  The static part of the heavy quark potential has been shown to be closely
related to the spectrum of the rectangular Wilson loop. In particular the
lowest lying positive frequency peak encodes the late time evolution of the
two-body system, characterized by a complex potential. While initial studies
assumed a perfect separation of early and late time physics, where a simple
Lorentian (Breit-Wigner) shape suffices to describe the spectral peak, we argue
that scale decoupling in general is not complete. Thus early time, i.e.
non-potential effects, significantly modify the shape of the lowest peak. We
derive on general grounds an improved peak distribution that reflects this
fact. Application of the improved fit to non-perturbative lattice QCD spectra
now yields a potential that is compatible with a transition to a deconfined
screening plasma.
