Free Pale Kings and Princes by Cassandra Clare, Robin Wasserman Page A

their fourth coffee at Java Jones. Simon was doing his best to turn his blood into caffeine, in preparation for September. The Academy was a coffee-free zone. “Sometimes, that old Clary feels just as far away from me as the old Simon must from you.”
    “Do you miss her?” Simon asked, but he meant: Do you miss him ? The old Simon. The other Simon. The better, braver Simon, who he was always worried he no longer had it in himself to be.
    Clary had shaken her head, fiery red curls bouncing at her shoulders, green eyes glinting with certainty. “And I don’t miss you anymore, either,” she’d said, with that uncanny knack to know what was going on in his head. “Because I have you back. At least, I hope . . .”
    He’d squeezed her hand. It was answer enough for both of them.
    “Speaking of what you did on your summer vacation,” George said now, flopping back on his sagging mattress, “are you ever going to tell me?”
    “Tell you what?” Simon leaned back in his chair—then, at the ominous sound of cracking wood, abruptly leaned forward again. As second-years, Simon and George had been offered the opportunity to claim a room aboveground, but they’d both decided to stay in the dungeon. Simon had gotten rather attached to the gloomy damp—and he’d discovered there were certain advantages to being far from the prying eyes of the faculty. Not to mention the judgmental glares of the elite-track students. While the Shadowhunter kids in his class had, for the most part, come around to the slim possibility that their mundane peers could have something to offer, there was a whole new class now, and Simon didn’t relish teaching them the lesson all over again. Still, as his desk chair decided whether or not to split in half and something furry and gray scampered past his feet, he wondered if it was too late to change his mind.
    “Simon. Mate. Toss me a bone here. Do you know how I spent my summer vacation?”
    “Shearing sheep?” George had sent him a handful of postcards over the last two months. The front of each of them had borne a photograph of the idyllic Scottish countryside. And on the back, a series of messages circling a single theme:
    Bored.
    So bored.
    Kill me now.
    Too late, already dead.
    “Shearing sheep,” George confirmed. “Feeding sheep. Herding sheep. Mucking about in sheep muck. While you were . . . who-knows-what-ing with a certain raven-haired superwarrior. You’re not going to let me live vicariously?”
    Simon sighed. George had restrained himself for four and a half days. Simon supposed that was more than he could have asked for.
    “What makes you think I was doing anything with Isabelle Lightwood?”
    “Oh, I don’t know, maybe because last I saw you, you wouldn’t shut up about her?” George affected an American accent—poorly. “What should I do on my date with Isabelle? What should I say on my date with Isabelle? What should I wear on my date with Isabelle? Oh, George, you bronze Scottish love god, tell me what to do with Isabelle.”
    “I don’t recall those words coming out of my mouth.”
    “I was paraphrasing your body language,” George said. “Now spill.”
    Simon shrugged. “It didn’t work out.”
    “Didn’t work out?” George’s eyebrows nearly rocketed off his forehead. “Didn’t work out?”
    “Didn’t work out,” Simon confirmed.
    “You’re telling me that your epic love story with the hottest Shadowhunter of her generation that spanned multiple dimensions and several incidences of saving the world is over with a shrug and a”—his voice flattened again to an American accent—“ didn’t work out .”
    “Yeah. That’s what I’m telling you.” Simon tried to sound casual about it, but he must have failed, because George got up and gently slugged his roommate’s shoulder.
    “Sorry, mate,” George said quietly.
    Simon sighed again. “Yeah.”
    How I Spent My Summer Vacation
    By Simon Lewis
    I screwed up my chances with the most