Friday, June 19, 2015

Special: Baby-Sitters Club All Grown Up: Jessi!

Boy, I thought Mallory was hard! She was a piece of cake (mmm...cake) compared to Jessi. Good news though, I was feeling super inspired after I wrote this one and wrote out the next two too. :)

Jessi's dance career continued to grow as she got older. Being the only black student at stuffy Mdme Noelle's dance school really paid off. She stood out and constantly got lead roles that she wasn't ready for, earning the admiration and death threats of her fellow students. After getting early acceptance into the American Ballet Theatre, she moved to New York City midway through high school and never looked back.
(click pic to make bigger)
(go here for links & details-ballet dancer pictured is Misty Copeland)

Jessi was excited to finally have some diversity in her life again and not have to start every conversation with "oh, and I'm black." Her sort-of boyfriend, Quint, attended the school too and they soon started dating again. She had a big group of friends and was happy. Her parents were a little concerned about what she would be doing after she couldn't dance anymore, but dancing was her life and she didn't want to hear anything else about it.

Her career continued to flourish and she became a principal dancer with the company. After living with Mallory for a year, she realized that non-dance people just didn't "get it" and was glad when Mal moved back home. Jessi immersed herself in the dance world and soon became quite a public figure. The BSCers were so proud of their little junior officer and went to her shows whenever possible. Becca was especially proud of her big sister and became the president of the We <3 Jessi fan club. Squirt (who's nickname unfortunately stuck with him) had classic "youngest sibling" jealousy but didn't let it get to him too much.

When Jessi's career began to slow down, she finally started thinking about her life and realized that she had to have music in it, no matter what. So she took some courses at the local junior college and discovered that those sign language lessons she got from the Braddock kids had stuck with her and sparked an interest in helping challenged kids. With the help of Aunt Cecelia's inheritance money and Mdme Noelle's connections, she started a dance and music class for deaf & blind kids in Stamford. Quint is a fellow teacher and the two are still romantically involved, although not quite ready to make it permanent. They go home regularly to Oakland to visit their families.

And that's it for our 2nd Junior Officer and the last "official" member of the Baby-Sitters Club. Be sure to check out the "All Grown Up" tag if you've missed any of the previous! And as always, let me know what you think...am I right on the money or did I get it totally wrong?

2 comments:

  1. Great job! I enjoyed reading all of these! I feel like you nailed every one of these :)

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    1. Thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed them. :)

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