WARRIORS | Alec Lightwood¹

ONE

CONGRATULATIONS!

May gasped dramatically. She shot up from her seat and pulled her friend into a bone-crushing hug. "Oh my god! I knew you could do it, Red!" She squealed. She made heads turn, judgmental glares telling her to take it down a notch.

"What? The sad face? Really? Well played, well played." Simon nodded as he read the letter more carefully. May retreated to her seat and took another sip of her coffee.

"Thank you." Clary smiled. "You know, it's weird. They kind of liked my assigned work, but they flipped out over the drawings for our graphic novel." Clary explained surprisingly. She brought up the drawings onto the table and slid them towards May so she could take a look at them. She never had the chance to sit down and really look at the girl's designs thanks to her recently busy schedule. May didn't even know Simon and Clary were working on a comic together, which was surprising considering Clary told her everything.

May bit her tongue from saying anything as she examined the charcoal sketches etched onto the protective folder. Shit.

May looked up to see that Clary and Simon were too busy talking about the novel to notice her sudden panic. She ran her fingers over the pencil drawings of werewolves and vampires Clary must have drawn up from memory. She couldn't even count the runes that were scattered on the brown paper or the fact that they weren't messy or foggy. They were perfect drawings of Shadowhunter runes, bold and prominent on paper.

May knew that the day would come. Really, she dreaded it. That one day Clary would remember everything and be thrown into a new life she was hidden from. Then she would realize that everyone had been lying to her.

She had a bitter taste in her mouth after receiving the reality check.

"This day will go down in history as the greatest 18th birthday I ever had!" Clary said.

Simon pointed at the girl. "Which is why we are celebrating tonight." He announced. "Yes, with Maureen, after our show."

May put the folder down and hid her nerves as she pulled her cup to her lips. At the mention of their friend's name, she gave Clary a knowing look.  "Absolutely. So... what's the deal with you and Maureen?" Clary asked bluntly.

"Yeah, are we going to get another part of this 'love saga?'" May joked bumping her shoulder with Simon's making him raise a brow.

"What deal? No deal. No saga. We sing together." Simon shrugged taking a sip of his coffee to keep himself quiet. May always found it ridiculous that Simon never noticed the longing looks and the desperate efforts Maureen, Simon's band member, and friend, went through to get his attention. Maureen always tried but was always unknowingly pushed away because Simon only had eyes for someone else.

"Simon.." May started but Clary interrupted. "You seriously don't know she's been crushing on you this whole time?" She asked.

"What? No. No."

"Simon, how can someone as smart and perceptive as you, not realize that the person sitting right there, is in love with you?" Clary asked.

Mayla internally laughed. May has always been a little older than her friends, which allowed her to see them from a different perspective. The whole friend group seemed oblivious to the pining and unnoticed glances that they shared when another was not looking. It was exhausting, to say the least.

"Come on Red, I guarantee you he's not the only smart, perceptive person to make that mistake," May said, as she gave the nerd beside her a side-eye. He just took another sip of his coffee, not wanting to say anything.

Clary stared down at her cup seeing that there was now a drawing in front of her, she looked around the porcelain but couldn't find her snack anywhere.

Simon pointed to the cup "That's a latte."

"But I could have sworn I had a biscotti," Clary murmured.

May furrowed a brow, looking around the table to see she was missing her biscotti. "Maybe you ate it really fast and didn't even notice."

Simon nodded and turned to the younger redhead. "Happens to me all the time. When I'm happy... when I'm sad. But I will replace your mythical biscotti with an actual one." The boy took the biscotti off his plate and placed it on her chivalrously.

"Thank you."

May smiled and held her cup in the air. "Okay well, here's to Clary and her path to higher education. I hope the bone-crushing due dates, all-nighters, and many pots of coffee don't crush your soul and destroy all your hopes of happiness." 

Simon faced screwed at the weird toast. "That was dark."

"Speaking from personal experience, buddy-- L'chaim!" She cheered.

Clary and Simon laugh. "L'chaim."

The white cups clinked in harmonization as the three friends talked around the table. May took the chance to enjoy probably one of the last days of normality before the truth came out. Before everything was to slowly change.