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Lindsey, Susie’s sister, is 13 when Susie is murdered. Lindsey is a proxy for Susie and is a conduit through whom Susie matures. Likewise, Lindsey’s maturation transpires as an outcome of Susie’s death and through her drive to keep her family intact.
In the wake of Susie’s murder, as the family falls apart, Lindsey withdraws into herself. Her mother, Abigail, is increasingly absent both physically and emotionally. Meanwhile, her father, Jack, grows obsessed with proving that their neighbor, George Harvey, killed Susie. Buckley is too young to relate, and Lindsey is broken and alone in her grief and in her new identity as the dead girl’s sister.
On Christmas, less than a month after Susie dies, Samuel Heckler gives Lindsey a half-heart necklace for Christmas. He wears the other half. The necklace reveals that Samuel sees Lindsey’s brokenness, symbolizing a connection that will heal when Lindsey matures through her grief and when Susie reaches “wide wide Heaven.”
Lindsey soon begins carving an identity for herself fueled by love and family. Aware of Jack’s suspicions of George Harvey, and intent on holding the family together by supporting him, Lindsey breaks into Harvey’s house and steals the blueprints for the underground bunker where he murdered Susie, evidence that connects Harvey to Susie’s murder. Harvey spots her escaping his house and focuses on the number ”5” on her jersey. The numeral 5 represents the family of five that Harvey stole a member from, an act now countered by Lindsey’s stealing from Harvey. The number also foreshadows that Lindsey is integral in Harvey’s undoing as Harvey dreams of the number on her retreating jersey when he fears he is close to capture.
With Harvey gone, Lindsey continues repairing the fractured bonds within herself and her family. She is by Jack’s side both after he is beaten in the cornfield and when he suffers a heart attack. It is not until Abigail returns to the family to help take care of Jack that Lindsey finally feels free to pursue the life her heart desires. When Samuel proposes to Lindsey after they graduate college, thereby fulfilling the promise implied by his initial Christmas gift, her heart is made whole. She once again runs home to a different familial picture. But this time, Lindsey runs not in reaction to what has gone wrong but in celebration of what has become right.
