Pruning

This is the second post in my weekly feature where I post unused material from my forthcoming novel Leave Society. I've been working on its third draft. My editor had some small suggestions on the second draft, including to prune the second and third parts, Year of Pain and Year of Mountains, by around 1000 and 2000 words. Today and yesterday I pruned these sentences and fragments from Year of Pain:

-I wouldn’t have tested them like that. 

-That won’t help.

-“Maybe if you’re nicer to her, she’ll let you,” said Li.

-“And fish oil and chlorella,” said Li, putting capsules and tablets in a plastic bag.

-creating scar tissue

-Li didn’t respond. 

-and should get a blood test to find out

-he felt like he was blindly searching for a secret opening. 

-In the hall, on the way to the bathroom, he imagined someone watching him and feeling confused about what he was doing. 

-It caused chest constriction, lung fibrosis, fever, fatigue, and a hunched back. 

-Li said he was glad they listened to him.

-Li cried too, in a New York University computer lab, where he often teared while working on short stories.

-Another was serving two years for drinking beer in a state park. 

-with prison blueprints 

*UPDATE* I reinserted the sentence "Li cried too, in a New York University computer lab, where he often teared while working on short stories" into the novel as "Li cried too, reading his mom’s email in a New York University computer lab, where he often teared while working on short stories on sadness and loneliness." *UPDATE*