The Broken Miracle — People

Paul Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Paul, Purple Plum, Pollyanna, Paulie

• I · 1Narrator. A pianist and composer born on April 24, 1973 with half a functioning heart, a “blue baby” who had his first heart surgery 22 hours after birth.
• I · 1Names his heart Tom Sawyer, after the Rush song, so he can see it as a friend. Lives in Salt Lake City with Olivia, and composes facing Mount Olympus.
• I · 2At thirteen, swims a mile for his Eagle Scout rank, holding the pool's edge between laps. Earns the Eagle at thirteen.
• I · 10Classmates nickname him Purple Plum for his blue lips and fingertips after his first teenage surgery.
• I · 18Starts a blog about waiting for a heart, over Olivia's objections, to tell his story in his own words.
• I · 1As an adult, he wakes with two thick lines pressed into his cheeks by his oxygen tubes, which sometimes last all day.
• I · 1At thirty-two he is down to 150 pounds, much of it retained fluid, with deepening dark circles around his eyes.
• I · 2At thirteen, he has a long scar running from his left armpit around to his back, beneath his shoulder blade.
• I · 2As a boy he loves his Goonies t-shirt, though its tag scratches his skin.
• I · 3Has blue eyes. Before the Assembly Hall concert he wears gelled hair and a navy-blue suit jacket, his cheeks puffy and skin flushed.
• I · 4Drives to the cabin already dressed for fly fishing: a supply vest, beige waders, and pull-on wading boots with new felt soles.
• I · 6As a teenager, he glues his hair in place with cheap hair gel.
• I · 9After his teenage infection surgery, a sutured wound runs down his sternum, adding a chest scar to the one under his arm.
• I · 10On his first day back at school he wears a jean jacket, dark blue sweater, jeans, Vans and a gray puffer jacket.
• I · 10Surgery leaves him with blue fingertips and a large scar running down his chest.
• I · 10Keeps an emergency Rush tape in the family car, its white cover sketched with a life preserver.
• I · 13His lazy-day pajamas are blue, stamped with horses.
• I · 15At fourteen, deep bluish dark circles ring his eyes.
• I · 18His surgeries have left his shoulders turned inward and his chest slightly sunken; he jokes he has the staples of a centerfold model.
• I · 19Leaves the hospital at fourteen in blue jeans, his favorite white shirt and Vans.
• I · 20After the pacemaker, his fingers and lips are no longer blue.
• I · 21While waiting for a heart he speaks in a raspy voice, wears oxygen tubes on his face, and is wasting to skin and bone.
• I · 21Neil says that, with all his tubes, Paul looks like Pinocchio with the strings attached.

Jonahs Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Jonahs

• I · 4Paul's younger brother and the only other songwriter in the family. Keeps a buzz cut and a stubbly beard, ties his own fishing flies, and is starting a PhD in evolutionary biology.
• I · 6As a ten-year-old who kept crickets in jars, suggests Paul name his heart: “every broken hero needs an epic name.”
• I · 5Recently found wandering in the woods after a climbing fall in Idaho, saying a voice told him his life would be short.
• I · 5Sees himself as “a moth surrounded by butterflies,” a misfit who finds God among living trees rather than inside a church.
• I · 5Recorded the album Vagabond with his college band, including “The Man I Never Knew,” about their grandfather.
• I · 21On Christmas Eve, has an episode in the basement, clutching the nativity play's Cabbage Patch baby Jesus. He has been diagnosed as bipolar with severe anxiety.
• I · 4At the cabin he wears a red plaid shirt, blue jeans and boots.
• I · 5Is twenty-nine during the fishing trip. Drives a silver truck and keeps an old acoustic guitar behind its back seat.
• I · 6At ten, he refuses to let his hair look polished and runs his hand through it until it looks like a dark bird's nest.
• I · 6At Paul's Eagle Scout dinner he wears a blue button-down and khakis, and builds a mashed-potato dam with a gravy river and broccoli trees.
• I · 11Turns up at the clinic in a puffy black jacket, gray beanie, tattered blue jeans and boots.
• I · 20At ten, he comes to Paul's bedside in dinosaur pajamas, scratching his uncombed hair.
• I · 21Wears an ugly blue Christmas sweater patterned with Santas in beach clothes on Christmas Eve.
• I · 21On Christmas Eve he stares glassy-eyed, his head twitching; mid-episode his eyes bulge and the veins in his neck stand out.

Dad

The Cardalls

Also known as Paul's father, Mr. Cardall

• I · 10A journalist and familiar face on local TV, which gives the Cardall family a measure of local fame.
• I · 6A former scout leader who never earned his Eagle. His own father abandoned the family when he was a boy.
• I · 10Gathers the family for Bible study at six-thirty, and blasts “Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin'” at anyone slow to wake.
• I · 15Tells Paul that God has scars and that “fire refines gold.” After Paul's first surgery, he heard Paul's adult voice in the wind saying he'd be alright.
• II · 19Leaves with Mom for a year and a half to run their church's visitor center in Washington, D.C.
• I · 15Has graying hair combed and sprayed to the side, and wears a wrinkle-free white button-down, looking studio-ready.
• I · 19Folds his arms whenever he is about to reprimand Paul.

Mom

The Cardalls

Also known as Maggie Cardall, Maggie, Grandma

• I · 2Paul's mother, “the honorary driver and disc jockey,” who takes the hills fast to give her kids butterflies.
• I · 9Homeschools Paul after his first teenage surgery. Loves to read, even at her darkest.
• I · 10Tells Paul to own his story: “the prouder you are of your story, the weaker the eyes of the critic.”
• I · 15“It takes as much effort to doubt as it does to believe.”
• II · 15Tells teenage Paul that the dead still visit us in dreams, songs and memories.
• I · 2When Paul is thirteen, she has freshly permed brown hair and wears a brown dress patterned with yellow flowers.
• I · 6Has hazel eyes and a chiseled chin, and Jonahs shares both.
• I · 9Wears a pink blouse, and later a polka-dot one, at Paul's hospital bedside.
• I · 10Drives the family's white Dodge station wagon and keeps a small tape collection of Elton John and John Denver.
• I · 20Paul describes her voice as like a warm blanket.

Dan Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Dan

• I · 6Paul's younger brother, older than Jonahs, who shared the basement bedroom with them. Brags he learned to swim first.
• I · 10Falls asleep mid-prayer at the breakfast table.
• II · 2Gives a eulogy at Jonahs's funeral asking mourners to seek divine reason, and quotes Jonahs's lyric about flying away.
• II · 12Skips the Mount Olympus hike, wanting to remember Jonahs as the boy who hid crickets in their room.
• II · 19Surprises Paul in their parents' kitchen with Cocoa Puffs and a brochure for a Mediterranean cruise. “The greatest stories told have the most broken characters in them.”
• II · 22Flies Neil home from D.C. and breaks the news of the cruise to Olivia.
• I · 20As a boy, reads Superman comic books on his bed in the basement room.

Kirsten Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Kirsten

• I · 6One of Paul's older sisters, half of “the Unrelated Twins,” born the same day as Carla but nothing alike.
• I · 13Helps care for Neil during Olivia's bed rest.
• I · 21Stays with Neil when the hospital calls about a heart on Christmas night.

Carla Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Carla

• I · 6Paul's older sister and Kirsten's twin, one of “the Unrelated Twins.”

Molly Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Molly

• I · 6Paul's older sister.

Janice Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Janice, Janet

• I · 6One of the youngest siblings, eight years old at Paul's Eagle Scout dinner. A cabin photo in chapter 4 names her Janet.

Greg Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Greg

• I · 6The youngest sibling, three years old at Paul's Eagle Scout dinner.

Paul's grandfather

The Cardalls

Also known as The Man I Never Knew, Granddaddy

• I · 5Dad's father, who fought in the South Pacific in World War II, fell into drinking, and abandoned his wife and five children. Jonahs wrote “The Man I Never Knew” about him.
• II · 24Dad fears Paul's divorce repeats his father's path. Paul answers that, unlike his grandfather, he was raised by a good man.
• I · 5Jonahs's song describes him as a handsome, charming man, slightly built and not very tall, who married at twenty-one.
• I · 5In the song, he ends his life as a drunk on the streets and dies alone on a dirty mattress among empty bottles.

Hannah Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Hannah

• I · 4Jonahs's wife: blonde, a good cook, and the one person who calls Paul “Pollyanna.”
• I · 12Gives birth to Zoe at St. Thomas Women's Center.
• II · 11Moves back to Utah, heavily pregnant, and surprises Paul at Abravanel Hall. Asked how she is: “Mending.”
• I · 4At the cabin she wears her blonde hair tied back and an old white apron.
• I · 21Wears a bright red ugly Christmas sweater crowded with candy canes and reindeer.

Zoe Cardall

The Cardalls

Also known as Zoe

• I · 12Jonahs and Hannah's daughter, born the day before Paul's birthday. She has her father's lips and eyes.
• II · 11Wears a silver bow to Paul's Abravanel Hall concert. Hannah says she pores over her father's science books.
• I · 12As a newborn she is wrapped in a white blanket, a pink beanie on her head.
• I · 21Is almost two years old at Christmas Eve.

Olivia Cardall

Paul's family

Also known as Olivia, Mrs. Cardall

• I · 1Paul's wife, a nurse who works twelve-hour night shifts. Brown hair, hazel eyes, a beauty mark above her lip. Her favorite song is Elvis's “Can't Help Falling in Love.”
• I · 3Her mother played piano at the Assembly Hall before dying of cancer when Olivia was three. She remembers her saying that seeing the cup half full paves the way for blessings.
• II · 6Met Paul as a teenager at Todd Lewis's house, borrowing Todd's copy of Michael Jackson's Bad.
• II · 7Dreams of a family of her own and a steadier life than she had growing up, and plans a career in medicine.
• II · 13After the transplant, asks Paul whether there is still an “us.”
• I · 1On the morning of the Assembly Hall concert she wears a light blue nightdress.
• I · 8Leaves for Neil's birth in a brown coat. At home after his birth, she wears a long white shirt and pajama bottoms, her hair in a bun.
• I · 11Wears blue scrubs to her hospital shifts.
• I · 13Her lazy-day pajamas are purple and covered in flowers.
• I · 21Dresses for Christmas Eve in a knee-length black dress with a red bowed belt and flats, hair tied up, wearing sweet perfume.

Neil Cardall

Paul's family

Also known as Neil, champ, buddy

• I · 8Paul and Olivia's son, born in November after two miscarriages, to a Rush song on the car stereo.
• I · 13Loves dinosaurs and builds towers out of couch cushions.
• I · 14Tells his grieving parents the babies will come one day: “I want to be ready!”
• II · 5Seeing his dad after the transplant: “Dad, your lips are pink.”
• II · 21Draws a purple triceratops under a red sky and a pink sun.
• I · 8Born with wisps of dark brown hair on a reddish scalp, round puffy cheeks and small hands.
• I · 11As a baby, wears a blue romper with a dinosaur on the chest and chews an Apatosaurus teething toy.
• I · 12Wears a blue T-Rex shirt the day he announces he'll be a big brother.
• I · 13His pajamas for the family lazy day are white with lion cubs.
• I · 14Has brown eyes and crooked teeth, and sleeps in a toddler bed shaped like a race car.
• I · 21On Christmas Eve he wears a red bow tie and suspenders over a white shirt covered in Christmas trees, singing “Jingle Blels.”

Sarah and Abel

Paul's family

Also known as Sarah, Abel, the twins

• I · 13Twins, a girl and a boy, whose hearts beat strong after a bleeding scare.

Angel Cardall

Paul's family

Also known as Angel

More about Angel Cardall is revealed in the books.

Mr. Allen

Paul's family

Also known as Olivia's father

• I · 1Olivia's father, who cared for his wife through cancer and warned Olivia against building a family with Paul.
• I · 13Gentle and patient, but tells Paul on the phone: “Just don't die on my daughter.”
• II · 7Plays “Waiting for a Girl Like You” on repeat on the days he misses his late wife.
• II · 22Helps Olivia with the children while Paul is away.

Olivia's mother

Paul's family

• I · 3A pianist who played the Assembly Hall before she fell ill with cancer and died when Olivia was three.
• II · 7Olivia wishes she knew the last note her mother played, so she could play it over and over like a heartbeat.

Robert

Paul's family

More about Robert is revealed in the books.

Todd Lewis

Friends & school

Also known as Todd, the piano boy

• II · 6A blonde, freckled transfer from Seattle who reads The Goonies novelization every year and has played piano since he was six.
• II · 6Teaches Paul about Arrau, Chopin, Beethoven and Mozart, makes him a mixtape, and shows him improv at his family's piano.
• II · 7Quotes Bach's last words and hopes music exists after death.

Darla Lewis

Friends & school

Also known as Darla

• II · 6Todd's sister and Olivia's close friend. The two spend Saturdays together and borrow Todd's records.

Mrs. Lewis

Friends & school

• II · 6Todd's mother, who makes Paul “the most amazing grilled cheese sandwiches.”

Spencer

Friends & school

• I · 1A boy in Paul's town who died of cancer when Paul was nine, despite everyone's prayers and fasting.
• II · 9Paul's first close encounter with death, which he pictured as a two-headed monster.

Coach Dave

Friends & school

Also known as Dave

• I · 2A family friend who runs the scouts' mile swim in a cardigan, bald, with foggy glasses and a curly mustache.

Mrs. Dominguez

Friends & school

• I · 10A new health teacher at Evergreen Middle School with a butterfly brooch. She buys Paul chips in the teachers' lounge and invites him to tell his story to the class: “Take control of your story.”
• I · 18Her words inspire Paul to start his blog years later.
• I · 10Has dark brown eyes and dark curls, and wears a knee-length plaid dress in red, green and blue.

Mrs. Alberline

Friends & school

• I · 10The Evergreen Middle School office secretary whose eyeshadow matches Paul's blue lips.
• I · 10Looks at Paul doe-eyed and keeps tilting her head, talking to him like a lost kitten.

Michelle

Friends & school

Also known as Purple Plum

• I · 10A freckled girl with pink hearts on her denim jacket who names Paul “Purple Plum.” She transfers schools days later.
• I · 14Years later, she is the ER nurse who finally gets Olivia a wheelchair and a doctor.
• I · 10Blonde, with bright blue eyes, freckles over her cheeks, nose and lips, and a soft, sweet voice.

Mrs. Hayes

Friends & school

• II · 6Paul's high-school math teacher, known for her loud outfits and handwritten quotes on the walls.

Paul's great-aunt

Friends & school

• II · 6Gave Paul his first piano lessons when he was young. He quit.

Dr. Angie Brown

Doctors & nurses

Also known as Dr. Brown, Angie Brown

• I · 18A congenital cardiologist at Primary Children's Hospital and a fan of Paul's music. She calls him personally and insists a Fontan revision would kill him and a transplant is his best chance.
• I · 18Has a painting of a brown moth with eye-spotted wings behind her desk.
• I · 21Calls on Christmas night wearing a pine-tree Merry Christmas pin.
• II · 12Hikes Mount Olympus with Paul and gives him a sweaty hug at the summit.
• I · 18Has a mellow, calm voice that turns sharp as steel when she disagrees, and wears a white coat.

Dr. Kupo

Doctors & nurses

• I · 11Paul's adult cardiologist, with a scar under his nose from a cleft lip. He tells Paul his heart has started to fail.
• I · 18Recommends a Fontan revision and calls a transplant a final resort. Paul leaves his care when his insurance changes.
• I · 11Has a dark face with a scruffy beard and hair combed perfectly to the side.
• I · 18Wears thick-framed glasses; his graying hair is gelled.

Dr. Donald

Doctors & nurses

• I · 9Finds a walnut-sized viral infection on teenage Paul's heart and operates the next morning.
• I · 9His right leg bounces nervously while he gives the Cardalls bad news.

Dr. Homer

Doctors & nurses

• I · 8Delivers Neil.

Dr. McConkie

Doctors & nurses

More about Dr. McConkie is revealed in the books.

Christie

Doctors & nurses

Also known as cute nurse Christie

• I · 7A blonde nurse who looks after thirteen-year-old Paul and becomes his pal during his month in the hospital.
• I · 9Tells Paul that kids are always less afraid than their parents.
• I · 7Has bright blue eyes that match the stripes on her white scrubs.

Nurse Ana

Doctors & nurses

Also known as Ana

• I · 13Performs Olivia's ultrasounds and twice tells the Cardalls their twins are fine.
• I · 13Wears thick-framed glasses.

Rebecca

Doctors & nurses

• I · 13A hospital receptionist with a cat-face brooch.
• I · 13Has freckles across her cheeks and spring-green eyes, and wears a white coat with a name tag.

Stephanie

Hospital friends

• I · 19A girl of about nine with a tube in her throat who visits teenage Paul every day after his pacemaker surgery. She can't speak, so she draws on a whiteboard and gives him a crayon picture of herself under a tree.
• II · 3Inspires Paul to visit the children on his hospital floor: “It's my turn to be a Stephanie.”
• I · 19Has a pale face, shoulder-length blonde hair, round green eyes and dark circles around them. On Paul's last day she wears a yellow shirt with a rainbow.
• I · 19Her crayon drawing shows a stick-figure girl in green scrubs, with yellow hair, on a flower-covered bed under a tree.
• I · 21Paul remembers her big eyes and the tube coming out of her throat.

Patsy

Hospital friends

• I · 19Stephanie's mother, who brings Paul her daughter's drawing.
• I · 19Looks like her daughter, with the same round green eyes and blonde hair.

Gracie

Hospital friends

• II · 1A baby with hypoplastic left heart syndrome under Dr. Brown's care. She received a heart three days after being listed, but her body rejected it and she died. Paul writes “Gracie's Theme” for her.

The donor

Hospital friends

Also known as donor

More about The donor is revealed in the books.

Walter

Music & work

• I · 8Paul's booking agent, with a smoke-damaged voice. He mostly leaves the legwork to Paul, then books him a run of Christmas concerts in the upper Midwest.
• II · 3Out of the picture once Paul is too sick to perform.

Maria Dawson

Music & work

Also known as Maria

• II · 5A raven-haired fan who hears Paul play the hospital Steinway while visiting her nephew. She promises to message him and never does.
• II · 10Applies to be Paul's assistant. Her nephew was born with a ventricular septal defect and had surgery the same day as Paul's transplant.
• II · 16Tells Paul he needs to put himself first: “find a way to sail it back to where it belongs.”

Steve Miller

Music & work

• II · 12A local journalist who hikes Mount Olympus with the family and writes the article that sends traffic to Paul's blog.

Mrs. Hanson

Music & work

• II · 14A fan whose newborn died of SIDS. She emails Paul to ask him to play “Gracie's Theme” at the funeral.
• II · 16Greets Paul at the funeral home.

Bishop Mark

Faith & counsel

More about Bishop Mark is revealed in the books.

Bishop Jonathan

Faith & counsel

• II · 21Leads the Washington, D.C. congregation. After Paul plays “Redeemer,” he tears up and says we can only recognize a redeemer after we've been broken.

Matt Brown

Faith & counsel

Also known as Matt

• II · 27A faith-based therapist who works pro bono at Creative Haven in Franklin, Tennessee. He tells Paul about pebbles and ripples, and that there is beauty in not fitting in.

Mia

Faith & counsel

• II · 27Greets Paul at Creative Haven.

Tina

Tina's family

Also known as T

• II · 22A blonde woman in a blue tracksuit whom Paul meets in the cruise ship's art gallery. She borrows his computer to tell her ex, Brandon, to leave her alone, and they pose for a fake honeymoon photo.
• II · 23Grew up in Cleveland, worked on Wall Street until 9/11, moved into health and fitness, then to Orange County after a divorce. She went on mission trips through Saddleback Church and has a black belt in taekwondo.
• II · 25Tells Paul she won't be a band-aid on a wound that needs time to heal.

Christine

Tina's family

• II · 23Tina's mother, born in Slovenia. She escaped Tito's communist Slovenia as a teenager, became a tavern owner, and is sure the Lord is on her side at the casino.

Tina's father

Tina's family

• II · 23Ill in Cleveland. Tina moved home to care for him.

Brandon

Tina's family

• II · 22Tina's persistent ex. Paul's fake honeymoon photo finally gets him to back off.