Title: well you look like yourself (but you're somebody else)
Fandom: shadowhunters
Rating: teen
Length: ~1k words
Author notes: amnesia, post-canon/canon divergent, unreliable narrator, title from flora cash's you're somebody else


Clary is twenty-six years old, and only the past five years have felt real. Her therapist says it’s how her mind dealt with losing both parents, pushing away any memory that might have emotional resonance. The remaining memories are inconsequential- doing homework alone listening to Spice Girls, skating in dizzy circles, waiting at a bus stop on a busy street, drawing strangers in a cafe. It’s as if her mind is the exact opposite of a regular person’s, clinging to all the hollow memories.

There’s two reoccurring friends from when she was younger, recognizable by feeling rather than face. A boy that feels like sunny happiness, and a girl that feels like bubbly humor. Honestly, Clary doesn’t know if they were real or imaginary friends. Surely, if they were real, one of them would have found her? Then again, a twenty-something with no friends- what kind of horrible person was she? The unknowable guilt motivates her to do more with the community, as she volunteers at the local youth center. Art Afternoons run every Tuesday and Thursday, fun with pastels and crayons and markers and charcoal and water colors.

She’s been lucky, able to keep the family apartment and sell enough paintings on the side to live comfortably. Her therapist said familiar places might help her memories return, and Clary would give anything to remember, to feel whole and grounded. It’s almost as if she has a guardian angel, and isn’t that a laugh, five years too late to save either of her parents. (They must have been hippies, have zero online footprint. It’s almost creepy, if the sliver of knowledge wasn’t so treasured. Clary’s own profiles had all been deleted, and she tries not to think of why she would have done that.)

There’s a woman standing in front of her latest cityscape, her favorite work yet. She’d been tempted to keep it for herself, but there’s no room in the apartment for such a large work, and she’d hate for it not to be displayed. (She has an artist’s pride, wonders if her mother did as well, has a dozen of her works, each carefully preserved.)

At fifty by twenty feet, it’s the biggest piece she’s ever completed. Set at dusk, the sky is bleeding down, deep reds and purples and indigos, the city itself dark blue, almost black, and bare hints of gold in the details.

The woman’s nails glint out of the corner of her eye, pure gold lacquer, and in this moment, Clary is certain she’ll buy the painting.

“Evening, I’m the artist, Clary Fray. Can I help you?”

The woman’s gaze turns to her, an odd smile lighting her lips. “Yes. How much?”

“Make me an offer.”

“Sixty thousand.”

Clary can’t help the surprise or disbelief at the exorbitant figure- easily fifty-nine thousand dollars more than her highest price. She wouldn’t have to worry over rent all year, or taxes, or getting nicer canvases-

“Of course, for such a price I’d expect a dinner with the artist as well.”

Her brain snaps back online, schooling her expression back to a hopefully normal smile. “I’d be happy to Miss…?

Her lips curl up, “Belcourt, but I insist, call me Camille.”

“Camille,” Clary echoes, notes how the woman lights up, must enjoy having her ego stroked. “I’ll draw up a sale agreement.”

.

Clary’s pacing in front of her mirror. She’s changed her lipstick from bright red to clear to dark purple back to red again, and she’s still unsure. She doesn’t want to be too provocative (well she does) but she doesn’t want to misread the situation. Not that Clary thinks she is- regular people don’t drop sixty k on a whim. She’s nearly positive the woman wants more, and Clary doesn’t have any qualms with being a ridiculously overpriced escort for the night. Would have done it for free, Camille’s beautiful in a way that feels impossible. And Camille knows it too, has the ego to match her long eyelashes, could have had Clary on her knees the very second they met.

There’s a distant feeling, a warning perhaps, not to go to the dinner. But that feeling, probably from old boring friendless Clary, is easily ignored. She wants to be happy, wants to go on a maybe date with a woman so out of her league it could all be a convincing dream.

Camille takes her to a fancy fusion place where they dance until their feet ache, soothe the pain with more food than any two people need to eat, and then return to Clary’s apartment. Clary’s usually a three date kind of girl, but there’s something about Camille that makes her feel so very greedy, so very alive. Like she needs to consume all she can of her as quickly as possible, like she wants to kiss and sketch every inch of her body, like a half remembered memory, an erotic deja vu. Her thoughts don’t even make sense, twisted with heat and lust. (She dismisses the brief theory that Camille was the girl from her childhood, her humor is too pointed.)

They make love deep into the night, into the early morning when truths are so much easier to speak. Clary is thinking she could fall in love with Camille, is already halfway there. That Camille fits into her life so seamlessly, that it doesn’t feel new. That Clary could-

“I can give you your memories back.”

Clary’s mind goes entirely blank. “What? How?”

Camille brushes her hair back, cups her face. “It aches to see you like this. I can fix you if you let me.”

“Anything,” Clary breathes before realizing she’s speaking. “Please, what do you need?”

“It’s magic,” Camille says, and it feels obvious now that the idea’s out there. Of course it was magical, Clary had searched for years for any similar amnesia cases and came up empty handed each time.

“Okay, I’m fresh out of newts.”

Camille laughs lightly, strokes down her cheek. “If you become mine, forever, I can set your mind free.”

The old Clary screams so loudly at that, she nearly flinches. But the old Clary left her alone in a huge world with a spotty memory, the old Clary didn’t care when things went badly, the old Clary was silent until recently. Her past self isn’t even surprised at magic, probably could have fixed them herself if she wanted to.

Camille is a walking miracle, and the idea of them being intertwined until the end, makes her want to sing (scream).

“Yes.”

Camille grins wide, two fangs pointing out, and the world fades to black.

.

Clary wakes up underground, instinctively digging through wet soil, pressure increasing everywhere. There’s no air to breathe, no space to see, and the slippery mud is trying to make this grave last. She kicks out, finds a rock ledge to cling to, forces her way out of the earth.

Moonlight and dirt smeared on her face, Clary is reborn eternal.

(She remembers.)