Authors Note:

Heya! It's been a while! Does anyone even care about my fanfics anymore? XD

So this is actually an original story that I've been playing around with and I thought I would adapt it to TMI and get some feedback on the actual plot.

Completely AU as it is edited from an original story, set in the UK.

All rights of the characters goes to Cassandra Clare but the locations and plot are mine :)

Enjoy and let me know what you think! 3

Jace POV

"Welcome to Brookdale"

The sign mocks me as I cross the border into the North Yorkshire town. I feel anything but welcome in a place I know nothing about. My mum used to tell me stories about the idyllic setting, with its picture-perfect houses, complete with white picket fences to the townsfolk who treat each other like family. Honestly, she made it seem like a brochure vomited all over her brain. One of her biggest dreams was to bring me back to this town and all the promise she thought it had, I guess that dream died with her when the cancer slowly ate away at her brain, until there was nothing else to take away.

The dull ache spread across my chest, like it always does whenever I think of mum. I rub my chest with my fist to try and ease some of the tension as I adjust my Ray-Bans against the low autumnal sun. Following the directions my GPS barks at me, I find myself driving down what appears to be the main street. Shops line either side of the road, all locally owned, not a single branded company in sight. I didn't even know towns like this still existed. So cut off from the outside world. Driving down the road, clocking a grocery shop, a florist, what appears to be a Town Hall and a bakery. All dressed to the absolute nines with autumnal decorations; shades of orange, brown and yellow seeping into every crevice. Flyers for the "Harvest Festival" littering every surface as far as the eye can see, shop windows, lampposts, even a big wooden sign outside the town hall. A building on the corner catches my eye, a café. "Slice of 314". My eyes roll at the corniness but my stomach grumbles at the thought of coffee. It's been a long drive from the city of Leeds, and I didn't stop once I was on the motorway, meaning it's been about 3 hours since my last coffee.

I make a left onto "Chestnut Grove", honestly who was given the authority to name streets? A woman with a rat like dog stands to my left talking to an older gentleman who's back is towards the road. I watch as the woman catches glimpse of my car, her eyes widen and her lips purse together. I see her say something to her companion who does a one eighty... looking right at me. What the fuck? I glance in the rearview mirror and of course, they are now hunched up together, heads close. No doubt whispering about the stranger in a BMW. Why my grandmother wanted to live here her whole life I'll never understand, although I never met the woman in my life so I can't really comment on her living situation. She could have hated it for all I know. I clench my jaw, fingers gripping the steering wheel. This is why I hate small towns.

I slow the car to a steady pace as I try to read the house numbers out the passenger side window, looking for number 12. I spot the moderately sized three-bedroomed house with a bright blue door and pull my car into the driveway, killing the engine. I stare up at my family's home, a house I'd never been before. A house a man I didn't know grew up in. A house where my grandmother would have received that one phone call that changed her life, the one that told her that her only son was dead.

The sharp rasp of knuckles against the car window jolted me out of my thoughts. I push the button to wind down the tinted window to reveal a stranger. A man who must have been in his fifties, his blonde hair thinning and turning grey along his scalp, the faint lines around his eyes and mouth as he grinned at me through the window. "Mr Herondale I assume? I'm Hodge Starkweather, I'm handling all of your grandmothers' affairs, we spoke on the phone last Friday?" Hodge l said the last part as a question, as if unsure of his own memory. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, but then remembering I have sunglasses on so the old git would be none the wiser.

"Yeah, that's me. Give me a sec and I'll be right with you." I replied putting the window back in place. I remove the sunglasses and place one of the arms into the collar of my shirt. I rub my hand over my face, letting out a slight groan at my current situation. Why am I even here? Surely someone else could be doing this? What happens when someone doesn't have any living relatives? I should have just ignored the unknown number and I wouldn't be in this mess. With a deep breath, I grab my keys out the ignition and exit the car. I look over the roof and lock eyes with Hodge. "Excellent" he says as he claps his hands in front of his chest. "Shall we have a chat in the kitchen? Bit more privacy than the driveway, no?" He doesn't wait for me to answer and instead turns on his heel walking towards that blasted blue door. I follow silently, a weird feeling spreading across my chest as I walk over the threshold of a house, I now own but couldn't feel like more of an outsider if I tried. As I turn to shut the door behind me, I could have sworn I saw a shadow move in the neighbouring window, the still swaying curtain a big give away to whoever was snooping. This is why I hate small towns.

I spend the next two hours signing contracts and going over so much legal jargon that my brain starts to hurt. I luckily didn't have to go through any of this when mum died because we set her up with a will before she was too incompetent to make it once the cancer spread to her brain. However, it turns out 87-year-old Imogen Herondale didn't feel the need to make a will before her passing, meaning I now had a whole load of bullshit to get through for a house I don't even want. I was originally just planning on giving all her stuff to charity, giving the house a new lick of paint and selling the thing so I never have to think about it again, but the moment I stepped through the door I realised just how wrong I was.

The entire house was like a time machine back to 1957, nothing had appeared to be updated in the last 65 years. The floral wallpaper was yellowing and peeling off the walls, the carpet had walkways from the years of foot traffic. Everything had a musty old person smell and the amount of shit my grandmother apparently collected over the years apparent on every surface of the house. Ornaments and nicknacks everywhere. This was going to take me longer than the 3 months I originally proposed myself to flip this house. Why did I answer that unknown number?

Hodge finally gathered up all his papers and his laptop and left me alone in the strange house with one final handshake. The sound of the door clicking shut was the one sound in the silently still house. I looked around the poxy kitchen in utter bewilderment. Where do I even start? I pull out my phone from my pocket checking the time. "14:37" on the home screen are a bunch of email notifications and a missed call from my best friend Alec. He's the only person I've talked to about where I am and what's going on. He can wait an hour or so, right now I need caffeine and some lunch. I look around the kitchen for a coffee maker before I realise where I am, no coffee machine in sight. Instead, a lone silver kettle rests on one of the hob rings.

I guess I'm trying that cafe I spotted on the way into town.