I was reluctant to go to the Women’s March. It’s not that I didn’t want to support the cause or show that I have the utmost respect for women. Rather, I didn’t feel it was my place. I don’t know, it just felt like it would be sleazy rather than enlightened or considerate for me to attend. And yet, how was I to say no when my younger sister, Angela (a real goth who fittingly worshipped early era Jewel and Stevie Nicks) asked me to give her a ride into Manhattan from our removed little Garden City, Long Island world? Though I will say the fact that our town’s logo is a pineapple does speak to a larger sexual subtext, one that I can’t tell is progressive or not. I’d like to think probably not because it’s Long Island, and it’s better for me creatively to feel there’s an element of oppression where I’m living. I’m a musician, you know–I need constant inspiration. In any event, I didn’t start out my day thinking I was going to fall in love with a militant female protesting the patriarchy. I sort of just thought I’d park downtown, take the train with my sister up to Midtown to see she got situated, and then maybe hang around Hell’s Kitchen until it was all over. But it just didn’t happen that way.

It all began when I tried to leave Angela with her friends, the ones I had never met before or knew she even had. I guess ever since she started up with this weird book club in the East Village, she’s met a lot of new people. A lot of activists. I didn’t notice any of them because of Anna, who had made the grandest statement of anyone by dressing in a sequined black ball gown with a plunging neckline, white evening gloves, rhinestone jewelry and strappy silver stilettos. Hers was an ironic anti-feminist stance. She believed you could still adhere to a Marilyn Monroe aesthetic and possess within you the soul of a Gloria Steinem or Betty Friedan. I instantly knew I had to stay to see what she did next. I don’t want to call it love at first sight. That would be puerile at this point in my life. I’m a 32-year-old man living with my parents. I’m delusional, but not that delusional.

Anna was not nearly as captivated by me as I was by her. She’s a 24-year-old ball of fire–so everything captivates her constantly and at random. Still, she found the time to say, “You’re Alan? Angie’s brother? Heard a lot about you. I’m Anna.” She waved at me, balancing her PRESIDENT FRUMP, NO ONE WANTS TO GRAB YOUR DICK sign as she put on a pink pussy hat to crown her look. “You joining us?” she demanded. Again, it was a question I couldn’t say no to that day. And anyway, I’ve heard saying yes to everything results in good things. Or was that the tagline to Yes Man starring Jim Carrey?

Soon, I found myself taking up one of the girls on my shoulders and walking them down Second Avenue (it probably didn’t bode well for my involvement in the protest that Anna and Angela were the only women whose names I bothered to remember). By 53rd Street, I was desperate to get this girl off my shoulders and Anna onto them. But I knew a ball gown would not so easily permit the spreading of her legs, in any sense. Instead, I just kept looking back at her, all puppy dog eyes and patheticness. She didn’t notice–and if she did, she didn’t care, or was probably used to it. God, why do guys always have to go for the girls that are already desirable? We should give the less straightforwardly beautiful ones a chance. Oh fuck, now I sound like Trump or something. I should get out of this march before the shit inside my head gets even weirder, I reconciled. But it was at that moment that Anna tapped me on the back and said, “I need your help.” I practically threw the girl on my shoulders off of me to be at Anna’s service. “With what?” I asked, too eagerly.

It was then I saw her remove what I recognized from watching enough terrorist-themed films as a Molotov cocktail from her backpack (also black sequined). “I want you to throw this at the Trump Tower when we get there.” I froze, knowing with certainty that I would do whatever she asked me. I would be the Clyde to her Bonnie, the Charles Starkweather to her Caril Ann Fugate (except in these cases, it was the man acting as the Svengali–in ours it would be the other way around). And yet, I could tell she thought I was a pussy for even pausing to think about fulfilling her request. By the way, is it even permissible now to use the word pussy to signify being weak?

“Never mind, you’re obviously not for this cause,” she harrumphed as she put the cocktail back in her bag. I grabbed her by the hand (I could see where you would think that sentence might be going elsewhere) and squeezed it. “I’m with you. Believe me.” With this assurance and the taking of her backpack, I was returned to her good graces, and now it was she on my shoulders just as I had always envisioned from the second I had to carry some other nameless freedom fighter on them instead.

As we got closer to the building, I felt a surprising sense of calm. I could fuck up the operation, I could go to jail, I could end up injuring myself somehow, but to me, it all felt worth it if it meant Anna would continue speaking to me after this day. I would never meet another girl like her. Least of all in Garden City. Where I dreaded going back after an electric outing such as this. Made me realize why so many people were willing to sacrifice their sanity to live in New York. Because at least occasionally you felt something–even if it was, more often than not, all-out contempt. This thought was interrupted by Anna kicking my nipple with the back of her heel to remind me we’d arrived. This was the moment. And no sooner had she given me that kick, as though through the stirrups of imminent change, than I pulled the bottle out of the backpack she held before me, prepped my lighter and let the flame touch the cloth. Without any thought but Anna, I heaved the concoction at Trump Tower. It smashed through the window, spreading a fiery blaze throughout. While it didn’t cause much irreparable damage or any hospitalizations, it certainly garnered the permanent respect of Anna, who has been visiting me in jail every day since it happened. When I finally get out, we’re gonna get married, too. Needless to say, I’ll be taking her last name.