Chapter Nine: Living Nightmares

I wake up feeling warm. As I lift my head up gently I see Jace's droopy gold eyes looking down at me. I give him a lazy smile lying back down on his chest.

"Hey, how are you feeling?" he asks.

I feel my eyebrows knit together in confusion. What is he talking about?

I look up at him still confused, for a second.

"What do you me-" and then it hits me like a ton of bricks. Maybe two tons.

I lay back down on the bed replaying last night's events. The dancing. The drinking. The… the… I can't even say it in my mind.

I feel my breathing getting ragged as I remember what could've happened.

I'm back in Sebastian's room, him on top of me, him slapping me. It's too much. I feel Jace shaking me, but when I turn all I see is Sebastian. I let out a tiny scream and scramble backwards until I ultimately fall out of the bed onto the ground.

"Clary calm down." He says walking towards me. Adrenaline kicks in even more as he gets closer to me.

I try to make a run for the door but he grabs my arm faster than I could move a couple of steps. I feel myself curl into a ball as he lets go of my hand and attempts to pick me up. I hear myself scream as his hands touch me.

Right then I hear the door slam open to see my brother scanning the room until he catches sight of me.

"Clary? What's wrong?" He says, walking over to me slowly.

"Sebastian." I whisper through my sobs. I point in the direction where Sebastian is gone and Jace standing in his place.

My eyes widen when I see it's not who I originally thought it was. I feel a pang of guilt settle in my stomach.

"Jace." I whisper, my voice cracking a couple of times.

He looks afraid to come close to me, he just stays in his corner looking as guilty as I feel.

Along with the guilt I feel pain. A pain so real I can't do anything but fall back onto the bed holding the back of my head and whimpering. I close my eyes tightly, doing anything to take the pain away. When I open them again, Jace and Jon are above me with concerned looks on their faces. Through the pain though, I feel I have to make things right.

"Jace." I say, ignoring the added pain when I talk "I'm sorry. I didn't know what I-"

"Shhh." He says soothingly "You have nothing to apologize for Clary."

As darkness takes over me again I can't help but think how much more pleasurable death would feel right now.

As my eyes flutter open for the second time this morning I hear the sound of a beautiful melody being played by Jace on a piano in the corner of the room. As I turn under the covers, it's enough to trigger an upset stomach making me dash to the bathroom just in time as the contents of my stomach make a second appearance. Jace is there in no time holding my hair as I dry heave. When I'm done I flush the toilet and sit down on the floor, laying my head on the cool tile wall. Jace takes a glass from his sinks and fills it up with water then hands it to me. I take it gratefully taking small sips from it.

"I'm sorry." I say finally.

"For what?" He asks looking taken aback a little.

"For everything. Jace I don't deserve someone as amazing, sweet and thoughtful as you." I say hopelessly, waiting for him to break up with me.

"Clary, I need you more than you think." He says, coming to sit down next to me.

"No one makes me feel the way I do when I'm around you. It's like a piece of me is missing when you're not around. I feel complete with you in my life." He says honestly.

We sit there in silence for a couple of seconds.

"Oh and Clary?"

"Yeah?"

"You forgot handsome, and maybe you could've thrown amazingly sexy Oh! Or golden goddess." He says making me laugh, the first genuine laugh I've had in what seems like centuries.

"Come on." He says after a second standing me up and then helping me up.

"What are we doing?" I ask as we go down the stairs.

" Getting to the kitchen before Izzy can touch any of the food."

"I HEARD THAT." We both cringe as we hear Izzy in the kitchen yell.

As we walk in I'm hit with the scent of a burning, rancid something.

"Jesus." Jace says next to me, holding his nose "Izzy are you cooking or summoning a demon?"

"Very funny." Izzy replies dryly "I making pancakes!" she finishes cheerfully, showing us the batter she's mixing inside of a bowl.

Inside there's a dark brownish goop with swirls of yellow within it, clumps of the goop are sticking everywhere in the bowl. As she continues to stir the bowl a timer goes off making Izzy jump!

"The first batch is ready!" She says taking, still sticky glops from an incredibly oily pan.

"Try some Clary!" She says setting a plate in front of me. The nasty smell permeates around me.

"By the way." She says sounding a little more sympathetic, making me go rigid knowing what she's going to say next. "How are you fee-" From the corner of my eye I see Jace shaking his head frantically as if trying to tell her not to say anything. I'm grateful since I didn't want to talk about it anyway.

"You know what Iz." Jace says pushing the plate of god knows what away from me and back at Izzy.

"Why don't you leave the cooking to us?" he begins to coral Izzy out of the kitchen to the living room.

"Hey I can cook really we-" She can't finish her sentence since the kitchen door closes on her.

"Were you really going to eat that?" He asks me.

" does it look like I have a death wish." I say making him laugh.

I walk over to the kitchen throwing Jace a towel.

"Pancakes?" I ask him.

"I was thinking more along the lines of-"

"Pancakes it is." I say interrupting him as I get out the ingredients from the fridge.

It probably took longer to clean Izzy's mess than to actually make the food. After around 25 minutes of washing (and throwing soapy water at each other) and another 15 minutes of cooking we finally finish making breakfast. By this time everybody's awake watching tv in the other room.

"GUYS!" Jace yells "BREAKFAST."

Everyone starts filing slowly into the kitchen talking and laughing. I see Jon walk in looking sympathetic and frustrated. I put the food on the table and everyone digs in.

"You're lucky." Jace interjects. "We saved you all from having to eat Izzy's food."

Everyone laughs, aside from Jon and Izzy.

"Oh god bless." Jordan says earning him an elbow to the ribs.

As we laugh and reminisce on past events of Izzy's cooking, Jon all of a sudden slams his silverware on the table, causing us all to turn to him.

"Guys, cut it out I know we're all thinking the same thing." He says trying to hold in his frustration.

"Jon seriously you don't have to go there." Jace says trying to calm his best friend down, but still with a tone of warning in his voice.

"Oh cut the shit Jace." He retorts sharply at him.

I know where this is going. I look down at my hands to keep from having to look at my brother; I see Jace's hand grab one of mine calming down a little, giving me the courage to finally speak up.

"Jon, really, just let it go." I say quietly

He gives a short humorless laugh. "Are you kidding me? Clary almost got raped less than a day a go."

I feel Jace's grip on my hand tighten a little at this. I really wasn't in the mood for this right now, especially from my brother.

"And yet," He continues, despite the fact of everyone's shocked faces. "No one, not one person has brought it up. And you," He says staring at me with hard eyes. "You don't even seem fazed. Did you fucking like it?!" He asked almost disgustedly.

A tiny gasp escapes me. Jon may be a loving brother; but that doesn't mean he didn't get some traits from our father, like his temper, how angry he can get.

I don't say anything; if he's like this I know better than to talk, it'll just fuel him more.

"Dude. Not. Cool." Jordan says looking pretty mad.

"Are you kidding me?" Jace says trying hard to control his anger. "You would really say that to your sister? The one who was there for you when you broke your leg and missed two months of her art classes to care for your sorry ass? The girl who went to every football game of yours she was physically able to go to when she was in the hospital? This is how you treat someone who's showed nothing but love for you since the day she was born."

As Jon's anger starts to deplete little by little, he looks around the table to see angered faces on all of us, except for mine, stained with still falling silent tears.

"Clary-" he says incredibly guilty walking over to me. Before he can reach me Jace stops him with a hand on his shoulder.

"Jon," Jace says not looking at him "I think you should go for now."

He looks down for a second then nods, walking out of the room.

There's a tense moment where no one really knows what to do or say.

Before I even fully decide what I'm doing I run out of the door to follow my brother. As I catch sight of him on the street, he's already pretty far up. I run after him, which is pretty hard to do in one of Jace's shirts and a pair of old leggings in a stash I keep at the Lightwoods' house.

"Hey." I say a little out of breath when I'm behind him. He must've been deep thought because he only turns around after I touch him on the shoulder.

"I guess you got Valentine's temper." I say after a silent moment. "But you also got mom's loving nature which," I say looking up at him, offering a small smile. " Trumps anything bad you could ever say to me."

I don't know why I'm not mad at him. I guess I could to relate to how much stress he's under playing big brother and parent when our parents are away, I know anything he does for me is out of the love and concern in his heart.

"Clary I just embarrassed you in front of our friends and your trying to make me feel better?" He asks astonished. He shakes his head giving a short laugh and pulls me into a hug. "I'm just glad you have none of Valentine in you, don't ever let him make you believe different okay?" He says into my hair. I nod. "You know I love you? Right?"

"Right." I say back.

AN: Kind of a short chapter but I wanted to get it out before I go back to my summer job. I just saw 22 jump street and it was AMAZING, my friend and I had to lie about our age just a teensy bit (okay 4 years) in order to get in but it was totally worth it! The next chapter is probably going to be a short one also but I'll try to get it out by Wednesday night at the latest! I love you all!

R & R

XOXO

Erin