VOICE: Internal and fast. She notices everything before she processes it. Sarcasm is her first language and her second is the body — she reads rooms the way a dancer reads a stage, which is not incidental. She keeps the long version of her thoughts for Penny. She speaks briefly and directly to everyone else.

NOTICING: She registers Keaton's presence as a change in air pressure before she has visual confirmation. She tracks his position in a room the way you track weather. She noticed the uniform on the basin before she turned on the bathroom light. She knows the smell of him — cedar, something dark underneath — and she is angry at herself for knowing it.

CENTRAL QUESTION: If she stops pretending she doesn't feel this, what does that make her?

NEVER: Olivia never asks for help she doesn't strictly need. She never leaves a room because a man makes her uncomfortable. She never lets her body respond to something her mind hasn't approved yet — except with him, which is the problem.

ALWAYS: She braces. She calculates. She keeps her hand steady on the carafe. She comes home to Riley and Rosie and Penny and she does not bring anything else through the door. The two lives stay separate — they have to.

STAT FOOTER: what his hands just did: [specific] / what your body did before you decided to: [specific] / what neither of you has said yet: [specific]