No Advance

I met a man who healed trauma by hitting people on the body and blowing a didgeridoo up a man’s ass. He said it was THE spot. He said he had activated the kundalini serpent.

I thought:It’s something else.

Later I saw him snorting something in the toilet.

I met another woman who said she healed trauma through astrology. She sat in a tiny café with a two-thousand-euro laptop, telling the man across from her:

“Your father is in your natal chart. He is the culprit. Pathology. I can see everything.”

The man said nothing.

She talked about energy. The Shadow. How lucky she was to work online from a beach in Zanzibar. How people with low vibrations could never understand her truth.

She told him he would always attract narcissists until he raised his vibration.

The waiter brought the bill.

She didn’t have change.

Of course.

Later I met more of them.

Women from California who were priestesses on YouTube and sold themselves for fifty euros when the camera was off.

Men who came from Sirius but couldn’t handle one ordinary word:

no.

Shamans who talked about healing and punished anyone who disagreed with them.

Some fairies selling crystal amulets while spending four years stalking their boyfriend’s ex.

Women who said they loved art but wanted artists to work for free.

They asked for a logo.

No advance.

Then said no.

The artist got nothing.

Of course.

Two years later we saw her again. She looked ruined.

She told us everything she had was being taken from her. She blamed Uranus.

I thought of the advance.

Apparently planets keep accounts too.

The next day I walked past a yoga centre.

On the door it said:

LIGHT

LOVE

ECSTATIC DANCE

TRANSFORMATION

Inside they were selling packages of six sessions.

I thought about going in.

Then I kept walking.

I had spent too long in the dark to believe everyone who claimed they were selling light.

•Tea Franca