I Hate You (IN EDITING)

Epilogue

New York felt so distant than what she remembered. It wasn't necessarily that she didn't like being back home, it was just that it was so different from where she had spent the last two months, give or take. It was the place where she had fallen in love, but at the same time, it wasn't.

But it would most definitely be the place where her heart would shatter and be walked upon by the thousands of feet in New York. And it didn't seem to matter whether those feet were heeled or bare, cautious or careless, for she would still have her heart reduced to broken, jagged shards.

He hadn't even loaded his car down with boxes upon boxes and her chest already ached with a preview of the pain that awaited her after their separation. God, she felt like one of those cliché, melodramatic girls in romance movies. Fake sobs and all.

Why could she not be a genius like Jon? That way, she would be heading off to college for the coming school year, as well, and maybe, just maybe, she would be distracted enough to forget about Jace.

Then again, senior year was really going to kick her ass.

And her dearest friend Isabelle did not hesitate to remind her that college applications were due in the fall. Just what she needed.

She only had Isabelle left. And it broke her heart. Not that there was anything wrong with just having Izzy, but she was so close with Magnus and Simon and Jace, and even Alec, whom she hadn't really spent a great deal of time with. But they were all her friends and it sucked more than anything to see them going off to college while her and Isabelle were stuck finishing up high school.

Clary wasn't quite sure how she was going to hold back the waterworks display that wanted to so desperately escape her when they all went their separate ways.

XXX

"What're we doing? You have to get up early and—"

"I don't care." Jace nuzzled his face into Clary's neck.

"Jace," it came out as a whine.

"Mhmm?"

Clary turned to face him, one hand resting on his chest. "Why did you ask me to come over, only to lay in bed?"

The blonde sighed. "Clary, I love you, and you know I'm leaving tomorrow for school. Can't I want to go to sleep with you in my arms and wake up the same way?"

"I guess," Clary sighed melodramatically, unable to help the smile that spread across her lips. Clary registered somewhere in the back of her mind the fact that both Magnus and Alec were also leaving tomorrow morning for college, but she ignored it.

The more she allowed her resolve to slip, and allowed herself to fall into Jace's arms, the more she did not care. Because he smelled like lemon and laundry soap and sunshine, she just absolutely could not will herself to care. Nor did she care that what they had together would be so brutally ripped away rom them in the span of a year. The redhead knew all too well that things could change in a year—looking back on their summer vacation to Virginia, which, mind you, was only two months long, a whole lot of things had changed.

But still, she laid her head back down on Jace's chest, sighing in content and allowing the darkness to wash over her like a wave crashing down on the shore.

Maybe it would all be okay. Maybe they would all be okay, in the long run.

Or maybe not.

XXX

Clary sighed, frustrated, staring at the clock. The hands ticked and ticked and ticked around in the same circle over and over again—and yet, she was no closer to being free than she had been last year.