“Mrs. Evans […] marked in the X, spoiling my picture. She pointed. ‘This is a picture of a family, Hollis. A mother, M, a father, F, a brother, B, a sister, S. They’re standing in front of their house, H. I don’t see one W word here.’ I opened my mouth to say: How about W for wish, or W for want, or W for ‘wouldn’t it be loverly,’ like the song the music teacher had taught us? But Mrs. Evans was at the next table by that time, shushing me over her shoulder.”

On the first page, this passage establishes some of the key elements that define Hollis as a character. Her greatest desire is for a family. She’s highly creative and sees things in ways others don’t. Pictures help her make sense of her life. The big X symbolizes both the impossibility of family and the fact that adults have rarely tried to understand Hollis (a fact underscored by Mrs. Evans ignoring Hollis’s attempts to explain). The W picture remains a defining image throughout the novel, and Hollis finds closure once she has drawn her own real-life version of it at the end.

“Don’t think about it, Steven said in my head. I did that a lot; I pretended Steven was right there next to me when I knew he was miles away in upstate New York. I wondered if he ever said to himself, ‘What is Hollis Woods doing right this minute?’ And did he put my words in his head?”

Here, the author introduces a narrative trope that will continue throughout the novel—Hollis has imaginary conversations with Steven in her head. The italics in these sections are reminiscent of the italics in which the “picture” flashbacks take place and show the extent to which Hollis is always living in both the present and the past. The feeling that Steven is always with her will be literalized later in the book when he accurately guesses Hollis is hiding out at the Branches house and becomes her secret protector.