The last week has flown by. Between moving all my stuff into the new house, cleaning my old apartment, and sending my manuscript to an editor, I feel like I’ve barely had a chance to sit down and breathe. I promised myself I was going to publish it once I got home, and I knew if I sat on it and thought too hard, it would never happen.

So the morning after I got back, after christening every inch of the house with Stone, I promptly found an editor with availability and sent it over. It’s happening, and I don’t know how I feel about it. I’m a mix of happy, sad, overwhelmed, terrified, and anxious. This book, those words, and that story are so deeply personal to me and everything I went through over the last half a decade. I feel cut open, raw. The world will soon read my thoughts, my feelings, my everything… and that’s terrifying.

Stone has been nothing but supportive. He’s my biggest cheerleader and I love him for it. We’ve been so busy with getting our lives situated together that he hasn’t had an opportunity to read it. If I’m being honest, I’m kind of thankful for that, because having him read those words is far more terrifying than the rest of the world. It’s about him. About us. It’s brutally honest, and while it’s technically fiction, that doesn’t negate from the fact that it was loosely based on our experiences.

We’re just getting home now. We spent the morning making sure my apartment was in tip-top shape before returning the keys to the landlords. It’s official… Stone and I live together. Which, yes, we’ve been doing that for the last week, but the apartment was the last thing standing in our way.

Thinking back to the beginning of the school year, first arriving in Lubbock, I had absolutely no clue what the year held in store for me, let alone my future. I knew it would be an interesting year… starting over somewhere new where I knew no one, but I never could’ve anticipated all of this.

So much was accomplished in a year. So much has changed. It’s surreal. I moved halfway across the country, successfully finished my first year of teaching, finished my fucking book, and made my way back to Stone. In one year’s time.

I’ll never forget the terror, the nausea, the anger I felt seeing Stone in his office that first day. Coming face to face with the ghost from my past. The one who had the power to destroy me—and did—and realizing my fresh start wasn’t so fresh after all. Feeling hopeless and trapped here.