City of Heavenly Fire (The Mortal Instruments, #6)(193)

Jia sighed and pushed the phone toward her. Clary grabbed it, wondering how you dialed out of Idris—how did they pay their phone bills?—then decided screw it, she was just going to dial as if she were in Brooklyn already. If that didn’t work, she could ask for guidance.

To her surprise the phone rang, and was picked up almost immediately, the familiar voice of Simon’s mother echoing down the line. “Hello?”

“Hello.” The receiver almost slipped in Clary’s hand; her palm was damp with sweat. “Is Simon there?”

“What? Oh, yes, he’s in his room,” said Elaine. “Can I tell him who’s calling?”

Clary closed her eyes. “It’s Clary.”

There was a short silence, and then Elaine said, “I’m sorry, who?”

“Clary Fray.” She tasted bitter metal in the back of her throat. “I—I go to Saint Xavier’s. It’s about our English homework.”

“Oh! Well, all right, then,” said Elaine. “I’ll go get him.” She put the phone down, and Clary waited, waited for the woman who had thrown Simon out of her house and called him a monster, had left him to throw up blood on his knees in the gutter, to go and see if he would pick up a phone call like a normal teenager.

It wasn’t her fault. It was the Mark of Cain, acting on her without her knowledge, turning Simon into a Wanderer, cutting him away from his family, Clary told herself, but it didn’t stop the burn of anger and anxiety flooding her veins. She heard Elaine’s footsteps going away, the murmur of voices, more footsteps—

“Hello?” Simon’s voice, and Clary almost dropped the phone. Her heart was pounding itself into pieces. She could picture him so clearly, skinny and brown-haired, propping himself against the table in the narrow hallway just past the Lewises’ front door.

“Simon,” she said. “Simon, it’s me. It’s Clary.”

There was a pause. When he spoke again, he sounded bewildered. “I—Do we know each other?”

Each word felt like a nail being pounded into her skin. “We have English class together,” she said, which was true enough in a way—they had had most of their classes together when Clary had still gone to mundane high school. “Mr. Price.”

“Oh, right.” He sounded not unfriendly; cheerful enough, but baffled. “I’m really sorry. I have a total mental block for faces and names. What’s up? Mom said it was something about homework, but I don’t think we have any homework tonight.”

“Can I ask you something?” Clary said.

“About A Tale of Two Cities?” He sounded amused. “Look, I haven’t read it yet. I like the more modern stuff. Catch-22, The Catcher in the Rye—anything with ‘catch’ in the title, I guess.” He was flirting a little, Clary thought. He must have thought she’d called him up out of the blue because she thought he was cute. Some random girl at school whose name he didn’t even know.

“Who’s your best friend?” she asked. “Your best friend in the whole world?”

He was silent for a moment, then laughed. “I should have guessed this was about Eric,” he said. “You know, if you wanted his phone number, you could have just asked him—”

Clary hung the phone up and sat staring at it as if it were a poisonous snake. She was aware of Jia’s voice, asking her if she was all right, asking what had happened, but she didn’t answer, just set her jaw, absolutely determined not to cry in front of the Consul.

“You don’t think maybe he was just faking it?” Isabelle said now. “Pretending he didn’t know who you were, you know, because it would be dangerous?”

Clary hesitated. Simon’s voice had been so blithe, so banal, so completely ordinary. Nobody could fake that. “I’m totally sure,” she said. “He doesn’t remember us. He can’t.”

Izzy looked away from the window, and Clary could clearly see the tears standing in her eyes. “I want to tell you something,” Isabelle said. “And I don’t want you to hate me.”

“I couldn’t hate you,” Clary said. “Not possible.”

“It’s almost worse,” Isabelle said. “Than if he were dead. If he were dead, I could grieve, but I don’t know what to think—he’s safe, he’s alive, I should be grateful. He isn’t a vampire anymore, and he hated being a vampire. I should be happy. But I’m not happy. He told me he loved me. He told me he loved me, Clary, and now he doesn’t even know who I am. If I were standing in front of him, he wouldn’t recognize my face. It feels like I never mattered. None of it ever mattered or ever happened. He never loved me at all.” She swiped angrily at her face. “I hate it!” she broke out suddenly. “I hate this feeling, like there’s something sitting on my chest.”

“Missing someone?”

“Yes,” Isabelle said. “I never thought I’d feel it about some boy.”

“Not some boy,” Clary said. “Simon. And he did love you. And it did matter. Maybe he doesn’t remember, but you do. I do. The Simon who’s living in Brooklyn now, that’s Simon the way he used to be six months ago. And that’s not a terrible thing. He was wonderful. But he changed when you knew him: He got stronger, and he got hurt, and he was different. And that Simon was the one you fell in love with and who fell in love with you, so you are grieving, because he’s gone. But you can keep him alive a little by remembering him. We both can.”