The New York Shadowhunters Institute | Wednesday Morning
"I am going to kill that cat," Alec said irritably, lifting up his arm to inspect his torn shirtsleeve.
"Well that's what you get for trying to take his toy away," Jace said, frowning when the gray cat jumped up on his bed. "That was not an invitation to get your fur all over my bed sheets."
The cat, Church, gave Jace a look that clearly said he didn't care about the state of Jace's bed and even started bathing himself to prove his point.
"Great, now I'll have to wash those before I sleep tonight," Jace said, shaking his head. "I should let Alec kill you."
"You might want to think about becoming less of a compulsive neat freak," Alec suggested. "I'm sure they don't have single rooms in those mundie boarding schools. You'll drive your roommate insane."
Jace shrugged. "If I drive them insane that means they'll leave and I'll have a room to myself to make as clean as I like."
Alec rolled his eyes before wandering over to the suitcase Jace was currently filling up. He trailed his fingers over the steles that his parabatai had tucked into the bag. "You planning to bring any seraph blades?"
Jace nodded. "Got another bag full of them. Downworlders exist in Maryland as much as they exist in New York. Though I'm sure they have different accents."
"You don't have to fight them you know," Alec said quietly. "I mean, not without me."
"Well that wouldn't be any fun," Jace said breezily. "And don't even act like you won't be killing things here without me."
"I don't want to be out there killing things without you," Alec said before he could help himself. He managed to hold back what would've been a telling blush and went on. "I still don't understand why you're doing this. Parabatai don't really work well when they're several states away."
"It's not forever, Alec," Jace told him for what felt like the thousandth time. "I told you, I needed a change."
"A change from what?" Alec asked. "An exciting city? An Institute where you can be well trained? A family that loves you?"
Yeah, it would be the last one, Alec, Jace thought. He'd never voice that out loud for fear of Alec's reaction and for the fact that Jace never did do well with expressing his emotions in a healthy and open way. He didn't really think Alec would understand. How could he? He never had the life lessons that Jace's own father had taught him.
"You're being overdramatic," Jace said flippantly, nudging Alec out of the way so he could close his suitcase. Really, running off to a school filled with mundanes was pretty dramatic in itself, but Jace felt he was doing a good job pretending it was just a impulsive ridiculous Jace-like action. He didn't want the Lightwoods to know that he was running from them.
It was a bit late not love the Lightwoods and have them love him in return, he knew that. He should have never stayed as long as he did. But the lure of having a family was a little too much for him after watching his father die and he made himself comfortable. Marsye and Robert were as good as adopted parents to him, and Max and Isabelle were like siblings. And Alec was his parabatai. Jace was tied to him forever no matter what because of that.
Really, he would have been content with staying if he hadn't had a nightmare about his father a few weeks ago. All of his childhood lessons flooded back to him and he realized how crazy it was to stay with the Lightwoods. Which was how he ended up impulsively enrolling in a boarding school in Maryland.
Jace shut his suitcase and started wandering around his room, making sure he wasn't forgetting anything. Alec was huffing and trying his best to let Jace know that he was disappointed and Jace was pointedly ignoring him. It could have gone on like that for a while (because they were both stubborn bastards) but a knock on the door brought them both out of their passive aggressive fight.
Max poked his head into Jace's room. "Breakfast's ready."
"Excellent, I'm starving," Jace said, thankful to have an excuse to get away from Alec.
"Don't get too excited," Max said. "Isabelle made it."
Both Jace and Alec groaned at the same time.
[idk, I'm up early. NFI, NFB but OOC is fine]