Poor River

River was working on another Masterpiece painting, absolutely focused on every brush-stroke. It was wonderful watching her paint; the care and attention to detail honed over many months of practice. As a level 10 master of painting, she was sought after by collectors and her paintings sold for over §1K. She was in demand and that felt good because at least it kept the bills paid and the roof over their head.

There was a certain amount of satisfaction in being able to bring in a lot of money into the household. Her husband was doing it with his writing now as well as doing his own painting and he also collected the tiberium rocks that spawned in the yard and that provided a hefty cha-ching in the financial wallet. Life was good, but Haruo and River were never satisfied with status quo. Their objective was to not have any money worries at all.

But financial worries aside, the job of trying to make ends meet, was tossed by the wayside when a nasty nauseous feeling overcame River.

...which heralded yet another panicked egress from the artist's area to the washroom.

She paused for a moment staring down at the toilet as her stomach roiled making her wonder if it was just a scare but no, poor River...the contents of her stomach made another reaquaintance enroute to the john.

It was not pretty nor was it comfortable, because for a long time, it felt as though River wasn't able to stop throwing up.

It took a long while before she was able to stand up straight as she looked weakly at the contents of the toilet with a look of distaste before flushing the toilet. When she could stand without having to lean against the wall, she made her way to the sink.

She hastily popped the cap on the tooth paste, placed it on her toothbrush and shoved the toothbrush into her mouth brushing vigorously so that she could get every last bit of that vomit taste out of her mouth. She had never felt this sick before. It felt as if giant hands had taken her innards and squeezed them, twisting them into shapes they weren't meant to be twisted into.

When she had gotten the taste of the vomit out of her mouth, she made her way slowly and painfully back to the easel, her stomach not feeling any better than it did when she made that 50 yard dash to the toilet.

The pond had completely frozen over as Sunset Valley was in the clutches of a cold-snap.

The rest of the family was having dinner.

River valiantly struggled to keep her stomach from rebelling, but it was no use.

Her stomach felt like a ship caught in a Category Five hurricane. It felt as though the contents of her stomach were being whipped up into a churning mass of nausea.

"Oh god, here we go again..." moaned River as she stared at the toilet, then heaved...dropping towards the toilet on her knees. and upchucked what little remained in her stomach...until she was spent...dry-heaving.

And the ritual of brushing her teeth started over yet again.

Poor River.