You have just received a letter in the mail from the Governor. Apparently someone passing through Detroit hacked a woman’s body. That’s what you have been trying to tell black folks for years. It’s all over. Let the cowards run away. This is your city—you build this city up. You became Robin Hood and gave jobs to the people and made a way and now you are trying to protect what is yours from takeover. You are thinking of building a fortress around the city to protect your investment.

What can you do, though? You owe the Governor a favor. People look in the mirror and all they see are shades of gray. You see a man with no arms, no legs, no mouth and least of all, no man. You are a body, a crook, a spirit. No, you are a spirit inhabiting a body. You just want to be. People don’t really know who you are. For every soul you save through your rhetoric, another someone looked at you with a better way, someone who could do cartwheels that you refuse to, even though it would help the city. So, you just fly away. You do the best you can but you are getting past your prime—You are a young man in an old person’s body.

Why does the Governor spring this on you now? This letter doesn’t say this is what you should do; the letter says this is what you are going to do. A man is coming to your city. You cannot even alert your city about this strange floating tiger. You still could not alert your city even if the man was you, even though this man is you. You will keep an eye out for him, though everyone else can see him standing over your shoulder. You are shooting blanks and your hair is thinning. You are a shadow of your former self, too afraid to let you, though it is time for you to move on into the night.