Sleepless Revision Group 4 - Again

Yes, again. You might be asking — didn’t we just do Group Four? We just covered chapters 10-11! To which I say yes, but I only stated my intention. I didn’t actually write those changes into existence.

And I know my brain. My brain is a traitor. If something isn’t directly in my schedule, I put it off until the cows come home. So, it’s cattle-wrangling time, and you all are coming along with me.

I wanted to revise chapters nine, ten, and eleven, but in the end I only finished nine and ten, and will be finishing eleven some other time. These revisions took a long time to do and in the interest of not burning myself out, I opted to leave chapter eleven for another time.

FIRST UP — Chapter Nine will now be ending like this:

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She shot up in the grass, whipping her head around.

The waves crashed somewhere far below, and the broadcast continued all around her as teenagers laughed and conversed. She was back on the cliff and had been lying face up next to where Felix and Jaime were sitting. Felix pulled his hand back from her shoulder quickly, startled but relieved. Baxter sniffed at her, whining softly. A few others had gathered around as well, lingering in the peripheral of her vision.

“Hey, peanut. You okay? Looked like you might’ve passed out.”

Margo blinked at Felix with wide, blank eyes, scrambling to her feet. He held out his arms to catch her, but she managed to keep her balance without his help.

Her eyes had already found their way back to the forest, searching for meaning in the way sunlight filtered through the trees with quiet, misty beauty. Sifting for understanding in the way the grass and leaves sparkled with light.

No butterfly. Nowhere in sight, at least.

“Maggie?”

She could feel the locket still between her fingers, but looking down, she found her hands empty.

“Maggie…”

Felix’s hand on her shoulder guided her attention back to him as he checked her over, but she couldn’t stop thinking about the forest. About the house. That had to be where her parents were, right? Should she--