Richard Theo has no need of devastation; he’s happy with conflict. So he’s spent a long time listening to everyone. To people in the supermarket, in the DIY store, in the Bearskin pub, in the Hollow, in the Heights: he’s looked everyone in the eye, and instead of expressing an opinion, he has asked questions. “What should we politicians be doing for you?” “Where do you see Beartown in ten years’ time?” “How much tax did you pay last year? Do you get value for money from it?” From that he has learned that people around here are worried about three things: jobs, health care, and hockey.

So he sat down at his computer and started to write. All summer the local paper has been publishing articles about the rumors that the hospital in Hed is going to be closed, and Theo has commented repeatedly and anonymously using half a dozen fake accounts. He never spreads hate, never draws attention to himself, just discreetly tosses more fuel onto the already smoldering fire. When one worried pregnant woman wondered what was going to happen to the hospital’s maternity unit, one of Theo’s anonymous pseudonyms wondered, “Have you heard anything?” The woman replied, “I know someone who works there she says its being shut down!!!” Theo’s pseudonym replied, “We’d better hope the government doesn’t raise gasoline taxes, or we won’t even be able to afford to give birth in our cars.” When an unemployed man, recently laid off from the factory in Beartown, replied, “Exactly! Always us out in the sticks who have to suffer!,” another of Theo’s identities wrote, “Why should all our money go to the hospital in Hed instead of opening a new clinic in Beartown?”

The man and woman were joined by other angry voices, the tone quickly became more inflamed, and Theo merely nudged the general frustration in the right direction when he wrote, “So the women around here will have to give birth in their cars, but the council always seems to have enough money to support Beartown Ice Hockey?”

Hospitals and hockey aren’t funded from the same budget, those decisions aren’t even made by the same politicians, but if you ask a difficult enough question, there will always be a receptive audience for the simplest answer. So day after day, in different comment sections, Richard Theo has been doing what he does best: creating conflict, setting one thing against another. Countryside against big city. Hospital against hockey. Hed against us.

* * *

Us against you.

* * *

And now more and more people, of all ages and from all parts of town, are wearing green T-shirts bearing the words BEARTOWN AGAINST THE REST.

* * *

Politics is never strictly linear, big changes don’t come out of nowhere, there’s always a series of smaller causes. Sometimes politics is finding a hockey coach for a hockey club, sometimes it’s just answering a phone when all the other politicians are on holiday. The reporter who calls Richard Theo the second time is the same temp who called before. This time she’s trying to fill the summer news drought with simple questionnaires, such as “How did our local celebrities celebrate Midsummer?,” and of course Richard Theo is “both a politician and something of a celebrity,” and of course he was so helpful the last time they spoke. Naturally, Theo doesn’t pass up the opportunity:

“I was actually in Hed, watching the Midsummer celebrations—you know the council always pays for the festivities there? But of course I’d much rather have celebrated Midsummer here in Beartown!”

“You mean the council ought to organize Midsummer festivities in Beartown?” the reporter wonders.

“I think in times like these, taxpayers in Beartown may well be getting a little concerned that all the council’s resources seem to be going to Hed,” Theo says.

“How . . . how do you mean?”

“You only have to look at the comment sections of your own website, really, don’t you?” Theo suggests.

The reporter hangs up and soon finds the comment section below the articles about the hospital. By now Richard Theo has deleted all his own comments, but plenty of other people have already repeated, “So Beartown has to find its own sponsors while the COUNCIL foots the bill in Hed? Why is there money for Hed Hockey but not for the HOSPITAL?”

The reporter calls Theo again. He says modestly that he “hasn’t been involved in any discussions concerning the hospital” and suggests that the reporter might do better to ask the leader of the largest party on the council instead. So the reporter calls him. He answers on his cell phone, on vacation in Spain. The reporter gets straight to the point: “Why are you transferring all the council’s funding from Beartown Ice Hockey directly to Hed Hockey? Can’t Hed Hockey find their own sponsors so that the council can invest the money in the hospital instead?” Perhaps the politician is too relaxed, perhaps he’s even had a glass of wine, but he replies, “Listen, my dear, it’s not the same money at all, surely you can see that? Completely different budgets! As far as hockey is concerned, we’re focusing the council’s resources where we believe they will do most good, and right now that’s with Hed Hockey, not Beartown.” The reporter quotes him online but leaves out the word “hockey.” So now it just says, “right now that’s with Hed, not Beartown.” The comments section soon fills up: “Ha! As usual, Hed gets everything!! Do they think we don’t pay taxes in Beartown or something?!” Then: “Like someone said before, why is there money for Hed Hockey, but not for health centers in Beartown???” Then: “What do politicians think is most important? Hockey or health care?”

The reporter calls the politician in Spain again, and asks, “What do you think is most important? Hockey or the hospital?” The politician clears his throat and tries to explain. “You can’t make simple comparisons like that,” but the reporter keeps probing until the politician snaps, “Surely to God you understand that I think hospitals are more important than hockey!” The reporter quotes him directly and provides a few extra words of context: “He said, when we contacted him in his summer house in Spain.” The article also mentions in passing the fact that the Spanish-home-owning politician lives in Hed rather than in Beartown.

When the reporter calls Richard Theo again to request another interview, Theo asks if the reporter would mind conducting it in the council building, because Theo is at work all summer. “Being a local councillor here isn’t a job, it’s a privilege,” he adds.

The next article in the local paper includes a photograph of him alone in the dining room of the council building, hard at work. In response to the question “Hockey or health care?” he replies, “I believe taxpayers deserve a society where we don’t have to choose between health care and opportunities for exercise and leisure.”

* * *

Soon another article will appear on the website of the local paper. No one really knows how a summer temp could have dug up a piece of news like this, but suddenly there is documentation to prove that prominent councillors have been engaged in secret discussions about the Hed hospital all spring. It is claimed that jobs in one hospital department could be saved if another “more cost-heavy” department was closed immediately. Somehow the paper has managed to find out, from a “reliable source,” that the department that the “leading elite of establishment politicians” would prefer to save has more employees who live in Hed, while the one threatened with closure has more staff living in Beartown.

This later turns out not to be the case, but by then it won’t matter, because all summer the headline is “More Unemployment for Beartown.”

* * *

The comment section does what the comment section always does: smells blood and catches fire.

* * *

At one point during the summer, a female politician arrives at Hog’s garage to pick up her car, which had to be repaired when visibility through the windshield was slightly obscured by the unfortunate appearance of an ax in the hood. Bobo has repaired and repainted it, but when the woman goes to take out her wallet, the boy shakes his head and says, “It’s already been paid for.” The boy doesn’t say who by, but the woman understands. She drives home, still terrified at the very thought of catching sight of any men in black jackets, but there is nothing threatening waiting outside her door. Just a magnificent bouquet of flowers. The card reads, “Don’t be scared, you’ve still got friends, we won’t let the forces of darkness win! Richard Theo.”

The woman calls to thank him. Theo is humble, says he doesn’t want anything in return, and she respects him for that. He smiles as he hangs up. He often has a plan, but not always; sometimes he’s just like a good hockey player: he’s got quick reflexes. That afternoon just before Midsummer, after the establishment politicians had their meeting with Peter about Beartown Hockey, the insecure female councillor was standing in the corridor, not daring to go outside. Richard Theo passed her at the coffee machine and asked, “You look worried—what’s the matter?”