# Comedy Doctor — Chapter 15: Keys Elsewhere

Calibration: reading guide §2 commits to "warm, precise, lightly comic... observational and character-true — June's dryness... never sitcom rhythm." Target reader: the O'Leary / Henry-at-60%-banter / Morisaki reader who wants jokes that arise from small routines and will be bored by quotable workshop wit. Chapter flags include `flag:comic-register`. Packet constraint: adult temptation — comedy must not unserious the offer or turn Nia/Asha into devices. Dialogue Doctor round 1 already flattened 12 polished Nia constructions; this audit hunted the residue.

`INVENTORY:`

`1 — "popping with a sound like a knuckle... chin clamped on the top spine" (line 3) — mechanism: physical comedy via precise small failure — source: situation — funniness: 2 — portable: no (nine Ch14 catalogs, the loan tote) — dramatic work: opens the offer chapter in action; catalogs as weight, not prophecy — workshopped: no`

`2 — "This took four minutes to establish and involved every flat surface she owned" + the 8 in. / 10.5 in. / 30x40 survey (line 5) — mechanism: deadpan audit / specificity overload — source: character (June's measuring eye) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: makes the apartment's smallness literal so Nia's rent math lands later — workshopped: no`

`3 — "less like books and more like a deposit she was holding against her own behavior" (line 5) — mechanism: reclassification — source: character — funniness: 1 — portable: no (Theo's ledger, blank returned column) — dramatic work: arms the catalog danger — workshopped: no, but the "less like X and more like Y" frame is the hedged-comparison shape the packet's own protocol flags ("not X, but Y → can I commit?")` — **BLOCKING (funniness 1)**

`4 — "She told herself that was about weight distribution." (line 7) — mechanism: self-deception deadpan — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: protects the slip without reading it — workshopped: no`

`5 — slip shows anyway; stack turned ninety degrees to face the wall (line 7) — mechanism: escalation — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: avoidance made physical — workshopped: no`

`6 — "if she moved it now she'd be admitting she'd noticed" (line 9) — mechanism: self-deception logic spiral — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no (umber cuff, Ch14) — dramatic work: desire tell kept alive per packet — workshopped: no`

`7 — "because she had run out of furniture to rearrange" (line 9) — mechanism: deflation — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: names the procrastination without interiority weather — workshopped: no`

`8 — "Pen that worked, established by scribble." (line 9) — mechanism: deadpan procedure fragment — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: "her preparation should look like work, because that is how she handles fear" — exactly the packet's order — workshopped: no`

`9 — "It had been unopened for twenty-six hours. It occupied one narrow strip of sill." (line 11) — mechanism: deadpan precision (counting the hours of an object she won't touch) — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: Theo pressure through the jar, off-page as ordered — workshopped: no`

`10 — crossed-out "what happens if no" + "because it was not a question you asked, it was a question you got answered by asking the others" (line 11) — mechanism: symmetrical epigram — source: drifts from character action to narrator-overlay explanation — funniness: 1 — portable: no — dramatic work: names the real fear — workshopped: yes (the cross-out is the joke; the balanced not-X-it-was-Y clause is composed-for-quotation and explains the bit it follows)` — **BLOCKING (workshopped)**

`11 — "both of which were real, neither of which had taken until eight-forty" (line 13) — mechanism: deadpan self-audit — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: two days of stalling convicted by arithmetic — workshopped: no (symmetry noted; it's June's audit register and it commits)`

`12 — "I had a thing with panels." / "For two days." / "They were complicated panels." (lines 17–21) — mechanism: deflection visible as deflection, with a straight man — source: character (both) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Marchetti panels) — dramatic work: plain-speech floor kept; June's avoidance is text, not subtext — workshopped: no`

`13 — "Or the other way around, depending on which grant we're answering to." (line 23) — mechanism: institutional incongruity — source: character (Nia's infrastructure candor) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: the job is real-world, not brochure — workshopped: no`

`14 — "fix the boring things before the artists arrive so they don't fix them wrong" (line 27) — mechanism: wry creed — source: character (Nia) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: states, in one clause, the exact trap June will see at line 67 — workshopped: no`

`15 — "Marco's been opening it with a screwdriver." after "the other names on my list" (line 33) — mechanism: deadpan understatement — source: situation — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Vandercook gripper) — dramatic work: proves Nia needs June's specific competence; offer not a favor — workshopped: no`

`16 — "Either way it's an afternoon." June heard herself and stopped. "Hypothetically." (line 35) — mechanism: competence-betrayal turn — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: the chapter's whole argument enacted in one slip — she is already doing the job — workshopped: no`

`17 — "Invoices usually arrive first. Benefits mostly happen in other people's paperwork." (line 39) — mechanism: paired epigram — source: character drifting to generic freelancer wit — funniness: 1 — portable: yes (the second sentence could sit in any gig-economy novel; paperwork-irony is a monitored tic family since Ch02, fiscal register flagged Ch08/09) — dramatic work: gig precarity — workshopped: leaning yes (two aphorisms back to back)` — **BLOCKING (portable)**

`18 — "your portion of whatever you're doing now. I'll spare you the rent math." (line 41) — mechanism: dry elision — source: character (Nia) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: rent pressure without a finances montage, per packet — workshopped: no`

`19 — "I can do math," June agreed + the margin math already done (line 43) — mechanism: irony of agreement — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: the offer is genuinely good and June knows it — workshopped: no`

`20 — "because I wrote the job description... It's in writing." (line 45) — mechanism: repetition / self-citation — source: character (Nia) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: makes after-hours access contractual, not romantic — workshopped: no`

`21 — "You're being very fair about the part where it might evaporate." (line 53) — mechanism: politeness inversion — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: renewal risk named; the offer stays serious — workshopped: no`

`22 — "I know you're taking notes. I can hear the pen." (line 75) — mechanism: caught-in-the-act deadpan — source: character (Nia) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: old-peer intimacy without rescue logic — workshopped: no`

`23 — "Noon. Eat lunch after." (line 79) — mechanism: anticlimax — source: character (Nia) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: deadline humanized without being softened — workshopped: no. Checked against Odile's feeding-imperative register ("Eat. Then decide to be tragic."): ruled distinct — this is deadline pragmatism, not feeding-as-care — but Nia should not get a second Odile-shaped imperative in Ch22.`

`24 — "do I give your slot to Dario" / "Don't give it to Dario. He overtightens everything." / "He does. So that's a yes?" (lines 85–89) — mechanism: work-shorthand ribbing turned back into business — source: character (both) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (installer craft) — dramatic work: June guarding the New York slot is the earned-stay groundwork doing its job under a joke — workshopped: no`

`25 — "340/mo, no heat after 10pm, you'd love it, it's terrible." / "send pics of the terrible room" (lines 93–95) — mechanism: paradox tag + repetition pickup — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no as a pair (the pickup converts it into June/Asha shorthand; alone the tag would be portable) — dramatic work: keeps the NY path alive and unsentimental — workshopped: no, but this is the chapter's closest approach to text-message sitcom cadence; it survives because Asha cuts back to terms`

`26 — "June, who had sworn off looking at it, looked at it." (line 99) — mechanism: self-deception deflation — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: flyer/kiss pressure intrudes as ordered — workshopped: no`

`27 — "not surprised. That was the trouble with it. Surprised she could have explained." (line 99) — mechanism: inversion — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the flyer photo, the caption hunt) — dramatic work: names the kiss's reality sideways without a relationship conversation — workshopped: no`

`28 — "one occupied by a coat that I ruled counts" / "The coat counts. Coats are people who left their position marked." / "That's going in the label notes" (lines 101–105) — mechanism: deadpan bureaucratic ruling / shared bit — source: character (both: Theo's logistics tenderness, June's verdict register) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (41 chairs, the Ch14 count promise, After Class label drafts) — dramatic work: double — keeps Theo present through objects only, and "left their position marked" silently describes June's own receipt-and-jar exit strategy — workshopped: no; the aphorism shape is diegetically licensed because they are literally drafting label language, and the narration de-sitcoms it ("answered the part that was a fact"). Watch: Theo's "ruled" grazes the legal-clerical register declared spent after Ch07/08 — one word, tolerable, no second instance.`

`29 — "facing them at the wall had been melodramatic and the slip was just paper" (line 107) — mechanism: repetition-with-variation / self-deflation — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: closes the stack-turning bit honestly without resolving the danger — workshopped: no`

`30 — "it looked, if you didn't know, like she'd brushed a doorframe somewhere. She knew. She left it." (line 107) — mechanism: deadpan understatement — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: desire kept without naming — workshopped: no`

`31 — "so it couldn't slide off, fold shut, or otherwise excuse itself" (line 115) — mechanism: escalating personification — source: character (the receipt is given June's own excuses; the joke is on her) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: June engineering against her own avoidance is the close the packet ordered — workshopped: no. Tracker note: object-as-agent figures now run three in this chapter (item 3's deposit, the press that "needs listening to," this) against the Ch08 personification caps; all are distinct families from the embargoed panel/folder/scarf sets, but the mechanism is trending toward a house move — hold at this level.`

**Distribution checks (work shown):**
- *Density:* appropriate to register and to `flag:comic-register` on an offer chapter — comedy front-loaded in the setup, deliberately thinned during the money/deadline stretch (lines 37–61 are nearly joke-free, correctly: the offer is never made unserious), returning in the texts. Not DRY, not THIN.
- *Mechanism variety:* deadpan precision/understatement ~10, self-deception/deflation ~6, turns/inversions ~4, repetition-with-variation ~4, creed/institutional ~3, personification ~3. I considered MONOTONOUS for the deadpan-audit cluster (items 2, 8, 9, 11, 19); ruled against — it is June's card-licensed pressure register ("under pressure: shorter syntax, more visual specificity"), and the call and texts run on different mechanisms. Counts stand for the tracker.
- *Source:* character ~25, situation ~4, overlay-drift 1 (item 10). The strongest counter-candidate for narrator-overlay I considered was item 2's "This took four minutes to establish" — ruled character: it is June auditing herself, not the narrator being witty at her.
- *Sweetness:* checked the Asha-referral beat (line 97) — "a tool on the bench you weren't using and someone else needed" is left sharp, no joke discharges the ethical weight; checked the close — item 31's wit does not soften the unanswered deadline, which gets the last, flat sentence. Not OVERSWEETENED.
- *Cringe:* none; nothing misjudges the Morisaki-patient reader. The Dario/terrible-room texts are the nearest sitcom risk and both are cut off by terms ("So that's a yes?" / "That's a hold.").
- *Inheritance check (ordered):* Ch13/14 logistics comedy is not inherited as default texture — the single logistics bit (item 28) is plot-required by the Ch14 chair-count promise and compact. No paired echo confirmations, no prepared Theo speech, no new Odile aphorism, no `Winter Kitchen`. Nia's residual quotable-grade lines number ~6 across a long call, three of them voice-card anchors used as designed; at ceiling but inside the style guide's functional-majority rule — no new Nia epigrams in Ch22.

**Chapter verdict: `CLEAR`** — majority funniness-2, overwhelmingly character/situation-sourced, non-portable, mechanisms varied, and the comedy consistently does dramatic work the packet ordered. Strongest surviving item: 16 — `"Either way it's an afternoon." June heard herself and stopped. "Hypothetically."` — the temptation thesis performed as a slip, not stated. Weakest surviving item: 25 — `"you'd love it, it's terrible"` — rescued from portability only by June's pickup; it sits at the edge of the register.

Three blocking findings stand; the chapter is not committable until they are resolved.

`REVISION ORDERS:`

1. **Item 3 (line 5)** — `"They were less like books and more like a deposit she was holding against her own behavior."` Failure: funniness-1; the hedged "less like X and more like Y" scaffold under-commits the reclassification (the packet's own mid-draft protocol flags this frame). Fix: commit — drop the comparative scaffold and state the reclassification flat in June's audit register (e.g., assert the deposit reading directly against the ledger's blank returned column, which is already on the page). Do not soften into plain description; the deposit idea is correct and earned.

2. **Item 10 (line 11)** — `"because it was not a question you asked, it was a question you got answered by asking the others."` Failure: workshopped; the balanced not-X-it-was-Y clause is composed-for-quotation and captions a joke the cross-out already made. Fix: de-workshop by cutting the explanation down or out — end on the physical cross-out, or give one short asymmetrical June-register reason (her interiority rhythm is perception → judgment → self-rebuke, not epigram). The crossed-out *what happens if no* is the funny, frightening thing; trust it.

3. **Item 17 (line 39)** — `"Invoices usually arrive first. Benefits mostly happen in other people's paperwork."` Failure: portable — the second sentence is interchangeable freelancer wit that could appear unchanged in another book, and it stacks a second epigram in a tic-watched register (paperwork-irony, fiscal). Fix: replace with material from this book's inventory — the two invoices sitting on her thirty-by-forty table in this chapter's opening, or the Kessler net-45 / "invoice Jan, see it in Mar" math her own scrap and Asha's text carry — so the W-2 lands against June's specific receivables, not against gig work in general. One sentence, hers, non-quotable. Cutting the riposte entirely and letting "W-2" sit there is also acceptable; a politer generic line is not.
