Chapter Text
LYDIA
Lydia seems to have a penchant for walking into rooms at the worst times. Her parents talking poorly about her, ‘friends’ talking about her behind her back and ah yes, Isabelle Lightwood hooking up with people.
First, there was Meliorn at her sixteenth birthday party. Then, Camille in the abandoned dorms of Magdalene. And now, Clary in Raphael’s study of all places. She had come to the office as a final resort, in an attempt to seek some peace from the party going on outside. But, by some fucked up divine providence, it seemed Lydia couldn’t seem to go anywhere without finding Isabelle kneeling in front of someone.
The party outside had been too loud, the lights too bright. She’d excused herself from Maureen and the group they were with to head somewhere she’d be safe to sit and think clearly without the music thumping through her ears. Maureen had seemed concerned, gently placing a hand on Lydia’s arm to reassure her. She’d smiled gently and made a beeline to the office, just desperate for the music to stop.
Because the thing was, Lydia could not stop thinking. Not even for a moment was she able to let herself relax at a party. Lydia was unsure about everything. At the front of her mind, weighing heavy, was her inability to have secured a place in her dream university. Her grades had fallen too low. Her tennis performance had gradually gotten worse over the last couple of months. The absence of her parents was really, finally, beginning to take its toll on her and well, that sucked, because all she wanted was nothing more than for her parents to be proud of her, to say anything nice to her at all.
And, really, the thing that was getting her down above all else was that Maureen had gotten into her dream university. Lydia wasn’t jealous of Maureen; she could never truly be jealous of her best friend. It was just that they had planned to go together, it had been their shared dream for as long as she could remember. No one understood her like Maureen understood her. It felt to her, as if her planned future was slipping out of her hands and there was nothing, she could do to regain control over it.
Standing there tonight, chatting to the group, with Maureen by her side, was when it had finally clicked. There was a reason her best friend got her, there was a reason she was upset they weren’t going to the same college and there was a reason that every time Lydia was with her, she felt like she was home.
She’d never known what pure unconditional friendship and love was until Maureen. Her parents had never provided her with any sense of home or belonging. But Maureen had. She always had. But in a sense, Lydia always knew Maureen had loved her. The question was whether she was ready to return this love? And what did this love look like anyway? Lydia had never experienced unconditional love and in many ways, felt unqualified in receiving it let alone bestowing it upon another.
From their positions, Maureen could tell that Clary had been lying on her back on Raphael’s desk before she heard the door turn and the noises of the party outside got louder. She shot up, hand going to her mouth as Lydia stood in the doorway.
“Well, well, well…” was all Lydia was able to manage before Isabelle stands and swings around.
“Fuck off, Lydia.” Isabelle shouts and Lydia didn’t need any more encouragement, turning on her heel and leaving immediately. Clary and Isabelle, she thinks, now that’s something I didn’t see coming. Lydia makes her way through the crowd and back to her group, the weight of a scandalous secret resting over her, begging to be told. She had not found the few moments of quiet from this party she longed for. Instead, she had found something much greater. Telling everybody in Magdalene about what she had just seen would bring her greater solace than any silence ever could. Lydia opens her mouth, and she tells her friends everything.
CLARY
“Cool,” Clary breathes. “We’re screwed.”
Clary is pacing the length of Raphael’s office, the muffled sound of her converse hitting the floor and creating tiny thuds against the plush carpet. She finds the sound calming, the methodical shuffle of feet becoming a pattern that help distracts her from the fact that she is utterly, utterly fucked. Isabelle is propped up on Raphael’s desk, her legs crossed.
“I’ll make sure she doesn’t say anything,” Isabelle reassures Clary. “She knows not to cross me.”
“This is Lydia we are talking about,” Clary reminds her, coming to a halt in front of her girlfriend. “You could threaten that girl and her entire family, and she still wouldn’t be able to keep something like this a secret. The girl is a walking, talking scandal machine.”
“Ah, but I know something about our dear Lydia that you don’t. In fact, I know the one thing in the world that can keep that girl’s mouth shut,” Isabelle says smirking. “Get her a place at Maureen’s future college.”
Clary considers this. “I know they’re best friends but I’m pretty sure Lydia could survive without her; it’s not exactly going to keep her from speaking. Plus, it’s not like we can magically conjure her up a place at university.” Isabelle laughs loudly, sliding from the desk and onto her feet.
“Clary, how were you friends with them for so long and you couldn’t see it?”
Confusion clouds Clary’s face. “See what?”
“Lydia and Maureen can’t function without each other. Maureen has essentially taken care of Lydia where her parents haven’t. I honestly don’t think Lydia would be half the callous bitch she is now if she didn’t have Maureen by her side, ready to defend her. They’re a package deal.”
“Still,” Clary reasons. “She’ll get used to life without her. I mean, who stays friends with the people they went to high school with?”
“You really don’t get it, do you?”
Clary raises an eyebrow. “Why do I feel like this is a test?” Isabelle laughs at this.
“She loves her, you idiot.”
“Like in a gay way? Or like, you know, a love thy neighbour way?”
“God, Clary, my little obtuse angel, of course in a gay way.”
“How do you know?”
“All those months ago, when I told you that it was Lydia that kissed me. It was true, all of it.” Isabelle says and then considers for a second. “I don’t think she knows how to deal with it, and honestly, it’s not my problem. She’s been a bitch to me. But if we can help her get into Maureen’s college, well, maybe she won’t feel the need to tell everyone about what happened.”
Clary goes silent, considering what Isabelle has told her. She realises, suddenly, like a wave, that she kind of doesn’t care anymore. She doesn’t care if Lydia tells everyone and there was no point trying to stop her either. Clary realises then, that she has come to terms with who she is; she no longer feels the need to tip toe around her feelings or cover up how she feels with lies. She also notes that she doesn’t want Isabelle to have to keep lying either.
The thing that Clary has always admired about Isabelle, even when she did not quite understand it, was that despite the hurt Isabelle had experienced over the years, she never hid. Not from Clary, not from anyone. Repeatedly, she had taken the fall. For Lydia. For her.
Clary would no longer ask Isabelle to hide, would no longer make it her responsibility. In this moment, it felt as though a choice was presenting itself to Clary; she had to pick between continuing to hide and wrap herself up in the bubble-wrap of safety her faith provided or shun it. Reject the religious doctrine that had provided her comfort her entire life because she realises, now, that Isabelle is more than that.
“I find my faith in you. I find my salvation and my purpose in you.” Clary says after a while and Isabelle raises her eyebrows, confused.
“What do you mean?” Isabelle asks her.
“For so long, I have found it hard to reconcile loving you with my what my faith tells me. For so long, I have expected you to take the fall for me, to hide for me.” Clary is blinking hard, trying to stop the tears that threaten to spill from her eyes. “But my faith and my love for you are connected. They always have been, and I have just failed to see it.”
“Clary, are you okay?” Isabelle asks, sounding worried. She reaches out a finger to wipe a tear from Clary’s cheek. “I will never ask you to choose, I will never make you do something you don’t want to.”
“But I do want.” Clary tells her, plainly, simply, as if it were the most natural thing she could have possibly said in the world. “I want you. In this lifetime and in the next. I want you in the morning, the afternoon, the night. I want you even when the church tells me I shouldn’t, but my faith tells me I should.”
Clary tells Isabelle this, her eyes on the floor at all too times. She is too scared to look Isabelle in the eye, too scared of how she might react. Would her vulnerability be off-putting?
Clary continues. “You tell me that you will never make me choose between my faith and you. And for so long, I thought it was one or the other but Izzy, what I realise now – what I have maybe known for a while now – is that they are one in the same.” Clary raises her head at last, her gaze locking onto to Isabelle’s to find that she is now crying too. Though, Clary suspects if she ever brought it up to Isabelle, she would fervently deny it. “I find my faith in you. All things that are spiritual and connect me to God, I find them in my love for you too. And I am tired of pretending it is wrong when to me, it feels like the most natural thing in the world.”
Isabelle is staring at her intently, gaze fixed tightly on her own. She nods, silently, and Clary understands then that Isabelle never needed to say anything to indicate that she understood. The moment of silence between them passed in comfort, in understanding, in acceptance. Clary knew that Isabelle understood how she felt in that moment. Isabelle had exposed everything of herself to Clary, her sexuality, her past, her family, her involvement in the circle and Clary had accepted it all without hesitation.
Isabelle wipes the tears from her eyes. “I wasn’t crying.” She tells Clary, even though she knows it’s a lie. “And if you ever tell anybody I was, I’ll kill you.”
“Don’t worry.” Clary says. “I’d never dare tell anyone I made the big bad Isabelle Lightwood cry.”
Isabelle laughs then and closes the space between them, connecting her lips to Clary’s. And it feels so right, so natural, so pure that Clary was confused that she had ever thought otherwise. As she felt Isabelle against her, Clary knew she was home. Everything holy was in Isabelle’s lips and if she lost her place in heaven for something so right, she knew that Isabelle’s touch was godly enough that she would serve an eternity in hell just to feel it throughout her lifetime on earth.
***
Clary was done hiding. She had told Isabelle that night at Raphael’s party that she would never expect her to take the fall for her own uncertainty ever again. Clary no longer cared what people thought of her. It was freeing.
It had not surprised them how quickly Lydia had spread what she had seen around the student body. But they realised, they had not even minded. They understood that in this small act, Lydia was able to feel control in a life that felt so uncontrollable and so volatile to her. Not even able to accept herself, Lydia had traded in others secrets at their expense. This small act allowing her, if only just for a moment, to exercise control over something.
When they enter the school grounds the day after the party, it is clear that everyone already knows. What strikes Clary most of all, is how little anyone seems to care. Even as Lydia stares them down, laughing with some of her friends, Maureen shoots them a friendly smile as they walk towards the school building. In it, she communicates that she understands. That she will always be Clary’s friend.
As they enter the building for the morning service, Isabelle squeezes Clary’s hand tightly and in it, Clary finds more than just a simple touch. She finds a promise, a thousand unuttered words.
It’s Clary’s last day at Magdalene School for Girls and she’s fucking terrified. But Isabelle is by her side, holding her hand, and everything is going to be alright.