A couple lifetimes ago, Jess had a problem.

She was facing a black hole. It was like a vacuum -- sucks life in and gives none back. Or like a hairdryer -- eliminates the moisture but blows out only hot air.

It was hurting her, on the days that she was prone to those things. She could not work; she could not think; she could not be happy; she could not sleep. Patience, pleading, passion did not work. Optimism, hope, silence did not work. It would not go away.

"Just walk," said GirlA. "You deserve better," said BoyB. "Why do you even fucking care?" asked the Man Who Sleeps With Nihilism. "Why do you need this? You have so much. So much. You are being greedy."

"I can't; I know; I don't understand," She sobbed.

She wanted to inflict violence. She wanted to cause harm. She wanted to destroy, maim, hurt.

But she wasn't even sure if she had that capacity within her. "Maybe I do," she told herself.

"What goes around comes around," said her artistic lesbian neighbor, who heard her crying. The neighbor gave Jess some magic powder, charcoal, and some red rock to burn. "To chase away the evil spirits," the witch explained.

"Violence gets you nowhere," said the other neighbor who shared her back porch. He gave Jess an authentic voodoo doll with real hair to walk through her apartment with. Jess gripped it to her chest and lay down on her bed. When she returned it to the neighbor, he was holding a rattle-shaker in the shape of a devil's head. "It's the devil." Jess shook it a couple times but did not want to bring it inside.

Jess burned the rocks. They smelled good. Jess stared out her window and looked at the walls that constituted her view. Jess prayed for compassion and strength to do the right thing.

In a lifetime before that, Jess herself was a black hole. And she was not happy.

This too shall pass, I whispered in her ear.