This has been long overdue, so now that I'm still in the mood for this after recently posting a Leah Clearwater-central fic under my account http://www.fanfiction.net/~aeshnalacrymosa, I'm getting on with it.
In a previous entry in which I discussed my preferred outcome in Eclipse and Breaking Dawn, I mentioned Leah Clearwater quite a few times. Alongside Jacob Black, Leah Clearwater is my favorite character because of all the female characters, she is the one who exudes confidence and courage throughout her existence in the series. I also love the fact that she actually has the guts to berate Bella for all the bullshit she puts Jacob Black through, and whether you like it or not, Leah Clearwater always happens to be in the right.
Leah Clearwater first appears in New Moon in a perfectly insignificant scene wherein her family has dinner with Jacob's. Leah Clearwater is described to be beautiful; like the Cullens, that's the only kind of description about her that you would get from Bella Swan, who is so shallow that all she ever notices are looks. But by the next two books, I saw instead a strong woman who manages to be brave through troubles greater than Bella ever experiences. Bella only goes through one breakup and snaps and doesn't recover for months whereas Leah loses her boyfriend to her cousin, and a few months later, she loses her dad too, and Leah still keeps a straight face.
It's true that her manner of grieving put off her brothers. I suppose I would also be annoyed if somebody in the group somehow couldn't keep her problems to herself. But how could you blame a 19-year-old girl who first loses her boyfriend to her cousin for no apparent reason and then loses her father, who, if fan speculations are to be believed, died from a heart attack when she and her brother transformed into wolves for the first time. If that wasn't enough, becoming lycanthropes instantly gives them both duties that had nothing to do with them, duties that thrust them into a world of violence, pitting them against vampires that Leah is afraid of. And what's more, she now belongs to a brotherhood of men-wolves with constant telepathic contact with each other, meaning that she can hear her ex-boyfriend thinking about her cousin. That's really painful beyond measure, and it's really unfair and unjust how everybody in the "wolf pack" now cast Leah as the bad guy for being "grouchy" and a "harpy" because she doesn't approve of this norm.
Apparently, Leah's ex-boyfriend Sam imprinted on her cousin Emily, meaning that Emily is Sam's destined life partner and Leah is not. It's more than simply predestined love, Jacob explains in Eclipse; Sam happens to be "physically compatible" with Emily, meaning that she is "the best candidate for passing down the werewolf gene." But you might ask, if Leah is already a werewolf like Sam, why isn't she the one? It is revealed in Breaking Dawn that since Leah's first "phasing", she has stopped menstruating, rendering her unable to have children of her own.
That must be a great blow for a 19-year-old girl preparing for adulthood. It's even more painful that judging from her manner and voice during her conversations with Jacob Black in Breaking Dawn, Leah appears to be somewhat ambitious, which is a big deal coming from a young woman from a Native American reservation, which, let's just say, is normally not the best breeding ground for the world's most influential people. According to a blog by a Native American woman who has read the Twilight series, "the rez" is usually plagued with extreme poverty laced with disease, famine and substance abuse. Having promised herself to "have a job outside La Push, attend community college and take yoga classes for the sake of my well-being," Leah must be a mighty ambitious woman indeed. So how would you feel, having big dreams like that and yet getting stuck with a bunch of selfish morons who all think you're a bitch because you're heartbroken, not to mention that you have to work with them because you have a job to kill monsters who are likely to kill you first?
So maybe punishing them all by continually bringing up internal scandals and being snappish and sarcastic all the time is a bit mean. I don't quite blame the others for being angry at her all the time, but they could at least show a bit of kindness to a mourning person instead of behaving like they wouldn't feel the same if they were in her shoes. What pisses me off worst of all was that by the end of Eclipse, Jacob (and I suppose, so does the rest of the pack) preferred to defend Sam for leaving Leah, saying that "it's not Sam's fault Leah turned into this harpy. ... Sam loved Leah."
How much did Sam love Leah? The first time that was brought up, I imagined that although the "magical" union between him and Emily was unbreakable, his feelings for Leah never changed. I would have been able to accept that. But in Breaking Dawn, I learned that this "fact" was superficial at best and was not true at all.
When Bella was found to be pregnant with Edward's demon spawn, Sam decided on leading an unprovoked attack against the Cullens, but because of Jacob's feelings for Bella, he refuses to obey and then, by virtue of being the son of the chief of the tribe, Jacob manages to break away from Sam's authority and becomes his own boss; when Seth and Leah Clearwater later follow him, he becomes their boss, their Alpha. Soon afterwards, Sam sends Jared as a messenger for him, ordering him also to call Leah Lee-Lee (Sam's pet name for Leah when they were together) and "get down on one knee if I have to." If Sam really loves Leah, he would think she would be worth the effort of going all the way across the county and beg on his knees to make her come back. But no, Sam's too good for that. He didn't bother; he sent someone else who must have preferred to not be involved.
The subsequent events made me fall in love with Jacob Black all over again.
Because of what I perceived to be the absence of external influence, Jacob's mind becomes clear and he is finally able to understand Leah: "I knew what it was like for Leah, having to see that all the time, hearing it in Sam's head. ... I would never blame her again." This was right after Edward first hears Renesmee's thoughts in Bella's belly, and the two of them coo over the unborn child as though Jacob wasn't right there in the room trying to comfort Bella, who was ailing from the difficult pregnancy.
I hated and loved that scene at the same time; it was the only scene in the entire series filled with poignant emotion that wasn't insufferably melodramatic. But I felt Jacob's pain there, while he watched Edward and Bella being happy, making it clear for him that he didn't belong in that picture. His heart torn, Jacob flees the scene and desperately finds someone to imprint on, just so he wouldn't have to deal with the heartbreak.
Heartbreak was what Jacob and Leah bonded over. By the end of the series, they considered each other as cherished friends, but not before an event that occurs while Jacob was away, grieving.
Jacob returns to the Cullen house to be greeted by a seething Edward, who informs Jacob that Leah had just berated Bella for hurting Jacob. Edward "loves" Bella, so I would understand how angry he would get, but the way he went about it was irrational, to say the least. He cannot read Bella's mind, but he thinks he understands how painful it is for Bella to make Jacob stay and care for her, whereas he can read Leah's mind like an open book but he fails to comprehend the meaning and emotion behind her harsh words for his wife. Jacob turned out to be more mature than the 101-year-old vampire; Jacob only appreciated Leah more for having "vehemently championed" him, because as far as he was concerned, Leah's behavior was far more justified than Bella's.
If you wonder why I think this is the case, let me explain. If you love someone, and I mean really care for someone from the bottom of your heart, from the core of your soul, would you subject him to unending anguish by making him watch you being happy with somebody else you obviously love more? Hell, no! You would spare him the pain and let him go and be happy by himself or with someone unattached. But no, Bella doesn't do that: she has too much fun playing with Jacob's feelings, feeding him affection and asking him to give her some, as if to make him feel like he still has a chance with her while she's already married and carrying her husband's child. If that's not an inconsiderate bitch, I don't know what is.
Oh, but Leah sees Bella for what she is. And Leah isn't afraid to point that out. Her mental contact with Jacob made her empathetic with him, urging her to barge into the Cullen house in human form (perhaps stark-naked!), making her vulnerable to the vampires' attacks, just to tell the bitch what kind of a heartless whore she is.
At that point, I expected that Leah and Jacob would eventually hook up. This is effectively evidenced by their earlier conversation in which they agree against imprinting and desire "falling in love on my own." The chemistry was perfect, despite the occasional bickering. But no, this is not what happens; instead, Jacob becomes a pedophile by imprinting on Bella's newborn baby.
I shall be skipping some of the details at this point, but the important part is that by the end of Breaking Dawn, everyone gets a happy ending, except Leah. Sam gets Emily and never gets punished for having hurt Leah; Paul gets Jacob's sister Rachel and is never punished for being incredibly rude to the Black family by hogging all their food; Quil gets Emily's 2-year-old niece Claire; Jared gets his classmate Kim; and Seth is happy enough being friends with the Cullens. Hey, even the humans get paired up!
Leah only has a big dream, which is good. However, due to the demands of the responsibilities of being the pack's Beta, it doesn't seem likely that this ambition is coming true any time soon. It doesn't help that there is also no promise or hint that Leah would become normal again, that she might be able to have babies after all. I really feel that there is a great injustice here. If anybody deserves to be happy, it's Leah. NOT SAM, NOT EMILY, NOT PAUL, AND ESPECIALLY NOT BELLA! The poor girl has had enough troubles already, can't she have a break? I think it's really cruel that Leah would be treated like that. It's not any worse than what had been done to Jacob, who gets a leftover for the hell of it.
I don't care if Stephenie Meyer said she'd love to write a story on Leah Clearwater's point of view. She has no love for her characters at all. Bella is her avatar and Edward is the OH-SO-PERFECT PRINCE CHARMING and Renesmee is THE WORLD'S MOST UNIQUE BABY, and THAT'S ALL SHE EVER CARES ABOUT!
