Susan, there's some pretty language in there, but honestly, I think it's more than is needed. You could easily lose the thing about the sun being a friend; it really isn't needed.

Well, if I cut anything, it won't be the sun, because that's what ties back to the previous paragraph about the searing heat of the actual setting that Anna is trying to ignore.

For now, I just took the sentence that was giving me fits out completely and changed "fresh trout" to "succulent fresh trout." Which saved me enough space to get the woman's scream that pulls Anna back to reality onto Page One, which ought to help with those pesky agents, editors, and contest judges.

Susan, what about:

Over that simple feast the present day would drop away, and Anna would imagine herself among the clan chieftains and their ladies of ancient days.

I think her father being English is irrelevant, unless you need it there for a specific reason.

Opposites Drabble:

She twisted sideways on her right foot and right hand. Looking over her left shoulder she picked out the spot she wanted to put her left hand. Back bends were nothing new to her, she was on the gymnastics team. Hair dangling down to the floor, Sheila stretched her left arm out over Bobby’s left leg. Her fingertips scrabbled a little at the plastic, but eventually she got her palm down in the middle of the circle. It was a little awkward still having her left leg in the air, but she now owned opposite corners of the Twister mat.

Hee! Funny and unexpected.

Ooh, I love the Twister drabble!

Glad you liked it, erika. That's what I was going for.

I actually adapted my opposites drabble into a poem, and for the most part I feel it works much better, though the last stanza is not sitting quite right.. anyone feel like taking a peek? I have to read at a launch next week and I thought I'd test it out if it's up to snuff.

blood wine

In the ring, she loses her vision of everything else. Just flesh and space and motion. Sure, she uses aggression to find her impetus, but in the end it's pleasure, not anger, that drives her. Satisfaction, the solidity of the hit. It's all focus, dislocation. Sweat in her eyes, the taste of blood in her mouth.

Later, she is present again, but vision doesn't matter. Body forgotten, the music rises. Emptiness, a base state of being. The other side of focus, a controlled drift, guided by the cantor's voice. The bread, the cup, the taste of blood in her mouth.

I'm sitting here trying to work, and I've got ideas for various stories, some fanfic, some original, playing in my head, and I keep finding myself staring off at nothing as the scenes run. I don't know why my muse works so much better when I'm trying to work than when I'm sitting at home waiting patiently for her to get her act together. Maybe she's really a three-year-old--or a cat--and lives for distracting me when I'm busy and ignoring me when I'm ready to play.