We need to talk about Jessamine Lovelace

Let's talk about how Jessie was raised as a mundane for a little while. How she'd never been marked. How her mother had begun teaching her French, because it was a beautiful language when she was thirteen. How her father had told her every day that she was the most beautiful girl in the world, that she was his little princess. How she was the center of their world and they loved her more than anything because. How, for them, she represented a new era, their lives free from the Shadowhunters (who, let's face it, they probably left for a good reason). Let's talk about how, as the emblem of their new lives, they poured all of their hopes and dreams into her until she literally overflowed with all of it. Let's talk about how, by the time she was six, there simply was no room in her for anything Shadowhunter.

Let's talk about how she dreaded the visits from the Clave representatives. Let's talk about how her mother wept when they came to visit and her father grew silent and angry. Let's talk about how she had nightmares for months after their first visit, because they told her that there were demons in the world and that it was her responsibility to destroy them. Let's talk about how she woke up screaming every night and couldn't sleep until both her parents were with her.

Let's talk about how her father saved her from the fire and went back into the house for her mother and she never saw either of them again. Let's talk about the fourteen year old girl sitting in the street, sobbing, screaming, wanting to going in after him, but being too afraid. Let's talk about the constable coming and the fire department and her parents not coming out of the house and slow, sinking realization that they never were going to again.

Let's talk about how a fourteen year old girl had to identify her parent's bodies. Let's talk about how she had to walk through the ruins of her house and see her entire childhood destroyed. Let's talk about how she trailed her fingers over her papa's burnt books and her mama's sewing. Let's talk about how her room didn't even get touched and how she realized that if her father hadn't bothered to try to save her, she would have been fine and they both might still be alive. Let's talk about how the only thing she had left of her parents was the two dolls.

Let's talk about how no one in her extended family wanted her. Let's talk about how she was beautiful and well-mannered and everything a young lady ought to be, and she wasn't good enough for them because she wasn't a Shadowhunter. Let's talk about how the same Clave representatives that visited her every six years now showed up at the neighbor's who had taken her in and took her from the life she knew into the life her parents had saved her from and forced her to become one of them.

For that matter, let's talk about the Shadowhunters of the time. Good people, most of them. But a lot of them were arrogant and cruel and to them the Law is the Law and the feelings of the fourteen year old orphan be damned. Let's talk about how they decided that it was for her own good that they took her. Let's talk about how they looked at the delicate, unMarked, beautifully dressed girl and sneered at her because she wasn't really one of them. Let's talk about how their attitudes confirmed every single thing her parents had told her about the Shadowhunters.

Let's talk about when she was brought to the Institute, when she was claimed by the Shadowhunters and she lost all her agency on the pretense of being brought into a "forward-thinking" society. A forward-thinking society that told her that her parents were wrong, that her mama was wrong for wanting to sew and play pianoforte and for wearing beautiful clothes instead of for killing demons. A forward-thinking society that told her that her father was a disgrace and a turncoat. Let's talk about how Jessie was alone and afraid and an orphan and these terrifying tattooed people told her that it was now her job to kill demons, and that werewolves and vampires, and even the faeries are dangerous and untrustworthy. Let's talk about how she was terrified and couldn't sleep for months because her nightmares were the combination of the fire that killed her parents and the horrible creatures she was forced to learn about every day.

Let's talk about how she had to go to lesson's with Jem and Will, who were already parabatai, who had inside jokes and a history with each other. Let's talk about how there were two beautiful boys that should have loved her because she was ladylike and delicate and beautiful herself and they didn't. Let's talk about how their tutor didn't know what to do with her, this mundane Shadowhunter. Let's talk about how Will was cruel to her and how Jem was kind, but still a fourteen year old boy and a dying one at that and always seemed untouchable. Let's talk about how even though she was surrounded by people, she was totally alone.

Let's talk about how Charlotte and Henry meant well, but they had no idea how to handle a girl raised as a mundane. Let's talk about how Henry hid from her most of the time, not because he didn't like her, but because he didn't understand her and that made him nervous. Let's talk about how every night after dinner, Charlotte would dive into her paperwork and Henry into his inventions and the boys would run off together and Jessamine would simply go back to her room because it never occurred to any of them that she might need some company.

Let's talk about how she spent hours and hours playing with her dollhouse. How she swore to herself never to let her parent's memory die. How she used those hours to create memories of her parents, to reenact them because she would not forget them. She spends hours remembering the little details, like the fabric of her mother's morning dresses and the scent of her father's tobacco pipe, committing them all to memory. Let's talk about how she began to forget her mother's voice and the color of her father's eyes and how she felt guilty and scared and horribly sad and couldn't tell anyone, because none of these people would understand.

Let's talk about how she started having conversations with her parents. How she would form their words and expressions in her mind. How she would rail against the Shadowhunters and imagine their responses and how, when she was very afraid, she would cry and they would comfort her. Let's talk about how they were the most real things in her world, how it was the training and the lessons and the Shadowhunters that were the nightmare and the conversations with her parents every night that were her reality.

Let's talk about how she started growing out of the dresses her mother helped her pick out. Let's talk about how Charlotte tried to help her buy new dresses and it wasn't anything like the shopping with her mother and it made her sad because shopping with her mother had always been an adventure. Let's talk about how Charlotte tried to convince her to wear plainer dresses because they were easier to move in, to wear her hair in a simpler style, because it was more practical. Let's talk about how Jessie resisted and threw a temper tantrum and Charlotte lost her temper and yelled and both of them cried.

Let's talk about how she found out that her parents had left her money and how she finally felt like she wasn't alone. Let's talk about how she was able to shop the way her mama had. Let's talk about how when she puts on silk dresses, she sees her mama in her reflection and hears her papa telling her she looks like a princess.

Let's talk about how she impossibly lonely and desperately needed a friend. Let's talk about how she never got to interact with the other girls her age because she was at the Institute and they were at school in Idris. Let's talk about how she wanted a lady's maid because she had read a novel or two and learned that lady's maids were supposed to be your friends. Let's talk about when Sophie came and didn't give a damn about dresses and society gossip. Let's talk about how Sophie, who was supposed to be for Jessamine, loved Charlotte more and idealized being a Shadowhunter and how Jessie was, yet again, alone at the Institute.

But that's a lot to talk about and we haven't even got to talking about Jessamine in the books. So let's think about Jessie for a little bit and think about the fourteen year old girl who'd been raised as a mundane who was truly alone and scared and devastatingly sad and mentally unstable and maybe not judge her so harshly.

Author's Note: This is kind of a tirade and I'm sorry-but-not-sorry if it bothers you. Jessie got into my head and the more I wrote her story, the angrier I got and how misunderstood she is. Cassie has this great post about Jessamine on Tumblr, which I read shortly after reading some great work on AO3 in defense of Susan Pevensie (another hugely misunderstood female character) and the idea hit me and wouldn't let me go. So here it is. I'd love to hear how you feel about Jessamine and whether or not you think that she deserves this much thought. Thanks for reading all the way to the end. -Smooch