My Assignment

I'm afraid I'll get an F on this one. The only suggestion I ended up using in my piece was Pirate Jimmy's. Sorry. But if it's any consolation, I give you the first three grafs of my story:

The Swineherd

His teeth were wearing down. He tried not to grind them, but if he lost concentration for a moment, he found himself tensing his jaw and temples again. When he awoke each morning, his jaw was sore from grinding his teeth in his sleep. His hunger pangs had pulled his face into a constant grimace; even when he felt no emotion, he was still hungry, and his face showed it.

The pigs were different. No emotion has ever been discerned on a pig's face, and their disfigurement was only the leanness of their bodies. They were perhaps more stubborn than usual and seemed to protest everything with their awful squeals.

There was no one to tell the herder about his face. He had not seen another human being for weeks. A few months ago, from a distance, he saw a figure silhouetted on a hilltop, but neither of them made any effort to acknowledge each other. The herder shifted his course slightly, away from the hill, and drove the pigs a little faster. No one could be trusted in the famine. That's why he carried the rifle.