In the Hour of Silence

Chapter 2

Clary POV

After all of the morning classes, I walk with Tessa to the lunchroom with her new friends Jem and Will. Jem's in her calculus class or something boring like that and Will and her have English together where they bonded about the literary genius that was Charles Dickens. They're both pretty cool and they're not bombarding me with questions about my mute-by-choice nature.

When we get to the lunch room I speed through the lunch line and sit down at an open table while I wait for Tessa and the boys. While I pick at my phone, someone sits across from me. I look up, expecting it to be Tessa; but it turns out to be a girl with jet black hair and eyes to match. I smile slightly and offer her a wave.

"You're Clary, right? I'm Isabelle Lightwood, but everyone calls me Izzy. I heard about you from my brother Jace," she explains while she smiles at me.

I quickly get out my phone and type You sure it wasn't the fact that everyone is talking about the crazy girl who chooses not to speak? and show her the phone. She laughs slightly when she reads it.

"No, it was really my brother who told me. But hey, what makes a person not want to speak?Like at all," she asks and I can see the confusion clear on her face. I bite my lip as I try to think of how to phrase this. Back at BHS, everyone had known me from junior high and my not speaking was completely normal. Now, it's completely alien to them.

It's just a decision I made after my family died. It was pretty traumatizing--seeing that at such a young age. I can't really explain it. That's just how it is.

Isabelle looks at me with her head slightly tilted. "So you've never even thought about talking for the past six years?"

Nope.

Isabelle opens her mouth to say something else when Tessa, Jem, and Will show up. "Isabelle, are you bothering Clary?" Will asks with a knowing smirk plastered onto his face.

Isabelle holds her hands up in surrender. "I'm just curious like everyone else."

"Haven't you heard? Curiosity killed the cat." Will frowns for a moment and adds, "Unfortunately, it never took that demon you, Alec, and Max call a cat." Jem laughs slightly as Isabelle reaches across the table and swats at Will's head.

"Church is not that bad," she defends.

"Yes he is," Jem and Will state in unison--which just makes them smirk at each other.

Is anyone else lost here? I type and place the phone in the middle of the table. They all read it and Tessa nods in agreement with me.

"Church is Isabelle's cat that has become host to one of the most horrible demons in all of hell. Which is ironic with his name being Church and all that shit," Will says which makes everyone except Isabelle start laughing.

"Church is just...misunderstood," she defends looking a little less than convinced.

"Are you really trying to defend that demon, Iz?"

Behind Isabelle, three boys walk to the table. The one who spoke looks just like her, but with blue eyes instead of black ones. Another has his hand locked with the first guy and has spiked up black hair with blue tips and yellow eyes. If I can tell one thing by looking at what he's wearing, it's that he loves glitter. The last one looks kinda awkward next to the other two. He has brown hair, brown eyes, and these thick rimmed glasses that I'm kinda in love with. Plus he's wearing a Star Wars shirt so we'll be getting along pretty well.