rachel's always dreamed of being a musician but has crippling stage fright and a weird fear of success that results in a lot of self-sabotage and a bunch of desk jobs she doesn't care about or stay with for long. the best friend would be the serena to her blair, who's the kind of person who gets everything without trying or caring or even wanting it that much, and she's not necessarily a brilliant technical artist but she's an extremely charismatic performer who's great to watch onstage and rachel's always been as jealous of her as she has loved her while the friend probably thinks or knows that rachel has a bit of a superiority complex when it comes to her, so they're always hurting each other without meaning to just because of who they are.
for the stepsiblings, rachel's parents got divorced in 2003 when he knocked up his longtime girlfriend and moved in, and they got married not long after. she hated the whole family on principle and only met them for the first time at the wedding because her mother bribed her into going, where she humiliated her stepsister who still holds a grudge and hooked up with her stepbrother who thought it actually meant something. i had in mind they were a bigger family so there can be other siblings farther apart in age depending on who you want to play. rachel came back to austin to go to college and always talks about finally leaving, but her dad's been in and out of remission for a few years and even though they're still not close at all and she makes a big stink about seeing him, she still does see him and the entire family is trying to make more of an effort to be a family so she's constantly bumping up against all these people and they all know they don't like each other but they're trying to play nice, and i thought that could lead to some interesting interactions?