Introduction

[intheheart]

All of the fantastic picspam pictures made by the lovely five_steps_back.


This is Ivy Sophia Hirschfeld-Kendall, as played by Neko Case. She's the star. Nominally, anyway.


Ivy is an opinionated loudmouth of a veterinarian with a complicated family, all of whom you'll meet later on, all of whom have her intense and undying loyalty. She's a lesbian, and she's been with her wife Gina since she was twenty-one; after their marriage, they have two children, Andy and Leah. She's reckless, stubborn, noisy, headstrong, confident to the point of insanity, and a little bit on the weird side. She's also loyal, loving, adores animals, fiercely protective of her friends, and very strong. She's short, but she has so much personality you'd never know it.

The story begins when Ivy first meets Gina, in May 2010.


Gail Hirschfeld and Nathan Kendall, Ivy's parents, as played by Teryl Rothery and Bruce Greenwood.




Gail's a kindergarten teacher turned politican. As of the story's start, she's pretty much responsible for special education in New York City. Outwardly, she's nice, polite, gentle, and rather absent-minded. Woe betide the person who buys that act. She's actually forceful, ruthless, doesn't take no for an answer, is fiercely protective of her children (which includes Jake and Aaron), and holds a grudge. She's also probably smarter than you. Ivy is the accidental result of an ill-advised affair with a gentleman named Bradley Spitzer, but Gail has never considered her elder daughter a mistake, and will injure anyone implying otherwise. She has a younger sister named Cecily, and a niece and nephew, Rachel and Tyler.

Nathan's an architect and a Navy veteran; he left the Navy after his first wife, Melanie, divorced him, to take care of their son Aaron, but remains very supportive of the armed forces. He's pretty calm, but he does have a few buttons, namely his family and anyone threatening his children. He's compassionate, sometimes to the point of idiocy, and he has a tendency to take in strays, probably because he's an only child who always wanted siblings. He's said that part of the reason he married Gail was because he was head over heels in love with Ivy, whom he formally adopted on her fifth birthday. He's also made a particular protege of Danny.


Aaron Kendall, Nathan's son, Ivy's older brother, as played by Daniel Vettori.


Much like his father, Aaron likes to sit back and take the world as it comes. He's asexual, and not broken. He very rarely gets angry, although misunderstandings of asexuality will set him off, and if you even look at his family cross-eyed he will rain napalm on your head, and you will never see him coming. He possesses a dry sense of humor that is sometimes necessary to survive being related to Ivy. He also nicknames everyone who comes in contact with him. He plays drums in a not-too-terrible garage band, which might be how he gets out all the aggression he doesn't appear to have. In Real Life, he's a preschool teacher. He's Lars's best friend and married to Clara, with whom he has twin children, William (Billy) and Marianne Lynne (Molly).


Summer Rose Kendall, Ivy's younger sister, as played by Rachel Hurd-Wood.


Summer has ASD, diagnosed as Asperger's Syndrome, so she simply doesn't understand a lot of social rules and interactions. She has a lot of difficulty interacting with her peers, so Summer tends to gravitate toward people much older than her. Fortunately, she's also extremely gifted, so she can converse with adults on a similar intellectual level from a fairly early age. Equally fortunately, her family is not afraid to browbeat people into making necessary allowances for her, so she's relatively well-adjusted and happy. She's adopted Lars as her own personal older brother. She graduates high school a year early and attends medical school, specializing in forensic pathology. She eventually settles into a stable triad with Zack and Felipe; they have one son, Thomas, who is the center of their lives.


Gina Caravecchio, Ivy's girlfriend/fiancee/wife, as played by Tricia Helfer.


Gina is pretty much what Gail pretends to be. Sweet, polite, very feminine, and extremely if quietly competent at just about everything. She's devoutly Catholic, and maintains a good relationship with her childhood priest, Father Arnott. By nature, she's a caretaker, who sometimes feels the need to save the world, although she's getting better about that. Gina's a Good Girl, capitals and all; she calms Ivy down and scales back her restless impulses, while Ivy makes Gina more outgoing and risk-taking. Gina has a wicked, Mel Brooks-sense of humor. She's also Olivia's best friend.


Olivia Marhenke, played by Regina Spektor.


Olivia had a charmed childhood, despite intermittent manifestations of the clinical depression and chronic anxiety that would plague her for the rest of her life. She was very much Daddy's little girl, and her father adored her. However, just after her thirteenth birthday, her mother informed her that she was not actually her father's daughter, followed up by convincing her that her father hated her, and promptly kidnapped her to parts unknown. Olivia would not see her father again for thirteen years. She dealt with her mother's emotional abuse and neglect until she was eighteen, transferred colleges, dropped all contact with her mother, met Gina, and started on the road to recovery. Meeting Jake helped; so did finding her father again when she was twenty-six. She can be rather gullible, but overall she's a total sweetheart who tries very hard to please. She works a variety of retail jobs, but most consistently teaches piano. She's married to Jake, with whom she has three daughters, Felicity, Vivian, and Elena.


Jacob Foster, as played by Paul Campbell.


Jake was orphaned at nine by a house fire that killed his parents and two sisters, and spent much of his adolescence dealing with it and the subsequent PTSD. Luckily for him he got help very early thanks to a loving foster family with whom he is still very close, and met Gail Hirschfeld just out of law school. He's now her main minion; she considers him a sort of surrogate son. He can be clingy and occasionally needy, prone to fits of denial and occasionally hypercontrolling. Generally, though, he's a good, solid guy, dependable and intelligent, a savvy politician, very much in love with his wife, and wound tightly around his daughters' fingers.

Lars Warmind, Aaron's best friend, Summer's adoptive big brother, and Danny's boyfriend, as played by Henrik Asheim.


Lars is smack-dab in the middle of seven siblings, which appears to have formed most of his personality. He's laid-back and conciliatory as a general rule, with a tendency to bottle things up until he explodes, at which point there is usually shrapnel and casualties. He's the driving force behind keeping Bedrock Drift together, and plays bass guitar in it. Apart from that, and occasional gigs babysitting Summer and tutoring lesser mortals, he doesn't appear to have an actual job; he says that he tends bar, but he's never been seen actually doing this. He is utterly devoted to Summer. Romantically, he has a thing for bad girls, and has had a dreadful crush on Danny ever since he met her. He tends to attract semi-abusive friends who will nevertheless murder anyone who hurts him in the face.


Danny Sierbenski, as played by Pink.


Danny's full name is Daniella Juliette, but she will shank you if you call her that. She's a very angry person, mostly because she comes from a neglectful, emotionally and semi-physically abusive background. There is no one on earth she's closer to than her younger brother Michael, although Nathan as her adoptive father, Aaron as her adoptive brother, and Lars as her boyfriend are catching up pretty fast. She's more or less been adopted by the Hirschfeld-Kendall family, much the same way Jake was. She's also a Navy veteran, and as of now is a reservist, living in New York and earning her civilian bread as a self-defense instructor. She's in a stable relationship with Lars, but she will never marry or have children, because of her childhood and the OI lurking somewhere in her genes.


Zachary Ryan, who goes by Zack, played by Alan Tudyk.


Zachary Ryan is a cop in Washington DC who signed up for crimes against property and is currently getting a whole lot more dead bodies than he bargained for. He's also in a lot closer proximity to Dr. Summer Kendall, who irritates him until he finds out about her ASD, at which point he feels like a heel. Once he gets over that, they hit it off and eventually settle into a stable triad with his best friend and former partner Felipe Claro. He eventually transfers into public relations, where he never needs to run across a corpse again. He has divorced parents, an older sister named Paige, and he likes to think he's a ladykiller. He also likes bad puns, and adores Thomas.


Felipe Claro, played by Enver Gjokaj.


Felipe Claro is Zack's partner, a uniform who really wants to be a homicide cop. This is a problem, since he also loves being Zack's partner, and Zack wouldn't do homicide if you forced him at gunpoint. Felipe is smart, charming, something of a Casanova, bisexual, polyamorous, eventually a homicide detective, and very much in love with both Zack and Summer. He's Portuguese by descent (although he doesn't speak the language beyond endearments and cusswords), has four siblings, and plays indulgent uncle to ten children and counting. Thomas is the center of his world.


Some of the more prominent minor characters:

Danny's brother Michael Sierbenski, played by Michael Weatherly.


Michael has osteogenesis imperfecta, or brittle bone disease, which means that his bones are extremely fragile and break if you look at them funny. He's also a happy-go-lucky young man who writes travel guides and adores his sister. He lives in Seattle, with Joy.


Rebecca Sierbenski, played by Marlee Matlin.


Rebecca was raised in a very restrictive household, and promptly swore she would never control her children to the extent that her mother did. She married Frank Sierbenski partly as a rebellion, and for a while she was happy. Then Michael was born with OI, and her life went down the drain. In her need to protect and control Michael, she wound up emotionally and physically abusing both her children, especially Danny. Frank left her, her children ran away, and she burned her bridges pretty effectively when she attempted to reunite with Michael. However, Rebecca recognizes that she failed her children, and has made repeated attempts to apologize. She may yet succeed.


Hugh Marhenke, Olivia's father, played by John Hannah.


Hugh, a pediatrician, originally dated Yvonne's sister before falling for Yvonne and marrying her. He devoted himself more and more to Olivia as he came to realize Yvonne's true character; he was devestated when Yvonne took Olivia and left. Yvonne's revelation that Olivia might not be biologically his daughter was briefly shocking, but he later decided that she was his daughter regardless of whose genes she had. He continued his search for her unabated, and was reunited with her in August of 2013. He now lives in San Francisco with his second wife, Joanna, and consistently refuses to get a paternity test.


Yvonne Marhenke, Olivia's mother, played by Ali Larter.


Yvonne Marhenke was also, somewhat ironically, Daddy's little girl, spoiled and petted. Her father died when she was seven, and she has spent the rest of her life attempting to get that spoiled, safe feeling back. Since she would probably be diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder if she ever let a therapist near her, this has proved difficult. She manipulated Hugh into marrying her to get back at her sister, cheated on him repeatedly, took Olivia away from him to hurt him, and neglected and emotionally abused Olivia. When Olivia ran away and Hugh divorced her, she took it as a personal betrayal. She continues to look for someone to take care of her. It is doubtful if she'll ever find someone.


Joanna Amala, Olivia's stepmother, portrayed by Sitara Hewitt.


Joanna is a lovely, quiet, sweet librarian, introverted and rather shy. She has an advanced case of endometriosis that has rendered her infertile. She's also Muslim, and the second oldest of six siblings. When she was seven years old, her father cheated on her mother and intended to leave the family for his lover, though he did not in the end; Joanna therefore grew up in a strained atmosphere, where she never dared speak her mind. She's getting better at that now. She adores Hugh, and looks on Olivia as the child she will never have (except in an AU).


Andy and Leah Kendall, Ivy and Gina's kids, as played by Aldis Hodge and Molly Quinn.


No prizes for guessing which kid is adopted.

Ivy and Gina adopted Andy when he was four. Leah was born two years later, the product of Ivy's egg and the sperm of Gina's cousin Joseph. Both kids are happy and as well-adjusted as it's possible to be when you are raised by Ivy. Andy is a romantic at heart, likes otters, is very outgoing, completely Ivy's son, and epitomizes tall, dark, and snarky. Leah lives her life in books, is strongly introverted, wholeheartedly believes in magic, is very much Gina's daughter, and is quite possibly the most subtle person in her family. Both are easily amused and likewise have short fuses.


Clara Hawkins Kendall, Aaron's wife, played by Alexis Bledel.


Clara is an asexual of the "EW EW EW" type, a social worker in the adoption/foster care track, and a Peace Corps alumnae. Her mother died when she was nineteen, and she has yet to recover fully from that. She's married to Aaron, and they have twin children thanks to DIY artificial insemination; Clara has yet to stop grumbling about the syringes. She also has an older brother named Ethan, and a close and loving relationship with her father, Gary Hawkins.


Clara and Aaron's twins, Billy and Molly Lynne Kendall (properly named William and Marianne), portrayed by Jake Abel and Emma Roberts.


Molly is surprisingly like Ivy despite not being genetically related to her; bright, stubborn, and deeply loyal. Billy is that one quiet kid with his nose in a book who could totally kick your ass. They have an intense case of sibling rivalry that lasts well into high school, but have each other's backs should anyone apart from them attempt to put one of them down. Billy is a marine biologist with a deep love for the ocean; Molly, following in her grandmother's footsteps, enters politics.


Thomas Kendall, played by Nicholas D'Agosto.


Thomas has two dads and one mom, and enjoys messing with people's minds on the subject. He enjoys messing with people's minds quite a bit, actually. He also enjoys juice boxes and logic puzzles, dislikes cough medicines and most sports, and seems destined for a career in law enforcement, though he expresses a preference for the CIA. He doesn't know which of his dads is his biological dad. He also does not care.


Felicity, Vivian, and Elena Foster, Jake and Olivia's daughters, as played by Emmy Rossum, Anna Poppelwell, and Felicity Jones


Of Jake and Olivia's three daughters, Vivian is the only one who was planned. The other two were welcome surprises. All three are adored and spoiled by their parents. Felicity can be rather arrogant and a little too aware of her father's political importance, but she is also very smart, fiercely protective of what she considers hers, and suffers from occasional anxiety. Elena has inherited her mother's depression and anxiety disorders in full force, as well as her father's quiet bookishness. Vivian is perhaps the most well-adjusted of the three girls; cheerful, bright and bouncy, she has her mother's talent with music and enjoys playing and singing for other people.


Clara's parents Gary and Lynne Hawkins, played by David Wenhem and Carla Gugino.


These way minor characters make it on the List because I the author am extremely and inexplicably fond of them and have been writing a lot about them. Gary is an English teacher with a twin sister who's a cop, a Marine brother-in-law and twin nephews. Lynne was a reporter with an awful older sister and (unfortunately) a familial predisposition toward the breast cancer that eventually killed her. Clara's daughter gets her middle name from her.


Clara's brother, Ethan Hawkins, as played by Ewan McGregor.


Ethan works a series of part-time jobs to pay the rent, and spends the rest of his time volunteering, reading, and playing video games against his cat. Some would call him a slacker; Ethan maintains that the perfect life consists of the ability to lie under a tree and stare up at the sky and think of absolutely nothing at all. He majored in philosophy in college, which may explain this in part.


Aaron's mother and Nathan's ex-wife, Melanie Newman Pierce, played by Evangeline Lilly.


Melanie made the mistake of marrying much too young and assuming that if she had children, she would want them. She was wrong. She nearly had a breakdown when Aaron was two, and made the decision to get out of her marriage and the obligations she couldn't handle. Despite this, she has managed to get back and remain on good terms with Nathan, enjoys Gail's company, likes Ivy and Summer, and adores Aaron-- God help you if you screw with him, for Melanie and Gail will team up against you. She has since remarried (to Ben Pierce, a cardiovascular surgeon) and writes children's books. Go figure.


Gail's best friend Kim Mulcahey, played by Lee Young-ae.


Kim is half-Korean, married to a Navy vet, is Gail's best friend, and teaches third grade. She helped Gail through her disaster with Brad and introduced Gail and Nathan.


Rachel Weston, Ivy's cousin, portrayed by Rachelle LeFavre.


Rachel is Gail's niece and Ivy's cousin, and lives in Orange County, California, which she loathes with a fiery passion. She eventually moves back east and becomes a newscaster.


Paige and Kayleigh Ryan, Zack's sisters, played by Emily and Zooey Deschanel.


Paige and Zack are full siblings; Kayleigh is their much younger half-sister. Her birth wrecked their parents' marriage and their father's affair with Kayleigh's mother Lorraine. After Lorraine died, Paige took Kayleigh in. The pair become very close and spend a lot of time making fun of their brother.


Joy Maserati, played by Sarah Porchetta.


Joy Maserati is bisexual, polyamorous, loves sex, and loves life. She's the only child of prosperous parents, a stripper by trade and a dancer in her blood, loves music and her body, enjoys the world and everything in it. She's very rarely angry or upset, and despite being serially monogamous, remains on good terms with nearly all her exes. She firmly believes that as long as you're enjoying yourself and no one (including yourself) is getting hurt, that you're not doing evil. She's very honest, and very happy. Joy truly lives up to her name.