I waited by the window with my nose pressed to the glass,
I watched the mail truck rumble down our street and then roll past.
I checked the doorstep seven times before my breakfast plate,
And paced around the living room and whispered, “Will it wait?”
My very first real novel, printed, bound, and mine to hold—
Not pixels on a screen, but paper, pages, real and bold!
“A Haunting Before I Do,” with my name there on the spine,
That book I’d dreamed and worried over, terrified, designed,
That book I’d bled and conjured from the midnight of my mind.
At last—a knock! The package! Heavy, beautiful, and brown!
I tore through tape and bubble wrap and tossed the cardboard down,
And there it was, just *sitting* there, as casual as could be—
This little supernatural thriller, waiting there for me.
I picked it up like precious glass, like treasure from a wreck,
Like holding someone’s newborn child or Ming vase from a deck.
I ran my fingers on the cover, felt each letter rise,
I flipped through all the pages twice with wide and wondering eyes.
The smell of ink! The weight of it! The corners, crisp and true!
I whispered to the empty room, “I can’t believe *I* grew—
From someone with a dream and doubt and too much coffee brewing,
To THIS. To real. To published. To ‘A Haunting Before I Do-ing.’”
I hugged it (yes, I hugged my book—don’t judge me, it’s allowed),
I showed it to my houseplants and I read the blurb out loud.
I took approximately six thousand pictures for my phone,
Then sat there on the floor and simply held it all alone.
Because it wasn’t just a book—it was every late-night hour,
Every “maybe I should quit,” and “do my words have any power?”
It was the fear and hope and grief mixed up inside my chest,
It was years of “not quite ready” finally getting laid to rest.
It was proof that ghosts and hauntings and the stories that we tell
Can travel from our secret hearts and find a way to dwell
In other people’s hands and homes and late-night reading lamps—
Can go from “just a weird idea” to “real” with printed stamps.
So there I sat, cross-legged, with my heart about to burst,
Just holding onto magic, holding onto my book first—
My “Haunting,” my beginning, my strange supernatural crew,
The moment every writer dreams about their whole life through.
And if you saw me grinning like some fool who’d struck it rich,
Well, friend, you’d grin that way too if your wildest, scariest wish
Showed up there on your doorstep in a box marked “Handle Well”—
Your first book, your first novel, your first story you can tell
Was *real* and *done* and *published* and completely yours to hold.
That’s better than a mountain made of diamonds, gems, or gold.
That’s magic. That’s a haunting. That’s a dream come true, it’s true—
That’s what it feels like holding “A Haunting Before I Do.“
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