Emma had. Clary’s best friend and parabatai, Simon, had belonged to them when he was a mundane. That was how they’d wound up named after the three most holy objects in the Shadowhunter world. Now Simon, too, was a Shadowhunter. She wondered how he felt about the band going on without him. About everything going on without him.
She made her way back up the stairs, her mind on Clary and the others in the New York Institute. Clary had found out she was a Shadowhunter when she was fifteen years old. There had been a time when she thought she’d lead a mundane life. She’d talked about it before, around Emma, the way anyone might talk about a road not taken. She’d carried a lot with her into her Shadowhunter life, including her best friend, Simon. But she could have chosen differently. She could have been a mundane.
Emma wanted to talk to her, suddenly, about what that might have meant. Simon had been Clary’s best friend for her whole life, like Jules had been Emma’s. Then they had been parabatai, once Simon was a Shadowhunter. What had changed? Emma wondered. What did it feel like to go from best friend to parabatai without having always known you were going to do it, how was it different?
And why didn’t she know the answer to that herself?
When she arrived back in the computer room, Malcolm was standing near the desk, violet eyes snapping. “You see, it’s not a protection circle at all,” he was saying, then broke off as Emma came in. “It’s pizza!”
“It can’t be pizza,” said Ty, staring perplexedly at the screen. His long fingers had nearly untangled all the pipe cleaners; when he was done, he’d tangle them back up and start again.
“All right, enough,” said Jules. “We’re taking a break from killings and profiles for dinner.” He took the boxes from Emma, shooting her a grateful look, and set them down on the coffee table. “I don’t care what you all want to talk about, it just can’t involve murder or blood. Any blood.”
“But it’s vampire pizza,” Livvy pointed out.
“Immaterial,” Julian said. “Couch. Now.”
“Can we watch a movie?” Malcolm piped up, sounding remarkably like Tavvy.
“We can watch a movie,” Julian said. “Now, Malcolm, I don’t care if you are the High Warlock of Los Angeles, sit your butt down.”
The vampire pizza was shockingly good. Emma decided fairly quickly that she didn’t care what was in the sauce. Mouse heads, stewed people parts, whatever. It was amazing. It had a crispy crust and just the right amount of fresh mozzerella. She sucked the cheese off her fingers and made faces at Jules, who had excellent table manners.
The film was much more puzzling. It appeared to be about a man who owned a bookstore and was in love with a famous woman, except Emma recognized neither of them and wasn’t sure if she was supposed to. Cristina watched in large-eyed bafflement, Ty put his headphones on and closed his eyes, and Dru and Livvy sat on either side of Malcolm, patting him gently while he wept.
“Love is beautiful,” he said while the man on-screen ran through traffic.
“That’s not love,” said Julian, leaning back against the couch. The flickering light from the screen played over his skin, making it seem unfamiliar, adding frecklings of darkness to the smooth, pale places and lighting the shadows under his cheekbones, at the hollow of his throat. “That’s movies.”
“I came to Los Angeles to bring back love,” Malcolm said, his dark violet eyes mournful. “All great movies are about love. Love lost, found, destroyed, regained, bought, sold, dying, and being born. I love movies, but they’ve forgotten what they’re about. Explosions, effects, that wasn’t what it meant when I first got here. It was about lighting cigarette smoke so it looked like heavenly fire and lighting women so they looked like angels.” Malcolm sighed. “I came here to bring true love back from the dead.”
“Oh, Malcolm,” said Drusilla, and burst into tears. Livvy handed her a napkin from the pizza place. “Why don’t you have a boyfriend?”
“I’m straight,” Malcolm said, looking surprised.
“Well, all right, then a girlfriend. You should find a nice Downworlder girl, maybe a vampire, so she’ll live forever.”
“Leave Malcolm’s love life alone, Dru,” said Livvy.
“True love is hard to find,” Malcolm said, gesturing at the people kissing on-screen.
“Movie love is hard to find,” said Julian. “Because it’s not real.”
“What do you mean?” said Cristina. “Are you saying there is no true love? I don’t believe that.”
“Love isn’t chasing someone to the airport,” said Julian. He leaned forward, and Emma could see just the edge of the parabatai Mark on his collarbone, escaping above the neck of his T-shirt. “Love means you see someone. That’s all.”