It’s tough to get fire right in close-up! Nice job from John and Jason there.

As I mentioned here, this was the last chapter to stick to the formula of our “spotlight episodes,” wherein “everyone else gets pulled into one character’s world, often due to some sort of unfinished business the one character left behind before joining the ensemble.”

Rachel and the others may have all thought they’d settled their affairs pretty well the day they parted, and we’ll see them briefly try to pick up their relationships right where they left off. But, uh, life takes you in different directions sometimes. I have friends (acquaintances?) I once saw every day, and not only are we no longer close, I don’t think we’d even be close if they were suddenly transported to my neighborhood. Facebook is a lie, in that way.

I was keeping up the branching outlines here, which was a heck of a lot of work, but the resultant brainstorming probably helped us flesh out Rachel’s sisters, whom we had to develop very quickly from some barebones notes.