FAME HIVES

Am I allergic to success?

I use a fork, but as the crimson spots bloom across my olive skin I need something wider, sharper, stronger. I pull my detangling hairbrush from the drawer, the one with the stiffest bristles and run it along the small of my back. A guttural sigh of relief escapes my throat. It feels like fucking on Oxy, and just like fucking someone while on Oxycontin, I know it’s going to make things exponentially worse.

Put the brush down, Holly.

I stare at the abandoned fork and consider every fork in the road of my life. You know when you’re so desperately uncomfortable that you flashback through your entire timeline, considering every choice you’ve ever made that lead you to the miserable moment you’re in? I could have been dead. I could have been married to a drug dealer in the south and then dead. I could have been married to a big-shot director, poorly hiding my expensive pill and Whispering Angel problem and then dead. I only had a few options, a few roads back then, but I got sober and the fork tines became infinite. So how did I land in the land of extreme itching? Perhaps this is the price of admission. Punishment for all my dreams finally coming true.

“I jumped timelines. I’m rich and famous now,” I announce plainly to my best friend the other day. Tucked in a booth at Swingers, she looks around conspiratorially and agrees, telling me that not only did she feel the timeline shift for herself, but she saw it in me too. My vibe feels different to her.

At this point, I’ve yet to see any physical proof of being rich and famous. My bank account dwindles, my credit card debt rises, and while my writing and Manthropology show are going well, there’s little evidence of the extreme success that I woke up just feeling in my bones. But as the week unfolds, I notice people treat me differently. Everywhere I go they stare like I have mustard on my face. Strangers approach, saying, “hey, I know you!” Another friend of mine randomly remarks that my aura feels bigger. I’m introduced to someone who says “Am I supposed to know who you are? You seem famous.”

And then Manthropology explodes on TikTok. From one day to the next, my videos hit millions of views. The energy from the comments gush towards me in a tidal wave of love, adoration, rage, excitement, prickly heat, pheromones, exhalation, hatred, lust, envy, joy, violence and everything but the indifference I’d grown so accustomed to in my years of obscurity. All directed at me, for me, about me, because of me. It’s everything I’ve ever wanted and I ride high, back straight, eyes wide, staring into my phone. I respond to the nice comments with heart eyed kitties, defend myself to those determined to misunderstand me, and argue with the misinformed… I may be a nepo-baby but I DO NOT HAVE A TRUST FUND... and of course, I can’t help but correct the spelling and grammar on the ones that call me dumb. I am mesmerized by all the attention.

As I prep my camera for my shoot the next day, I realize it won’t charge. I scratch at a random red bump that just appeared on my hip bone while considering my options. No biggie. I’ll just send it in for repair and rent a camera in the meantime. Then I get into my car and the engine light blinks red, accompanied by a suspicious whirring sound. What the fuck? Still, I remain calm as I watch the tow truck lift its back tires onto the giant metal fork.

Back in my apartment, I can’t help but open my phone again and again because every time I do, there are a thousand new comments, all about me: I’m a fraud. I’m doing God’s work. I’m a genius. I’m old and expired. I’m in danger. I should kill myself. I’m hot. I’m leading a feminist movement. I’m an idiot. I scratch at the back of my neck. It’s bumpy. Is it always bumpy? My scratching hand absentmindedly makes its way behind my ears, and then moves on down to my lower back as I consider how I’ll pay for my broken car and camera. The rich part of this new timeline hasn’t landed in the physical plane yet.

But it will. I can feel it. I feel it all coming, coming on me, literally jizzing everything everywhere all over and inside of me. Everything is coming for me. Money yes, but truly everything in the world! Tomatoes, pitchforks, fireballs, waterfalls of gold, rainbows, starbursts, zippers, leopards, unicorns, ham sandwiches, tubes of chapstick and lube, pencils, pianos, knives, goldfish, televisions, every kind of electronic device, every aspect of nature, trees and rose bushes, I mean everything at every point of the spectrum of existence! I feel everything thinking about me and watching me, the energy is palpable, love, hate, despair and rage. Then I break.

At first I don’t know what’s happening to me. I wake up at 3 am with my entire back, butt, hips, thighs, neck and scalp covered in puffy, angry, red welts. Inside of my chest a fiery ring caves in on my heart, and my throat feels like I’ve been swallowing razorblades. The bottoms of my feet are aching and swollen like I’d run a marathon, and my bones crunch into each other, my joints aflame. All I can think is, Oh, this is it. I’m actually dying.

By morning–after spending the night talking to ChatGPT and a Telehealth doctor–everyone, myself included, agrees that I have a severe case of Fame Hives. My nervous system got totally whacked out and went histamine haywire, bananas. Fame Hives, obviously. I feel ran through, like the woman who fucked 100 men in a day as a publicity stunt, but like, on the astral plane. Did I get gang banged in the multiverse? In my etheric energetic body or my light body or some shit and now it’s having real, physical consequences in this realm? Maybe it’s energetically slutty to be engaging with all those comments. Perhaps I simply jumped timelines too quickly.

I really hope I’m not allergic to fame. I’ve barely even arrived. I’m scared it’ll go away, like I’m subconsciously rejecting it because my body can’t take it. I still have mountains to climb, goals to accomplish and I feel immense pressure to create, create, create but now I’m so fuzzy-headed I can barely write this. Fame has made me a drug addict again. I don’t mean to be, I don’t want to be high.

Through the fog of Allegra for Hives, I’m trying to stay present, gripping onto my new reality. But the doctor says Claritin is better and it’s okay to take another antihistamine cause they’re different ones, so I pop it with my morning coffee. I take a Prednisone which I know will put me on edge, but what choice do I have? My usual Wellbutrin too, chased with a Pepcid AC, followed by a Tums snack. Another Wellbutrin in the afternoon with an oat milk Matcha latte. I have to write! I need special beverages to write!

Can I take another Allegra? I’m so fucking itchy. Fuck it. Later as the sun sets, I take two Benadryl, all while slathering prescription strength steroid cream on my inflamed skin. It is happy hour, after all. I stand naked before the mirror and massage the cream it into my scalp. I don’t recognize myself, all blotchy, puffy and red. It hurts to swallow water. I take another Pepcid AC. I take two more Benadryl. I am wired and exhausted and I just want to pass out and be done with this hellscape.

Don’t look at your phone, don’t look at your phone. That’s my mantra as I stare up at the ceiling, covered in ice packs, listening to a guided sleep meditation all the way through to the end. I get up and take half a Xanax. I stare at the fork. No Holly. I get back into bed and lay there for another hour. I slide out of bed again and rifle through my drawer, pulling out the detangling brush. I run it one time, very slowly over every inch of my naked body, hard enough to leave teeny-tiny trails of blood in the welts. Just this once, I sigh. I have self control. I’ve got this. I take another half a Xanax.

I know I keep threatening to go live. I’m gonna do it. This week. Email me with any burning questions or desires you’d like me to answer/discuss. Follow me on the gram to see the hives.