Hostage Situation.

Shea, Michael Martin

We have taken each other hostage. I have buried my demands in the dirt. Which is my right. You will circle the horses. You'll suggest we circulate our respective demands in the local papers. Instead, I will shepherd the bees. I will miss my getaway train. I will subsist on honey & stamens, a diet of uncanonized vegetation, a domain not subjugated to your equestrian worldview. I will tie up my demands in a burlap sack & heave them into the river & then I will keep silent, exercising my rights, which are many My demands will be the novel everyone talks about & no one reads. The local authorities will dredge the river for my demands & find nothing but old boots, evidence of a pack of entirely unshod vagrants, & they will search for them with vigor. You & I will be placed on the backburner, left relatively alone while the vagrants terrorize the countryside, whipping the people into a sort of panic not unlike cholera, & in the shadows, I will steal your finest horse. I will show up at the party alone & when the lights come on, I'll be found with my hands on someone else's stirrups. The newsmen will label it an elaborate ruse, the most vindictive parlor game we've seen in years. In interviews, I'll be forced to confess I have no clear idea what I want. This is all in the future, before you leave to patrol the frontiers. One day, we'll meet in my apiary to make amends. To trade possessions. My harvest for your stolen thoroughbred. Your pistols for my only pair of hands.