Roommates & Soulmates

Ch26: Alec's Outburst

Alec sat on his bed, following Jace's pacing with his eyes. Jace was in a state of constant movement, all the while looking down at the ground.

"Hey," Alec said in way of greeting. Jace stopped pacing and turned abruptly to face Alec.

"Jacketcomfclarytalkingwhyifshe," Jace said all in one breath.

"Didn't quite catch that buddy," Alec replied.

"She's wearing my jacket," Jace said more coherently.

"Who?" Alec asked.

"Clary!" Jace yelled throwing his hands in the air.

"Why?" Alec inquired.

"She said it was comfy," Jace answered. Alec had never seen Jace look so confused before.

"Then what happened?"

"She ran away," Jace said. He suddenly stopped pacing and turned to face Alec. "What the hell does that mean?"

"No clue," Alec said, though he had a pretty good idea: stupid promise to stupid boyfriend.

"Argh!" Jace exclaimed as he collapsed on his bed. Alec brought out the ice cream and spent the remainder of his evening watching whatever show Jace selected on Netflix. Alec had no interest in the show, however, and ended up texting Magnus the whole time.

'Please can I tell him!' Alec texted his boyfriend.

'Clary would be mad at me,' Magnus replied.

'How mad?' Alec texted back as his laptop showed some kind of explosion. What show had Jace picked anyway?

'Not sure,' Magnus said. 'I have never betrayed her secrets before.'

'Jace is a wreck,' Alec said. 'Please can we chance it!'

'Can't we let those two figure out their own problems,' Magnus texted back. Alec sighed.

"How can you sigh at such an epic scene?" Jace asked incredulous. Alec lifted his head to see the stereotypical 'protagonist walking away from the explosion in slow motion' scene. Alec just laughed lightly and passed Jace the ice cream to change the topic.

The next day Jace seemed to be a bit better and Alec dared to hope Clary wouldn't continue this strange behaviour. His hope was in vain, however, since the day after, when Alec returned to his dorm room, he was met once again with a pacing Jace.

"What happened this time," Alec said with a sigh. He sat down on his bed, resigned to spending the hours required to ease the anxiety on Jace's face.

"She said hello," Jace started. "Which was weird enough, but then she explained why she hadn't talked to me yesterday and I didn't know what to make of that. But worst of all, she moved a fraction closer to me and I SO wanted to kiss her, but then she ran away again." The hurt and confusion on Jace's face tore at Alec's heart.

"I don't know what's going on?" Jace whined.

"I'll go get the ice cream," Alec muttered as he got up and headed to his mini fridge.

"Thanks," Jace grumbled. "This sucks."

"Maybe she is confused," Alec told Jace as they both dug into the frozen dessert. "You should just ask her outright what she wants."

"Oh no!" Jace replied quickly. "She is finally talking to me. I don't want to ruin that!" Alec sighed.

"But her talking to you is making you miserable," Alec argued.

"But I get to see her," Jace said with a smile. Alec was so frustrated! Why couldn't he just tell Jace Clary didn't love Simon? If Clary liked Jace as Alec suspected, but didn't love Simon, what the hell was the problem! How mad at Magnus would Clary really be? And would Clary being mad at Magnus mean Magnus got mad at Alec? And why was life so damn complicated!