So, I have this habit of finding ways to relate songs I hear to books/TV shows, and sometimes they are really perfect fits, if I do say so myself. Sometimes only a few lines match up right, like that time I matched Mockingjay with The Story of Us by Taylor Swift (yeah, not my best work), but this one... man, I'm good. Because I follow Cassie Clare on Tumblr and therefore am constantly reminded of my heartbreak (and yet I will not unfollow her because I Love This Pain [that's Lady Antebellum]), here is my line-by-line dissection of Basket Case by Sara Bareilles and how it relates to the Infernal Devices.
Notes: "I"= Tessa; "You"= Will; "He/him"= Jem.
I don't want to talk about it to you
I'm not an open book that you can rifle through
Tessa won't admit to Will that she loves him, because it won't make things any easier on him to know that she does. This is right after he tells her that he loves the girl in the letters ("open book that you can rifle through"), so she wouldn't want to be that girl anymore, to spare him the pain of loving someone who can't admit she loves him back. Also, they both love books.
The cold, hard truth that you see right to
I'm just a basket case without you
The cold, hard truth is when Will says "You can never love me," because he realizes that it would be dishonorable for Tessa to tell him she loves him when she's engaged to Jem. But she is a basket case without him, because after this whole scene she goes and burns herself on a stoker to distract herself from the emotional pain with physical pain. If that doesn't say "basket case," I don't know what does.
He's not a magic man or a perfect fit
But had a steady hand and I got used to it
I feel like this might minimize what Tessa actually feels for Jem, but come on. It's pretty appropriate. Tessa's feelings for Jem didn't really start until she was fully convinced that Will only wanted to use her for her smokin' bod. Jem is, by definition, the "steady flame."
And a glass cage heart and invited me in
And now I'm just a basket case without him
Glass cage heart= breakable. Jem. He never thought he'd have a chance to fall in love, so if Tessa were to tell him about Will's and her feelings for each other, he would probably be crushed. Also Tessa agrees to marry Jem after he tells her that loving her is keeping him alive. And of course she would be a basket case without him, too, because she does legitimately love him.
You're beggin' for the truth
So I'm sayin' it to you
I've been saving your place
But what good does it do?
Now I'm just a basket case
Now I'm just a basket case
Back to Will, wanting to know if Tessa does love him, but the only truth she can tell him is that she is engaged to Jem and therefore can't say she loves Will. And she really has been saving his place-- it even says in the book that a part of her would always belong to him. But it does no good, because of the aforementioned engagement. So she's a hand-burning basket case.
I don't say much and it'll stay that way
You got a steel train touch and I'm just a track you lay
She doesn't say much to Will about how she feels about him. He only had a sense that she might love him back because of the things she does: kissing him, coming to get him from the ifrit den, that whole thing in the infirmary. The "steel train touch" part is especially accurate based on Tessa's previous close encounters with Will, how they pretty much attacked each other. Also, figuratively, it could relate to Will deliberately hurting everyone he cares about, specifically when he called Tessa a barren prostitute monster.
So I'll stay right here underneath you
I'm just a basket case and it's what we do
Well, this isn't exactly what it sounds like. One, even after Will calls her a barren prostitute monster, Tessa still has feelings for him. She stays under his influence-- when he's in the room with her, she chastises herself for admiring him, and when he's not, she chastises herself for thinking about him. Two, it reminds me of the party at the Lightwoods'. Which was, you know, the day after Jem was improperly romancing the young lady in his bedroom. It's what basket cases do.
[Chorus again]
Won't somebody come on in and tug at my seams?
Oh, send your armies in of robbers and thieves
To steal the state I'm in, I don't want it anymore
To me, this verse isn't actually about wanting someone to come and tug at her seams; it's a sarcastic comment from someone who feels like they already are. Tessa is so torn by the end of Clockwork Prince, and obviously she doesn't want to feel this way, so she becomes kind of self-destructive (in a minor way, of course).
[Chorus again]
Now I'm just a basket case
x4
The repetition of this line at the end is a lot like at the end of Clockwork Prince, when Jem announces their engagement out of the blue and Tessa has to deal with Will being in the room to hear it. Obviously there is a good chance this will make the "basket case" situation four times worse.
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