Yaaaaayyy another chapter! Please enjoy.
Free Brother-in-Law
Clary entered the small room, where everyone was already gathered for the staff meeting. She was in a bit of a sour mood since she had spent all morning baking muffins for the rest of the staff, but she had forgotten the basket a home.
There were six chairs lined up in front a white board, that Jace stood in front of. He held a marker in his hand as he paced back and forth. When he saw her he smiled. "Ah, you're here early," he said, motioning for her to sit down right in front of him, in between Alec and the tall brunette whose name she still didn't know.
The girl smiled at her as she sat down, offering her her hand. "Hi. I'm Isabelle."
"Shut up, Patrice!" Jace exclaimed, turning away from the whiteboard he had been concentrating on moments before.
Isabelle/Patrice sighed with exasperation. "Why can't we just get me a name tag with my actual name on it? There's never even been a Patrice that's worked here. We don't even know a Patrice."
Jace smirked at his adoptive sister. "Speaking of, we need to discuss everyone wearing their name tags when they're on duty."
Isabelle rolled her eyes. "I wouldn't have a problem wearing it if it said my name!"
"He said shut up, Patrice!" yelled a little boy from the back, who Clary hadn't noticed until now, when she turned to look at him, startled. He was about nine years old with curly black hair like his siblings and stormy grey eyes that were now back to focusing on what looked like a math textbook. He adjusted his glasses, too big for his face, and looked up, meeting Clary's eyes. He gave her a cute lopsided smile that almost looked like a smirk, and blinked at her very hard.
"Anyway, since you're here," Jace said, turning and scooping up a bundle of fabric. He turned back to Clary and rested it in her arms. "This is your new uniform."
Clary's heart sank, thinking back to her skimpy skirt and pigtails and feared the worst. She unravelled the white fabric to find a chef's jacket and matching hat. Clary smiled, relieved that the jacket would, in fact, button up high enough to cover her cleavage. She pulled her hair back into a low ponytail and pulled on the chef's hat, pleased to know it fit perfectly. She looked down at the jacket and saw that in the place of a name tag, the words Little Red were embroidered in red thread.
The door swung open, revealing two tall men standing in the doorway. One of the guys was in full HCC uniform. The other, wearing a spiderman t-shirt, black-framed glasses and skinny jeans. He kissed the first guy, shoving him playfully into the room. "See you after work, my spicy tortilla." A swift smack on the ass as he left.
"Bye, Simon!" Isabelle called as he left. The other boy rolled his eyes, ignoring the girl who was obviously obsessed with his boyfriend.
Clary smiled at the boy in the uniform, holding out her hand. "Hi, I'm Clary."
The guy, who's name tag read Raphael, introduced himself.
He sat down behind Isabelle, pulling out his phone.
"Shouldn't we start the meeting?" Clary asked, turning to Jace.
"We're still waiting on a couple people."
As if on queue, the door swung open again, revealing a small brunette and a tall blonde. Their name tags read Helen and Aline. They smiled at Clary, about to introduce themselves. Jace stepped between them, karate chopping their hands away before a handshake could be exchanged. "No! Do not introduce yourselves! We have a new employee. You know what that means."
The entire room groaned collectively, including Jace, who did it sarcastically.
"It's time for ice breakers!"
Clary quickly realized why she had been asked to come in at 4:30 in the morning. Jace was a child, and wanted to sit around and play icebreakers with his employees for two and a half hours. And Clary thought it was adorable.
When Jace left the room for a few moments Alec told Clary that Jace was a very ugly child and had no friends. So that explains a lot.
Forty-five minutes before the shop was meant to open, having won Twister, Jace finally ended the ice breakers and told everyone to bring their chairs back to the center of the room so they could officially begin their meeting.
"He's making progress," Alec muttered to Clary. "When we hired Aline a few months ago, we ended up opening three hours late."
Clary turned back to Jace, trying not to giggle, and saw that he had drawn a strange symbol on the board. It looked kind of like a childish drawing of a fish facing downwards. She squinted and tilted her head, trying to figure out what it was supposed to be.
"This is going to be our new symbol," Jace said, indicating the strange doodle on the board. "It's going to be on our shirts, on our cups, on our napkins, and I'm also considering printing it on our toilet paper. Soon it'll be as famous as the Starbucks logo. Alec, how's the trademarking coming?"
Alec stood, holding a piece of paper flat against his stomach so no one could see. "Well, turns out there this Russian company with the same logo. They manufacture hand-knitted G-strings. Anyway, we had to make a few small adjustments to make the logo our own."
Jace smiled. "That's fine. As long as the changes aren't too drastic."
Alec took a magnet from the corner of the board and pinned the piece of the paper in the center, covering Jace's original drawing with—
"What the fuck is that?" Jace demanded, staring at the page.
"Aww come on. Do you really not like it? I worked really hard on it," Alec cackled.
"IT'S FUCKING HORRIBLE!"
"Language," Isabelle muttered glancing back at her little brother.
"Shut the fuck up, Patrice," Max muttered, not even bothering to look up from his textbook.
"Alec, You need to change this. I won't have a bloodthirst beast as the face of my company!" Jace ripped the page from the board and crumpled it.
"What do you mean?" Clary asked, taking the crumpled page from Jace's hand. "It's just an adorable little ducky swimming in some hot chocolate!" Clary uncrumpled the page, holding up the small image of a baby duckling swimming in a teacup of hot chocolate, a small marshmallow lodged in its smiling beak. "Your symbol is even on the cup!"
"I like it," said Aline, Helen nodding in agreement.
Raphael looked up from his phone for a moment, before looking back down, unconcerned. His head whipped back up, as though his brain had just registered the picture. His eyes softened as he said, "aaaawwwwwwwwww a ducky!"
Jace grumbled, as though he wanted to say something rude but he didn't want to say it to Clary.
"Knock knock," came a voice from the door. They all turned to see Jordan standing in the doorway, holding a platter of cinnamon rolls. "Hey everybody. I know I'm technically fired but I just thought I'd drop in a show the newbie the ropes." Everyone stood from their seats, giving Jordan a quick hello as they left to open the shop for the day. Raphael smacked Jordan on the ass as he snagged a cinnamon roll. Max reached up for one, Isabelle taking it from his hand and putting it back on the tray, saying something about a healthy breakfast. After everyone had filed out of the room, only Jace, Alec, Clary and Jordan remained.
Clary looked at the cinnamon rolls mournfully, thinking of the muffins she had so tragically left at home.
Jordan seemed rather caught up in a conversation with Alec and Jace over the logo and how adorable he thought it was. So Clary just… very slowly… reached over… and took one or two rolls, stuffing them into her mouth.
Holy mother of god.
Clary's eyes almost rolled back into her head as she reached for a third, a fourth, a ninth…
"Hey, what happened to all of the cinnamon rolls?" Jordan asked, looking down at his now empty platter, then looking up at Clary, icing covering the entire bottom half of her face as she stuffed one more roll into her mouth and stashed another in her pocket. She tried to shove another down her shirt, but it fell, rolling tragically to the floor.
"Oh no!" Clary yelled mournfully. "What a horrible snaccident!" She scooped up the roll, blowing on it a couple times before stuffing it into her mouth. Clary took a moment to swallow. "They were alright I guess. I could have made them better."
"Right," Jordan smiled. He chucked the metal tray to the side, and led Clary out of the room. "You know, I only know one other person who could eat that much in one go, my boyfriend. Maybe you two should meet."
"That sounds like a horrible idea," Clary commented. "He would eat all my food."
Jordan laughed as he entered the kitchen in the back, ushering her inside.
"So, this is the kitchen," he said with a sweep of his arm.
"Obviously."
"Yes, well, this is where you'll be spending most of your time at work, so I thought I could show you around."
Clary shrugged. "Sure, I don't see why not. Maybe you could show me how you made those cinnamon rolls?"
Jordan smiled and they got to work.
OoOoOoO
"I'm starving," Clary mumbled over her second empty tray of cinnamon roll. "My brother should be bringing me lunch soon."
"No way," Jordan laughed. "My boyfriend is doing the same."
"CLARY! GET YOUR FAT ASS OUT HERE I HAVE FOOOOOOOOOOD!"
Clary jumped up from her seat and ran so fast out the kitchen she put Usain Bolt to shame.
Her brother was sitting at one of the tables, with an empty basket and a Subway bag in front of him.
When she got to him he smiled, hugged her, and handed her her footlong. Which she opened immediately, and took a big bite.
She grimaced down at her sandwich. "What the hell John, did you eat the insides of my sandwich again?"
John shrugged. "I only had a little."
"There's nothing left. There isn't even any sauce. The bread is just wet."
"Whoops."
"Is that my basket of muffins?" Clary asked, pointing at the empty basket on the table. "There's nothing left."
"I got hungry," John whined.
"John, there were 14 jumbo muffins in there. And you ate your sub. And the inside of my sub. And apparently that third sub."
"Hey babe," Jordan said, walking over and kissing Clary's brother on the mouth. "Did you bring me my sub?"
"Babe?!" Clary exclaimed, looking back and forth between them. "Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern, you had better have a real good fucking explanation about this. You're dating him? This is your boyfriend, who makes the best cinnamon rolls I ever had the extreme pleasure of putting in my mouth and you never introduced us?"
"And you ate my sandwich," Jordan said depressingly, reaching over for the subway wrapper that was crumpled on the table.
"I don't understand why you have such a huge problem with this!" Magnus yelled over his shoulder, entering the shop with a flair as he always does. "She's your sister. Why do you care if she comes over for dinner?"
Alec followed him in, shutting the door with a bang. "Because Magnus, what did I tell you about finding sad prostitutes and bringing them home? You can't remake the movie Pretty Woman no matter how hard you try."
Magnus seemed about to reply, but was interrupted by a loud and harsh squealing noise.
John stood from his chair, his mouth hanging open as his squeal continued. He approached Magnus slowly, never once closing his mouth to swallow his drool. "You… You're… My… You…" Jordan came up swatted him on the back of the head. John shook himself like a wet dog trying to dry his fur, and spoke. "You're my hero. My sister told me she knew you but I thought it was too good to be true! I've been practicing magic since I was a kid because of you!" he said, his voice becoming more and more high pitched. He reached behind Magnus's ear and pulled out a Subway wrapper, smiling down at his own hand as though he was surprised his own trick worked. "Please, Mister Bane, I know you're probably so busy, but do you think I could maybe have your autograph?"
Magnus smiled a dazzling smile, not seeming at all bothered by this large man child crowding him. "Of course, anything for my son."
"A fan," Alec corrected.
"I said what I said," Magnus retorted, not even looking back at his boyfriend. He turned his attention back to John, his smile never faltering. "Check your shirt pocket," he said with a wink.
John smiled an excited open mouth smile, looking down and reaching into his blue officer's shirt. He pulled out a red handkerchief, and when he unfolded it, he saw that the cloth was embroidered in fancy lettering, to John. May the magic forever be in your heart. Love, Magnus Bane.
John squealed as he read the handkerchief over and over, tears falling from his eyes as he nearly sobbed.
"It's embroidered," Alec said, clearly annoyed. "With his name. You just met him."
"It's magic, Alexander. Don't question it."
John, no longer able to hear anything but the pounding of his own heart, turned to his sister with tear stained cheeks and an ear to ear smile. "Clar-cla-cl-c-c-c-c," he stuttered.
Clary smiled, patting him on the cheek. "I know sweetie. I saw."
John just nodded his head, his mouth open in a silent scream and he hopped up and down.
Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter! Please review because we are desperate for attention and validation.
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-R&A