Invisible Emmie

Katie is Emmie’s imaginary creation, but this twist is not revealed until the story’s conclusion, although several clues present themselves throughout the novel. Katie’s life is the opposite of Emmie’s, which is demonstrated in the way Katie is described and illustrated. Her chapters are short, and the panels are bursting with color and people. By contrast, illustrations of Emmie’s life are defined by their blank space as much as by the drawings themselves. Throughout the novel, there are hints that Katie’s life is too good to be true. Whereas Emmie’s parents are almost never around, Katie’s parents are always around. Emmie has one friend, and Katie is the most popular girl in school. Katie excels in every subject and is always happy to go to school on a Monday morning, while Emmie dreads going. Emmie fills the anxiety and emptiness of her life with fantasies of the person she wishes she could be. As she says at the end, “Sometimes [Katie] had the kind of life I wish I had. And sometimes she just helped me deal with stuff” (176). When Emmie can’t will herself to speak up, she imagines Katie doing it for her. When Emmie is alone and needs the comfort of a friend, she imagines Katie coming to her rescue. Katie stands up to Emmie’s bullies and sets an example for Emmie to follow—an example that she created herself. Katie also has the same crush as Emmie, and Emmie imagines Tyler asking Katie out. Even when Emmie goes to the bathroom and has to wait in line, Katie gets to cut in front. Joe Lungo also finds a drawing of Katie on Emmie’s desk, hinting that she might be a character Emmie created. When Emmie finally finds her courage and her voice, she is able to let go of Katie and just be herself.

Brianna Davis is Emmie’s best friend. They have known each other since kindergarten, when Brianna moved from Georgia. Brianna excelled in academics even at that age and discovered that she could be a decent leader, too. When she found Emmie, who was easygoing and quiet, they bonded because Emmie was willing to be led by Brianna. As they got older, Emmie started to grow irritated with Brianna’s “bossiness” but never stopped loving her best friend. In middle school, Brianna got accepted into the gifted program, and now she and Emmie have no classes together. They make up for this by spending every lunch together, but even Brianna sees that Emmie needs more friends. She encourages Emmie to open up to others: “I wish you could be like this with everybody, Em. You actually talk. With me, anyway. You’re funny. You should loosen up around people” (93). Emmie is reluctant to do so and needs to find her own reason to open up, which comes when she and Brianna get into an argument. Brianna explodes at Emmie for possibly losing her love poem too, which hurts Emmie, who knows it was all an accident. At the end of the day, Brianna apologizes to Emmie and their friendship is mended. Emmie even tells Brianna about Katie, the girl she created to speak for her.

Tyler is a flat character in the novel who is defined mainly by the fact that Emmie has a crush on him. Emmie has known Tyler since kindergarten, but it was not until fourth grade, when he picked up her eraser and handed it to her, that Emmie developed feelings for Tyler: “I don’t even know if he really saw me. But that was enough. I fell hard” (69). Emmie writes a love poem to Tyler that quickly circulates around the school, but Tyler seems more interested in it than ready to laugh at it. Emmie likes Tyler because he is sweeter and more sensitive than his friends and because of his smile: “He smiles a lot (even with braces!)” (72). However, he disappoints her when he is too scared to stand up for her when his friends bully her. Emmie uses her made-up character, Katie, to express her hopes for a relationship with Tyler and then her frustration with his cowardice. This fear of Standing Up to Bullies is something that Emmie and Tyler have in common and something they overcome together when they yell at Joe to stop bothering Emmie. Afterward, Tyler and Emmie walk to class together and discover their shared love of art. Emmie makes a new friend in him and feels proud of herself for facing her fears and standing up for herself.

Emmie’s parents are static characters who are often absent from Emmie’s life due to their demanding jobs and lackluster attitude toward parenting at their older age. Emmie has two older siblings who were born about a decade before her, and when she came along as an “oops baby,” her parents had already moved on to other pursuits. Emmie’s father is always illustrated sitting at the kitchen table with a newspaper in front of his face and telling jokes to cheer up his daughter. Her mother is always just out of the scene as she scrambles to find everything she needs for the day. Emmie’s mother is passionate about health and fitness and insists on buying only healthy food. She gives Emmie health advice and tells her that she will likely discover her inner athlete when she’s older. The most important thing that Emmie’s mother tells her is that “things usually happen for a reason” (150). Emmie doesn’t know what the reason for her embarrassment is at first, but it becomes clear when she bursts out of her shell, stands up to Joe Lungo, and makes new friends along the way. After school, Emmie decides to tell her mother about her day, suggesting that the two will grow closer as a result of Emmie’s growth.