared at the door that led in from the garage, just willing Jace to walk in. She had thought about driving around and trying to find him, but she really had no idea where he might go, and thought her chances of catching him here were the best. Unfortunately, that meant Clary just had to sit there, letting her thoughts eat away at her. Eventually she couldn't take it anymore, and turned on the TV. She flicked through the channels for a little while, finding that nothing could hold her attention for more than a few minutes, when she came across a movie that Jace was in. He was probably fifteen years old. She leaned back into the couch, watching a Jace she'd never met but felt like she'd known forever.
Once that movie ended, she went onto Netflix and started watching another one of Jace's films. She was in the middle of her fourth movie and Jace still hadn't come home. She was beginning to suspect that he wasn't going to come home at all tonight. She wanted to be ready if he did however, so she paused the movie and collected some sheets, blankets and pillows to make herself a bed on the couch, hoping she'd wake up if Jace came home. Once she'd finished setting up her bed, her phone started to ring.
She was hoping it was going to be Jace, but Izzy's face came up on her screen.
"Hey Iz," Clary said, trying not to sound too disappointed.
"Hey Clary," Izzy said, with some yelling in the background. "So it turns out that Jace is our house at the moment, yelling at Simon."
Clary heard something crash in the background.
"I'll be over in a minute. I'm so sorry Iz," Clary said, while quickly putting on shoes.
"I'd bring a bucket," Izzy said, and then yelled something over her shoulder.
"Okay thank you Iz - I'll be over as soon as I can." Izzy hung up the phone without replying. Clary assumed Jace had been drinking, and that's why Isabelle had advised her to bring a bucket.
This was confirmed when Izzy met Clary outside her house, and quickly ushered her inside.
"Why would you talk to my wife like that?" Jace asked Simon. His speech was slow and slurred, and he was heavily leaning up against the wall.
"Jace," Clary called out, and tried to quickly look over at her, but somehow slipped and ended up on the ground.
"Clary?" Jace asks, struggling to stand. "How'd you find me?"
"The fairies." Clary answered, not amused. Apparently Jace was though, because he started to laugh, which apparently made it harder for him to stand.
"Come on, we're going home," Clary said, and tried to help him stand. But she was about half his size, which meant he did a better job at pulling her down than she did of standing him up.
Simon hurried forward to help her, and when he got up close, she whispered, "are you okay?"
Simon nodded back at her, and she couldn't see any marks on his face, so she assumed all Jace had done was yell. In this state, he probably would even be able to hit Simon.
"I'm sorry," she whispered again.
"It's not your fault," Simon answered, and then they pulled Jace to his feet. Simon and Clary led Jace out of the house and into Clary's car.
Once they'd gotten Jace's seat belt on, Simon quickly told Clary to "call me if anything goes wrong," and then Clary drove Jace home. While she would have preferred silence, Jace seemed to think singing along to the radio as loudly as he could was the best idea.
After parking, Clary tried to half carry Jace inside before dumping on the couch.
"Hey," Jace said, pointing at the TV, "you're watching my movie!"
"Mmmhm," Clary replied, trying to figure out what to do next. She could leave him to sleep on the couch - she had made up a bed after all, but she knew she'd just stress the whole night wondering if he was okay.
"Clary we need to talk," Jace said. While she did want to talk to him, he was currently slumped back into the couch because he couldn't support his own weight and his eyelids were drooping shut. There was no point talking if he was just going to forget it all the next morning.
"Tomorrow, when you feel better," she told him. She thought there was also no point in getting mad at him if he was just going to forget.
"I feel fine," Jace slurs out.
"Come on, let's go to bed," Clary told him. He heavily leaned on her the whole way to the bedroom, while continuously telling her that he was okay.
She put him gently down on the bed and then bent down to undo his shoelaces. She momentarily thought about getting him into some pyjamas, but thought it would just take too much effort.
"I'm mad at you, you know," Jace said, looking down at her.
Clary looked up at him.
"What are you mad at me for?" Clary asked. If sober Jace wasn't going to tell her, maybe drunk Jace would.
"'Cause you left me!" Jace said, as if that proved everything.
"And you said you were okay with it," Clary replied, pulling off his shoes.
"But it's not just that," Jace said, refusing to meet her eye.
"Then what else is it?" Clary asked, helping him take off her jacket.
"Everyone only cares about you," he said, pouting.
"What do you mean?" Clary asked, completely confused.
"I went to meetings and all they asked about was if you were going to be in the movie. Or if you were writing music! This is my movie. Not yours," Jace said lying back into the bed.
"Okay, well Jace that isn't my fault. You should have just talked to me about it." When Jace crossed his arms, Clary said, "I know this is your movie," before turning off the light.
If he wasn't going to hear her out, then she wasn't going to have this argument.
She got into her side of the bed and shut her eyes, ignoring Jace as he struggled to get under the covers. Thankfully, she fell asleep quickly.
But it wasn't for long.
She woke up a few hours later and the bathroom light was on, and she could hear Jace inside. Part of her told her to let him suffer on his own, but another part told her to go help him.
She rubbed her eyes before getting up and going to the bathroom.
Jace was sitting on the ground next to the toilet, and he wasn't in a good state.
"I'm sorry Clary," he sounded a lot more sober now. Sick, but sober. "You can go back to bed."
Clary smiled at him before flushing the toilet and sitting on the ground next to him.
"Are you okay?" she asks.
"I will be," he tells her.
"Well it's my job as your wife to wait with you until you start to feel better - or fall asleep again. Through sickness and health and all that," Clary says, looking straight ahead.
"Well, I haven't been a good husband, so I don't blame you if you just want to go back to bed," Jace says, leaning his head against the wall.
"I'll stay for a little bit," Clary says gently. She may have been angry at him, but that didn't mean she wanted to see him sick.
"I really am sorry," Jace says, and something in his tone makes Clary think he's talking about more than being sick in their bathroom at three in the morning. She looks over at him, and he's already looking back at her. His eyes are gentle and searching her face for anything she may not be saying. She nods back at him.
"I know I was making an absolute dick of myself," he says, "but I was just so annoyed at you."
"For something completely outside my control," Clary says, fighting to keep her tone even. "You should have just talked to me."
"I know, but I didn't think you'd understand. You've always been so… good. You wouldn't understand why I'd be jealous of you," Jace says, sounding disgusted at himself.
"Maybe I wouldn't have completely understood you," Clary says, "but wouldn't it have been better than the last week? Than going and getting absolutely shit face drunk?"
"Today was about something else," Jace says quietly.
"Then what was today about?" Clary asks, desperate to figure this all out now so it could just be over with.
Jace takes a deep breath before saying, "I don't want a divorce Clary. I love you so much - I may not have shown it in the past week. But please, don't leave me. I'll get better. I promise I will."
"A divorce?" Clary asks. "Why would you think…" but then she remembered her phone call with Simon that afternoon. "How did you know about that?"
"I heard you… on the phone with Simon. Please don't leave Clary," his voice breaks.
"I'm not going to leave you Jace - I wasn't sure if you loved me anymore; I wasn't going to stay in a loveless marriage, but now I know…" Clary says, and when Jace doesn't reply, she looks over at him. The tension is out of his face, and his head is leaning against the wall again. Thinking he might be asleep Clary whispers, "why is this so hard?" to herself.
She's about to go get Jace some pillows and a blanket, knowing she won't be able to get him into bed and not wanting to wake him, but he whispers back, "falling in love is easy; being in love isn't."
"What?" Clary asks, but he's actually asleep now. Deciding that they should finish their conversation when they've both had some sleep and Jace is better, she gets his blankets and then goes to sleep herself.
When Clary wakes up later that day, Jace is in the bed next to her. She smiles over at his sleeping form, glad to finally wake up in the same bed as her husband again.
She goes to the kitchen and makes them a pot of coffee and a light breakfast before going back to their room to wake Jace.
She was going to have this conversation now - she didn't care if he went back to sleep after.
She gives him a moment to wake up and drink some coffee before asking, "how much of last night do you remember?"
"Everything here at home," he tells her, taking another long sip of his coffee.
"Good, because I need to go over a few things with you," she says. She found it a lot easier to be straight with him when he didn't argue back like a three year old or didn't have his head in a toilet.
"Okay," he says, yawning. He quickly shakes his head, trying to wake himself up a bit more and then sits up straighter.
"I get you're going to be busy with all this new work - it's bigger and exciting. And I get it might not always go the way you want. But you can't push me away because of it. Just tell me you're going to be more busy - I understand how crazy it can all get. I don't care if we can't eat dinner together every night, so long as you sleep in the same bed as me. Try to have a cup of coffee with me some time in the day. Even if you just call me for three minutes telling me how everything is going!"
Jace nods at her. He knew he'd been pulling away. He didn't want to be, but he felt so much pressure - he had to prove that he could do this to all the naysayers, to Clary, to himself. And then everyone kept asking about Clary so he thought if he could just distance himself from her completely, then people would stop asking. But everything seemed to just be ten times harder without Clary around. "I promise to pull away again. You are my priority, now and always. Just tell if I am, okay?"
"I don't have to be your priority all the time," Clary tells him, "I just still need to be in your life."
Jace nods at her again, but doesn't say anything.
"Which brings me to," Clary says, "me travelling. Jace I can't keep having the same fight. So say what you want to now and then let's be done with it."
"I didn't like that you left," Jace says. "And I don't want you to do it again; at least not the same way. I get you're going to go on tours and all of that, but you can't shut me out either. I know sometimes you go through things that I can't even begin to understand, but you can go through them with me - I'm not going to stop you from trying to figure whatever you're feeling."
"I am sorry that it happened like that, and I promise I won't ever do it again," Clary says.
"Okay," Jace says, "thank you."
"And the last thing I really wanted to talk to you about is your press tour," Clary says, "I know we talked about me coming to a few premiers with you, which I'm still happy to do. But if you don't want me to be there, I'm fine with that. You deserve the spotlight to be on you."
"No, no - I want you there! What's the point of doing this all if there's no one to share it with? Please come Clary. Don't let my being an ass stop you," Jace says quickly.
"If you really want me there-"
"I do!"
"Then I'll come," Clary says, smiling at Jace. He kisses her on her temple, and she leans into him. It finally felt like she had her old Jace back.
As promised, Clary went to some of Jace premiers with him - she left him to go to few on her own, both because she thought it would be good for him, but because she was still recording her album as well, and she couldn't keep leaving every few days.
When he got back from his press tour, he went back to work on creating his new movie, and just like he promised, he kept Clary in the loop about everything. It felt like they were finally back in their groove.
So that's finally started to sort itself out! As promised, I'm going to visit some other characters in the next few chapter, so let me know what you want to see! Stay happy and healthy :)