Waving Not Drowning

She can barely open her eyes. They're slits now, like a snake. Her skin is hot, red and tight, stretched across her face like a hide being cured. The antihistamines are useless. Two packages of Benadryl and she's in a stupor with no relief. It's day three and something is making her swell up like a balloon about to burst. If she drank forties like water and mainlined salt like sugar, maybe this would make sense. People recoil from her on the street. Thankfully she loves oversized sunglasses and large brimmed hats because when the allergist's receptionist saw her even his jaw dropped. "Oh my, you are an emergency, aren't you?" The doctor figures it's environmental, something in the air or walls where she's living. Julie can't believe it. After everything she's suffered through now she has to move. Again. Benny leaves her high and dry with three weeks to find an apartment. There was a note on the fridge. He packed up the bike and was heading ...

It's called the playroom. Mike has no idea why, it's not like there's any playing going on down here nowadays. Mike's mom is burying herself in stuff. Since dad died she's flat out refused to deal with the reams of paper and magazines, decades of dad's old journals, mail order catalogues, piles of tools, stacks of books and three full sets of outdated encyclopedias. At some point, she went on a christmas decoration buying binge, so there are random rubbermaid bins spilling over with garland, plastic reindeer, wooden creches,  half cracked blown glass ornaments and fibreoptic glow in the dark mini wreaths. It's beyond Mike's scope. He knows she needs help, a professional organizer or something, he's seen some shows on tv. They bring in someone to help you get everything sorted and cleared out. Then inevitably, the poor person ends up buried alive in the same junk months later. It's all so depressing. Mike's first drumkit, which she and dad bou...