#wwotwd

IT’S HERE IT’S HERE OH MY GOD IT’S HERE

THERE IS A BOOK 

WITH MY WORDS IN IT 

AND MY NAME TO IT

AND IT’S HEEEEEEEEEEERE

(Did I mention I might be a little excited?)

This isn’t going to be a proper unboxing post because my fingers were shaking so hard I almost didn’t get the box open. It sat on my table for two days because I couldn’t believe it actually existed. As though its permanence depended on my neither confirming or denying its reality.

You know. Schrödinger’s fanthology.

But I finally pounced on it, and unearthed all manner of lovely things from a smol sea of packing peanuts and bubble wrap, and then there was the book. The book with my words in it and my name to it and it was there.

Everyone has that one feeling that they are always looking to recapture, whether conscious or not, whether pleasant or not, whether to relive or to simply better understand. For me, it’s the sound of my pulse in my ears and my heart creeping up my throat and the world turning to static around the edges of my vision while I watch a dollar store pregnancy test turn positive. Exhilaration and panic and finally and oh God now what. Epiphanal knowledge that Shit Just Got Real.

I sat down, checked the table of contents, then started turning.

“While We’re on the Way Down”, it’s called, but things are largely looking up.

I had to do a complete read-through of the story before my hands stopped trembling. It’s just so very...big, the feeling. It’s just big.

Having felt the Pregnant Pause twice now, I look forward to continuous attempts at feeling this fucking ecstatic again in the future. Then again, just as there’s no second first child, there’s neither a second first time having a published story in front of you nor a second first time seeing your non-deadname printed above your work. I’m so lucky that I got to share these milestones with you.

Thanks to @radiance-anthology, who worked with me when it became clear that someone at the USPS was hungry for more fanworks and ate my original package in its entirety. Further thanks to them, because I was both livid and devastated and likely semi-unpleasant to be around. I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity to work on this project, and delighted to have been included in such a gorgeous book that will probably be hugged to my chest for the rest of the night. <3

Thank you so much! I’d been wanting to write a piece like this for a long time (basically since I first joined the fandom), so the reactions people have been having to it makes me incredibly happy.

It was also a great way to work through how much I dislike Huckleberry Finn.