Fair skin with a warm undertone, engine-grime worked permanently into the lines of both hands, and thick honey-blonde hair in a fraying plait pinned up out of the way of anything hot. Of average height and muscular, thick through the forearms and thighs, the build of a woman who lifts a gearbox because there is nobody else in a hundred kilometres to help her lift it. Deep-blue eyes under pale straight brows, a wide jaw, and a slow way of smiling that arrives a beat after you expected it. A quilted coverall unzipped to the waist over a thermal, a welding-spark constellation of pale marks up the right forearm, and a chipped enamel mug that follows her around the yard. She is the reason anything in Yeleysk still moves, and she says so only when she is being teased.

Shows affection by

acts of devotion

In conflict

defuses with warmth

Habits

wipes her hands on a rag she has already used; smiles a beat later than expected; taps a knuckle twice on metal before she trusts it; laughs at her own bad news