# Chapter 20 Synthesis Memo

## Provenance

- Claude raw draft: `output/drafts/claude/chapter_20.round_01.md`
- Accepted base: Claude draft, integrated and line-synthesized by Codex in `output/chapters/chapter_20.md`
- Codex parallel draft: none
- Current chapter word count: 2,516
- Current manuscript word count through Chapter 20: 47,949

## What Was Kept

- Ruth/Sam care-without-advice engine: catalog removal by a route that does not pass through Theo, practical availability, and no opinion on the job decision.
- Asha-first consent structure: June asks before spending Asha's name and gives the full Tasker terms.
- Tasker refusal as a materially expensive no: Nia remains right that the offer is better on paper, and June declines because the role repeats keys/press/program obligations.
- New York scaffolding as worse but owned: Dana deposit/key date, Kessler W-9/load-in dates, landlord notice, `FEB = coat`, and the leaving-side study on June's wall.

## What Changed In Revision

- Mechanical/raw repairs removed markdown chat formatting, a banned echo-line, `a beat`, timestamp drift, and several Claude-default theme glosses.
- Dialogue/Comedy cycles removed dialogue-diagnosis captions, portable narrated wit, repeated Nia contest frames, false clock precision, and premature `FEB = coat` payoffs.
- Clarity repairs planted the crossed-out Vandercook line, fixed a Sam pronoun garden path, named Sonia's relationship through context, and made the armory countdown computable.
- Positive/Purple/Genericization/Narrator/Plain Translation repairs removed portable wisdom, over-polished sample-line echoes, repetition around wall footage, generic care certification, and publicist approval phrasing.
- Voice Check 20 repairs across Chapters 16, 18, 19, and 20 cut span-level drift: excess `the way`, offer-formula restatements, squaring overuse, wall-footage repetition, `is real` convergence, Ch19 He-chain/lock echo, and an angle-of-someone surplus figure.

## Final Audit State

- Voice Check 20 round 3: `OVERALL: VOICE-HOLDS`
- Dialogue Doctor round 14: `OVERALL: CLEAN`
- Comedy Doctor round 9: `CLEAR`
- Clarity Pass: `OVERALL: CLEAR-UNDER-COMPLEXITY`
- Thought Development: `OVERALL: DEVELOPED`
- Positive Prose: `INHABITED`
- Purple Prose: `OVERALL: CLEAN`
- Genericization: `OVERALL: HELD`
- Narrator-Publicist: `CRITICAL-DISTANCE-HELD`
- Plain Translation: `REGISTER-HOLDS`
- Final mechanical gate: PASS open=0 allowlisted=0 WATCH=1147 full-book current gate
- Dialogue scene manifest: OK missing_doctor_files=0
- Prose variability audit: PASS

## Forward Cautions

- Ch21 should not introduce a third spoken `the math`, a third `Noted`, a third June bare `I know`, or additional `north window` / `ten feet` diction.
- The invoice/itemize family is at ceiling after Asha/Nia/June's Ch20 calls.
- The `not X. That's Y` template, Asha's boring-parts joke, `FEB = coat`, and the coat/level families are spent.
- The next care scene must not explain the virtue of care without advice; let the objects and actions carry it.
