AUDREY BARNS: 28 years old. Born in 1979 in Richmond, Virginia. Her father (Joseph Reynolds) and mother (Gail Swift) divorced in 1987 after Gail refused to return from a writers seminar in Eugene, Oregon. Joe and Gail’s marriage was always a difficult one with moments of absolute bliss (fun family outings, board games, and loving words) and indescribable pain (shouting matches, verbal abuse and countless walk outs usually by Gail). Audrey and her brother Greg lived with their father in El Paso where Joe was an electrician. In 1992 Joseph packed up his two kids and moved in with his girlfriend, Bridget in Indiana. Bridget was a recent college graduate who worked in El Paso as part of her teacher’s training. Joe met her while working on the new gymnasium at the nearby high school. Audrey always had a difficult time accepting Bridget who was only 22 when she married the 37 year old Joe. Gail was absent for most of Audrey’s childhood and adolescence.
In high school Audrey became involved with theatre. It was discovered that she was a very talented dancer though she had no formal training. Her high school theatre instructor took a special interest in Audrey both as a student and a partner. He gave her the parts she needed and she in turn gave him the things he wanted. Her freshmen in high school an anonymous note was delivered to the PTA (parent, teacher association) reporting that Mr. Daniels was having sex with his student Audrey Reynolds. Bridget, a prominent member in the PTA interrogated Audrey who continued to deny the affair. Mr. Daniels, however, did confess and was sentenced accordingly. Audrey (15 years old), unable to handle the shame and pain that came with her situation dropped out of school and moved to New York to live with her mother. Gail was at this point a celebrated author and had many inroads with various thespians. Audrey started work with a small, independent dance troupe where she worked diligently. Her raw talent, passion and her mother’s contacts drove her to the top. By the time she was 23 she was one of the most desired classical dancers in northern America.
In the fall of 2006 Audrey had found it ever more difficult to keep up with the other dancers. She was tired and weak. In the spring of 2007 during a sold-out show Audrey collapsed. She was unconscious for a little over a minute but it felt like hours. She was rushed to the hospital where media speculations ran amok with tales of drug overdose. While trace amounts of cocaine were found in her system, it was the large lump in her breast and the slew of cancer infected cells that had doctors worried. Audrey was told to have mastectomy to which she bitterly conceded. Her dance troupe dropped her quicker than you can say shit and Audrey was left trying to find work with any troupe that would have her.
Audrey talks to her mother from time to time and her father even less. He was so greatly shamed by her affair in high school and disappointed in her running away that all the two of them manage are Christmas and birthday calls. She hasn’t spoken to her brother in 11 years.
Audrey takes her mother’s maiden name Barnes.
GAIL SWIFT: 51 years old. Born in 1957 in Illinois. Gail met Joe when she was working on some community service projects in Michigan. Joe was Gail’s first real love and the two were married in 1976 when Gail was 19. That year Gail had Greg and the family was happy. Gail always loved to write and kept a journal since she was a young girl. However, it wasn’t until a neighbor saw Gail’s work and suggested that she submit it to the local newspaper that Gail began to think of writing as a possible career. Being a housewife, Gail spent most of her early twenties taking care of her home, husband and son. But any free moment she had, she was writing. Within a few months Gail had a faithful following of other housewives. She became a celebrity in their small neighborhood as she was saying those things that housewives felt but didn’t have the means to say. She was even given her own column entitled “This little life: tales of a housewife”. By the time she had Audrey in 1979, Gail was hugely popular and began to write entire books about being a housewife. In the early 80’s Gail began to tire of the housewife story and thought that she needed to experience new things so she could write more. This desire put a strain on her and Joe’s marriage as Gail was often so busy with meetings and writing that she was ever more absent in the family’s life. In 1987 she set off for a writing seminar in Eugene, Oregon and never came back. She filed for a divorce 2 weeks later.
Gail had no interest in having sole custody of her children as she was too wrapped up in finding herself and experiencing all she could for the sake of her writing. Writing had become her number one priority. It was a relatively easy ruling for the judge as Joe wanted the kids and Gail did not and so Greg and Audrey spent the rest of their adolescent lives with their father. Gail would write letters to both children but they wouldn’t physically speak until they were much older.
MEGHANN VARDEN:
GREG REYNOLDS: 31 years old. Born in 1976 in Richmond, Virginia to parents Joseph and Gail Reynolds. Greg was born during a very passionate moment in Joe and Gail’s marriage where both Joe and Gail were really trying for a child. Greg’s birth was a scary one with him nearly dying because the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck. During his childhood he suffered from many physical maladies including chronic earaches, colds and allergies. He had sensitive skin which made playing out in the Texas sun dangerous. The Reynolds could not have pets because he was allergic to their fur. His eye site was poor and he had no atheletism to speak of. Yet the Reynolds loved their little boy and coddled him so much that it wouldn’t be until the second grade that Greg finally stopped wetting the bed.
His soft mannerisms and nerdy appearance (overweight, pale with blonde hair, braces and thick eye glasses) tormented him from elementary into high school. He was considered a mama’s boy, which by all definitions of the word, he was. Gail loved her son and his visible literary talents made her even more certain to protect and baby him. Greg was her son and in him she saw so much of herself. Joe was a little less affectionate toward Greg. While he was very happy with his son’s scholarly achievements, he was always pushing and hoping that Greg would get involved with sports. Joe thought his son may be gay because he was so traditionally “soft” and one day even asked Greg about his orientation. His father’s suspicions continue to haunt Greg today and he never feels adequate as a man.
When Gail ran out on the family Greg was 11. Because he was so attached to his mother, he took this abandonment personally and has since despised her. Greg was always jealous of his sister Audrey because she was so beautiful and because their father seemed so pleased with her. When she, too, ran away her senior year of high school to meet up with their mother, Greg saw the two as selfish and in cahoots. He hasn’t spoken to either of them since they ran off.
Greg is suffering from clinical depression and often hallucinates so that he has a difficult time discerning reality from fiction.
Greg works as a psychologist alongside Meghann Varden. He dates Meghann for a time and is in love with her. Meghann is questioning her own sexual identity. She is attracted to Audrey, Greg's sister but because Greg doesn't talk to or about his sister, Meghann does not know the connection between Greg and Audrey. He doesn't even mention that he has a sister.
DORA REYNOLDS: wife of Greg.
BARRY KING: interested in Meghann
NICK SHAUGHTS: Audrey’s first real love. Broke her heart and abandoned her.
MICHAEL HARMEN: 53 years old. Born July 31 1955 in Maine. Michael met Gail at a book signing in Connecticut. He was instantly attracted to her and the two hit it off immediately. Harmen is a widower of 12 years and has only recently been able to get back into a relationship. He is a doctor and has worked on both Gail and Audrey although he does not know that Audrey is Gail’s daughter because Gail uses her pseudonym Swift and Audrey uses her mother’s maiden name Barnes. Michael would like to settle down with Gail but she still seems too self-absorbed to realize how truly wonderful he is for her.
THE CONTRACTOR/THE GIRL: hallucination of Greg’s
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