MS#3: Countdown to Going Live

She was sweating. Sweat beaded on her forehead and ran, stinging, into her eyes. Absently Without a conscious thought, she wiped it away. She kept going. Her wrists hurt. Her left leg had gone numb. Something moved in her peripheral vision, some hungry beast hunting in the twilight, or maybe a filament (That’s not the right word. You know the right word. Think, brain, think.) figment of her imagination. It was a toss-up as to which was more likely. The screen grew fuzzy, the small bones of her neck creaked and rubbed together when she leaned forward.

So, I’m revising a completed manuscript. Frantically revising it, apparently. I usually slow down at the end of a piece, spinning in my chair, surfing blog waves, and generally dithering a good deal before I get to the “the end” part. I don’t even write “the end” at the end, as if it’s too much trouble. After 80,000-90,000 words, who cares about two more little words?

I need to do a few more things, like pull my outline into a slightly more atmospheric synopsis. Then I’ll copy it and wring every last drop of superfluity out of it until it reveals a sleek, breakneck little cousin that lives and breathes on a single page (single-spaced). Have to spell check the query and read it aloud for stowaway typos and awkward wording.

And then…then I’m off to the races.