# Chapter 22 Characters-Wrong / Competence-Default Audit — Round 2 (Post-Repair Verification)

Scope: current integrated text of `output/chapters/chapter_22.md`, verifying the three revision orders issued in the round-1 verdict `TOO-COMPETENT (3 findings)` and checking that the repairs did not introduce a second rupture, generic melodrama, or a new too-clean apology. Repair boundary confirmed by diff of `chapter_22.0039...before_characters_wrong_round1_repairs.md` against `chapter_22.0041...after_characters_wrong_round1_repairs.md`; the after-snapshot is byte-identical to the current chapter text.

## Order compliance

Order 1 — Theo: let one usefulness/over-explanation escape uncaught; recovery must take more than one line; the exchange must lose its rhythm. SATISFIED. The offer now completes and over-runs before June can move: "If you're going, I can get crates from the stockroom. Freight elevator at eight. I wouldn't come up. Or I could leave them with Sam, or downstairs, or--" (line 83). This replaces the self-arrested "He stopped. 'No. I'm asking.'" and the charmed "'Freight elevator,' he admitted." June's "Don't be useful right now" (line 85) is now a real interruption of a running sentence, not a fond interception of one he had already stopped. The stall is on the page: "He stopped with his mouth still a little open. The coffee between them had stopped steaming." (line 87). His recovery takes two failed moves before plainness — "Sorry," he said (line 89), rebuked as more usefulness ("Don't make that useful either," line 91), then "He looked at the table. 'I'm asking. Are you going?'" (line 93). That is his card's shame sequence (performs usefulness, over-explains, then goes very plain) executed on-page for the first time, at visible cost: a silence he caused, cold coffee, a second rebuke, and the plain question arriving late. Supplementary repair in the apology run: "He touched the inside pocket of his coat, found the paper there, and took his hand out empty" (line 61) replaces the clean "He reached for his cup instead" — the list of six things is now physically present and nearly drawn, a body-level near-miss instead of a frictionless decline.

Order 2 — June: the misread must fire at Theo's measured response; she goes colder and more exact; Theo absorbs defensiveness he did not earn; no clean apology; the certificate "That's the right amount" deleted or inverted. SATISFIED. The trigger is the same maximally-understanding line round 1 named — "If you were going, I'd hope it went well. Since you're staying, I'm glad. I don't want to make more of it than that." (line 99) — and this time June misreads it: "That sounds prepared." (line 101). The text establishes the misread as a misread: "He looked up then. 'It isn't.'" (line 103), and the one sentence he did prepare was a different, worse one (line 107) — the graciousness she fired at was genuinely unrehearsed. She doubles down, colder and more exact per her stress spec: "It sounds like you brought the right sentence either way." (line 105). And the no-clean-apology clause holds in the strongest available form: "June watched the coffee climb the cup and let her own line sit there, meaner than she had meant it, because taking it back would make him comfort her." (line 109) — the refusal to retract is itself the gets-wrong field operating a second time, comfort pre-read as being handled. Both round-1 certificates are gone: "That's the right amount" is deleted (replaced by the wrong verdict "That sounds prepared"), and "which was the correct level of involvement" is cut from the waitress line (now plain: "The waitress refilled them both without asking," line 109). The scene's judge is now wrong on the page, not merely strict.

Order 3 — break the mutual clairvoyance; one misunderstanding must survive more than a single exchange, uncertified. SATISFIED. The confirmed crates prediction is gone — June no longer names crates before he says them; Theo says them himself and she interrupts (lines 83–85). "beating her there" is removed from the fear-canvas turn: "Theo turned his cup once. 'I looked at your week-six canvas Thursday night. Really looked, I mean.'" (line 111) — he raises it himself, anticipating nothing. And the surviving-misunderstanding requirement is met by the prepared exchange: it runs four lines of dialogue plus narration (lines 101–109), June doubles down after his denial, no one corrects it, no one certifies it, and the conversation only resumes because Theo changes the subject (line 111). Residual unverified inference checked: "She watched him nearly do it anyway, nearly tell her she'd had no way to know" (line 81) is June attributing content to an open mouth — but it is uncertified (he says nothing; she may be wrong) and pre-dates the repair boundary; not a clairvoyance instance of the confirmed round-1 type.

## Section 1 — Competence-default sweep

WRONGNESS-PRESENT — instances:
- Theo, "If you're going, I can get crates from the stockroom. Freight elevator at eight. I wouldn't come up. Or I could leave them with Sam, or downstairs, or--" (line 83) — blind spot (usefulness-as-love) firing uncaught, plus saying the wrong thing at the worst moment.
- Theo, "'Sorry,' he said." answered by "Don't make that useful either." (lines 89–91) — saying the wrong thing; the apology itself is another usefulness move and is named as one.
- June, "That sounds prepared." (line 101) — misunderstanding plus defensiveness for no good reason: he had just given the correct, undemanding response to the most exposed thing she said all morning.
- June, "It sounds like you brought the right sentence either way." (line 105) — doubling down colder after his denial.
- June, "let her own line sit there, meaner than she had meant it, because taking it back would make him comfort her" (line 109) — blind spot: comfort pre-read as being handled.
- Theo, "'The umber one,' he said. 'There's a jar under it. I put it there Thursday. Old habit. I can take it away.'" (line 159) — blind spot, still pre-confessed (residual from round 1; see Section 3).
- Theo, "'It does,' he said. 'I stocked it in October.' He winced." (line 185) — saying the wrong thing, uncaught until after it lands.
- Theo, "'They do the cinnamon thing on Sundays,' Theo said, and stopped." (line 37) — host reflex at an apology, self-caught (residual).
- Minor physical wrongness, new or retained: the kiss starts wrong ("getting the angle wrong at first, off-center, his nose cold against her cheek," line 177); June files the receipt "where later it would confuse her" and knows it (line 155); the good sweater "was, as suspected, not the warm one" (line 189).

Present-time misunderstanding between the principals — the category that was at zero in round 1 — now exists and survives multiple exchanges (lines 101–109). The running correctness certificates that graded the round-1 scene ("That's the right amount," "the correct level of involvement") are gone. The sweep passes. Strongest counter-candidate considered before ruling: the apology run (lines 45–71) is still highly fluent — "I was deciding what you got to know... I keep wanting to make it sound cleaner" (line 67) remains a man diagnosing his own flaw in real time — but it no longer stands alone; the same flaw now misfires undigested twenty lines later (line 83), which is the difference between insight replacing wrongness and insight failing to prevent it.

## Section 2 — Per-character wrongness conformance

June Park — gets-wrong field: "mistakes being understood for being pitied; assumes choosing herself requires choosing alone" — verdict: OPERATED ("That sounds prepared." line 101; "It sounds like you brought the right sentence either way." line 105; "taking it back would make him comfort her" line 109).

The being-understood trigger that fired on nothing in round 1 — Theo's measured reception of her stay decision (line 99) — now produces the declared misread: she hears management in an unmanaged sentence, goes colder and more exact (her card's stress response: "gets quieter, funnier, more exact"), and is wrong. The narration confirms both the overshoot ("meaner than she had meant it") and the field's second layer: she cannot retract because retraction invites comfort, and comfort reads to her as being handled. Second clause (choosing alone): NO-TRIGGER, correctly — the Tasker/Nia/Asha/W-9 sequence (lines 95–97) predates the booth and the reading guide's earned-stay test (§8) requires that decision to be hers alone; giving that flaw a live trigger here would break the book's thesis. Counter-candidates checked: "the exit installed before she'd even reached for the door" (line 13) is still poised both-hypotheses ambivalence, but it is pre-scene deliberation and no longer the only trace of the field; "aggrieved" (line 165) is affection wearing irritation, not defensiveness, and is not credited.

Theo Brennan — gets-wrong field: "believes delay is kindness; believes being indispensable is the same as being loved" — verdict: OPERATED ("If you're going, I can get crates from the stockroom. Freight elevator at eight. I wouldn't come up. Or I could leave them with Sam, or downstairs, or--" line 83; "'Sorry,' he said." line 89; the pocket-paper near-miss, line 61; the jar, line 159).

The card's promised shame behavior — "over-explains when ashamed... performs usefulness, over-explains, then goes very plain" — now happens on the page instead of being declined offstage: the crates offer escalates through three fallback logistics (Sam, downstairs, the dash) before June kills it, and even his apology arrives as a service ("Don't make that useful either"). The plain phase ("I'm asking. Are you going?") arrives only after two rebukes. Residual fluency noted honestly: the apology run itself (lines 45–71) is unchanged and remains articulate — but round 1's order offered a choice of beat (the crates run or the list of six things), the repair took the crates branch, and the pocket touch (line 61) roughens the list beat besides. The field is no longer inert anywhere it has a trigger.

## Section 3 — Friction yield

- Theo, crates run-on (lines 83–93): FRICTION ("He stopped with his mouth still a little open. The coffee between them had stopped steaming." — the exchange loses its rhythm for a visible beat he caused; his apology is rebuked as more usefulness; the conversation June came to have restarts only at line 93, late and flattened.)
- Theo, "Sorry" (lines 89–91): FRICTION ("Don't make that useful either." — the apology costs him a second rebuke instead of buying absolution.)
- June, prepared misread (lines 101–107): FRICTION ("He looked up then. 'It isn't.'" — Theo absorbs two cold lines immediately after doing the right thing, and must volunteer a small humiliation — "I brought one sentence... It was worse." — to absorb the second one; the exchange dies there and he has to restart the scene himself at line 111.)
- June, the unretracted mean line (line 109): FRICTION ("let her own line sit there, meaner than she had meant it" — the cost stands on the page, unapologized, and her reason for not paying it is the flaw itself.)
- Theo, cinnamon thing (line 37): COSTUMED (announced then resolved in-beat: "and stopped. 'You didn't come for that.'") — residual, acceptable as opening texture; not every instance must bleed.
- Theo, jar under the stain (lines 159–161): COSTUMED (pre-confessed, removal offered, converted to a gift within two lines: "Leave the jar. I might want clean water.") — residual from round 1 and not covered by any order; tolerated because the stain terms carry the chapter card's collaboration close and a second stalled beat there would crowd the ending.
- Theo, "I stocked it in October" (lines 185–187): COSTUMED ("He winced. June laughed, first time all morning.") — sanctioned: the reading guide's warmth floor (§8) requires embarrassment to be survivable, and this is the chapter's one deliberately repaired misfire.

Ratio check: four FRICTION instances against three COSTUMED residuals, where round 1 had one FRICTION (paid before the scene opened) against four COSTUMED. The codex audits were consulted; their line references predate the repair batch but their verdicts are unaffected — the earned-stay sequencing (`chapter_22.earned_test.md`) is untouched at lines 95–97, and the term-setting the complicate audit credits remains flawless governance, but it is no longer the scene's only texture.

## No-new-damage checks

- Second rupture (banned by reading guide §6: "no second rupture after the confession"): NONE. The friction stays inside the booth and inside the morning — no exit, no new secret, no reversal; the kiss (line 177), the terms line (line 179), and Tuesday at four (line 183) all still land, and the misread is absorbed within the scene without being laundered.
- Generic melodrama: NONE FOUND. The new material is diner-concrete ("mouth still a little open," "The coffee between them had stopped steaming") and introduces no registry tics — no breath-catching, no "something shifted," no "a beat," no weather underline. The single "Oh," June said (line 127) is the reading guide's one sanctioned instance, at the confession, and predates this repair batch.
- New too-clean apology: NONE. The only new apology is "Sorry," (line 89), and it is immediately rebuked as another usefulness move — the opposite of clean. Theo's larger apology run is unchanged and was already ruled on in round 1; the order targeting it was satisfied via the chosen alternative beat.

## Cross-audit flag (not a characters_wrong finding — route to the register/dialogue-diagnosis gate)

The order-2 repair implements the misread partly as sentence-talk: "That sounds prepared." (line 101), "It sounds like you brought the right sentence either way." (line 105), "I brought one sentence," he said. "It was worse." (line 107). Reading guide §2 is zero-tolerance on dialogue diagnosis ("no calling a sentence careful, rehearsed, lawyerly") and §6 makes any instance a defect "in any speaker's mouth." Line 101 is arguable — it targets his preparedness, not his phrasing — but lines 105 and 107 rate and inventory sentences by name. This is outside the characters_wrong verdict and does not weaken the wrongness (the misread is real, aimed correctly, and costs correctly); but if the register gate flags it, the repair must move the accusation off the sentence and onto the plan — e.g., she accuses him of having an answer ready for either outcome; he admits he had a plan for if she was leaving and it was worse — while preserving the fired misread, the doubled-down cold line, and the unretracted cost at line 109. Deleting the exchange outright would reopen round-1 finding 2. ("Don't make that useful either," line 91, was checked against the same rule and cleared: it characterizes the apology's function, not its language.)

## Chapter verdict

WRONG-ENOUGH

Weakest instance, quoted as the format requires: "I brought one sentence," he said. "It was worse." (line 107) — the wry shape of Theo's absorption flirts with converting June's cold turn back into banter, and the beat stays FRICTION only because line 109 refuses the retraction and no one certifies the exchange. Adjacent weak spot for later passes: "Good," June said. "Keep doing the quiet version." (line 153) is the one surviving grading line from round 1's certificate list; it is tolerable now only because the scene's judge has been demonstrably wrong once (line 101). Do not add further correctness certificates in subsequent repairs.

REVISION ORDERS: none. (The cross-audit flag above is routed, not ordered; any register repair to lines 101–107 must preserve the fired misread, its multi-exchange survival, and its unretracted cost, or it will reopen round-1 findings 2 and 3.)
