Wings

Chapter 26: Wide Awake

How did you do it?
You got me losing all my breath,
How did you give me,
To have my heartbeat out my chest?

Now I've got you in my space,
I won't let go to you,
Got me shackled in my embrace,
I'm latching onto you,
Now I've got you in my space,
I won't let go of you.

C.P.O.V.

I hear the voices again start swirling around in my head. It seems like a few minutes pass by, but I realize that I can feel my eyes start to open.

I am finally able to crack open my eyes after a couple minutes, and the threads of fluorescent light that shined through made my retinas ache. The feeling of thin sheets and the lumpy mattress underneath me where the two things that I first registered. I must be in the hospital. I thought to myself, and I try to see past the blinding white light. A shadow was cast by a figure kneeling at the end my bed. Hospital bed, I corrected myself, as I watch  the shadow slowly fades away. After it had gone away my vision starts to clear so I can see, sort of.

My head feels like it is full of bees, buzzing around, not letting me think. My body feels heavy, too heavy. I try to lift up my arms, but it feels like my shoulder and biceps don't have the strength to. My legs must be made out of lead or some kind of rock, because I can't lift them up either. My neck feels stiff so I can only use my eyes to scan my surroundings. In front of me lies a small TV hanging on a small contraption that has sprouted from the ceiling, which is currently playing old Simpsons re-runs. Then two small chairs on either side of me suggest that I have had some visitors.

Then my hearing comes back in like someone had just started to turn the volume up on their favorite song. Slowly and then everything hit me all at once. The door to my left is full of noise. Actually everywhere else is silent but there. I hear familiar voices, some shouting, some calming.

Moonlight streamed through my cracked open widows to my right, but the harsh light of the fluorescent diminished it before it could reach me. The door was cracked open, and I could hear them quiet down to a whisper. I bet they knew that I was awake. I still wwasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. 

I tried to move my arms around, and to my surprise, they actually obeyed. I lifted my arm up and down testing it's strength. Then I tried my legs. Both lifted with a surprising amount of ease. I must have been healed somehow. I turn my back away from the door and slowly try and lift myself out of bed. I throw the thin sheets toward the end of the bed. I shift my body and take a deep breath. My arm muscles flex, and I strain against my own weight, as I strain to try and dangle my feet over the edge. My legs move a couple of inches before the creak of the door behind me makes me stop.

I stopped moving. The sound of footsteps and rustling clothes fill my mind. I suddenly become so much more aware of the feeling of eyes on my back. I'm not able to breath, I know I should turn around, but I don't know if i could handle it. These are the people that I sacrificed bliss for. I chose to fight for. I am so overwhelmed with emotions, that I can feel my mind fill up with so many fleeting thoughts. Oddly enough fear is the only emotions that I can identify. Nagging at me, questions circle through my mind, but, I know that when I turn around that my life won't be the same. That this will be a moment that I will always remember, because, for some reason, I know that he is here. I can feel the string that connects us loosen to the point where I know that he is close, so very achingly close. I know that he'll look at me the way that he did when he first saw me at the park, and I know that I will take one look at his golden eyes, and I won't be able to get away. That I'll forever be his.

I take a deep breath and turn around. As I turn slowly, I can hear small gasps and swallows. My eyes start to water and my head starts to cloud up. I am finally facing them, but my eyes are so flooded with tears that I can only make out the blobs of my old friends. What are we going to do?

J.P.O.V.

"WHAT!?!" Izzy yelled. She jumped up, rushing past me to the door. "Jace! How? What? I just... WHAT!?" I push past her and block the door. Crinina had charmed Clary to sleep for a couple more minutes so I could explain everything to Simon and everybody else. At least she had thought to come at night. 

"Izzy, just sit back down. Please, I need to explain something to everyone." I told her in a quiet voice, and she looks at me with a startled look. She obviously had expected me to explode, so she backed up and sat back down in her chair. Simon's face was scrunched up with worry, and grabbed Izzy's hand. Time to tell them everything. 

"Three years ago, it was the first anniversary of Clary leaving, so I went down and got wasted at Pandemonium. The past year I had spent looking and searching for her desperately, thinking that she made a mistake, or maybe I had made our relationship go too fast. I tried everything, but it seemed like she had disappeared. All the doubts that I had had just came over me.  I didn't care how wasted I got or if I went home with a stranger. I had to feel something other than pain for once." I shrugged my shoulders and stared at the ground, knowing the expressions on their faces. Pity. "If Clary didn't care, then was I am supposed to? So I drank and drank, and flirted with every girl in the room, getting into fights, and just anything that could maybe help the memory of her car driving away go away. It almost worked until I got so wasted, that I started seeing her. All over the bar, any kind of attractive girl suddenly looked exactly like Clary. It was like my own personal hell, and I broke down, right then and there. I-" I choke back some tears, and I shoved my hands through my hair. "I grabbed the girl I was talking to and took her home. And that was the first night that I let myself go." 

I knew that my eyes were welling up with sadness. All I could feel was the waves of deep dark sadness, loneliness, and mainly regret, crashing over me. "I just kept going back because I was addicted. It was the only time I was able to see Clary. I would be able to see her dancing like she did at Jocelyn and Luke's wedding. Or her laughing like she used to with you and Simon. Every single person had a little bit of her in them. That first night was too much, so I grabbed the girl I was talking to and took her home. And that was the first night that I let myself go." 

"Jace it's not that big of a-" I feel her stand up and take a step toward me.

"It was Crininia" I waited for her to blow up and scream at me. Tell me how much of a screw up that I am, to tell me to go away and to never see her again. But instead, she just sighs and pulls me into a hug.

"Oh, Jace." She says in my ear. It's odd, but I feel so much more aware of everywhere. I can feel Izzy's heartbeat thump on my chest. I can feel the weight of the secrets and confessions come off  I stare at Simon, his eyes glued to Clary's hospital room door.

I know that he is dying to go in there. I can see the anticipation growing in his eyes, and the new flood of tears tell me that this won't be easy.

But then again, life never is.