Angels Twice Descending Read Free Page B

lex .
    The Law is hard, but it is the Law.
    Lex sucks, Simon thought.
    â€œYou want me to go in with you?” Clary asked.
    He did, more than anything—but something told him this was one of those things he needed to do on his own.
    Simon shook his head. “But thanks. For bringing me here, for knowing I needed it, for—well, for everything.”
    â€œSimon . . .”
    Clary looked hesitant, and Clary never looked hesitant.
    â€œWhat is it?”
    She sighed. “Everything that’s happened to you, Simon, everything . . .” She paused, just long enough for him to think through how much that everything encompassed: getting turned into a rat and then a vampire; finding Isabelle; saving the world a handful of times, at least so he’d been told; getting locked in a cage and tormented by all manner of supernatural creature; killing demons; facing an angel; losing his memories; and now standing at the threshold of the only home he’d ever known, preparing himself to leave it behind forever. “I can’t help thinking it’s all because of me,” Clary said softly. “That I’m the reason. And . . .”
    He stopped her before she could get any further, because he couldn’t stand for her to think she needed to apologize. “You’re right,” he said. “You are the reason. For everything.” Simon gave her a gentle kiss on the forehead. “That’s why I’m saying thank you.”
    *    *    *
    â€œAre you sure you don’t want me to heat that up for you?” Simon’s mother asked as he shoveled another heaping spoonful of cold ziti into his mouth.
    â€œMmff? What? No, it’s fine.”
    It was more than fine. It was tangy tomato and fresh garlic and hot pepper and gooey cheese, and better than leftover pasta from the corner pizza place had any right to be. It tasted like actual food , which already put it head and shoulders above what he’d been eating for the last several months. But it wasn’t just that. Takeout from Giuseppi’s was a tradition for Simon and his mother—after his father died and his sister went away to school, after it was just the two of them knocking around an apartment that felt cavernous with just the two of them left in it, they’d lost the habit of having daily meals with each other. It was easier to just grab food whenever they thought of it, on the way in or out of the apartment, his mother heating up TV dinners after work, Simon picking up some pho or a sandwich on his way to band practice. It was, maybe, easier not to face the empty chairs at the table every night. But they made it a rule to eat together at least one night each week, slurping down Giuseppi’s spaghetti and drenching garlic knots in spicy sauce.
    These cold leftovers tasted like home, like family, and Simon hated to think of his mother sitting in the empty apartment, week after week, eating them on her own.
    Children are supposed to grow up and leave, he told himself. He wasn’t doing anything wrong; he wasn’t doing anything he wasn’t meant to do.
    But there was a part of him that wondered. Children were supposed to leave home, maybe. But not forever. Not like this.
    â€œYour sister tried to wait up for you,” his mother said, “but apparently she’s been up for a week straight studying for exams. She was passed out on the couch by nine.”
    â€œMaybe we should wake her up,” Simon suggested.
    She shook her head. “Let the poor girl sleep. She’ll see you in the morning.”
    He hadn’t exactly told his mother he was staying over. But he had let her believe it, which he supposed amounted to about the same thing: yet another lie.
    She settled into the chair beside him and stabbed a ziti onto her fork. “Don’t tell my diet,” she stage-whispered, then popped it into her mouth.
    â€œMom, the reason