BAGINGA AND THE WOLF

  Tan was a young man who, quite undeniably, resembled a wolf. In fact this was true to such an extent that it could be fairly stated ‘Tan was a wolf who resembled a young man’. This would be untrue. Tan was as human as you and I. He too felt pain, irritation and the need for leisure activities. He too whiled away his hours wondering at the exact difference between a kipper and a herring, and attempting to devise a name for the back of the human knee (his initial effort ‘salawazza!’ had been dismissed as ‘just plain silly’ by The People who Matter). On one night in the month however, usually upon the appearance of a full moon (although, just once, the smile of Melvyn Bragg on television had the same effect), Tan’s bodily hair would vanish, leaving his skin as fair and smooth as porcelain, and considerably less breakable.

  The love of Tan’s life was Baginga, a notably pretty (if not quite beautiful) orphan girl with a voice as shrill and clear as a bugle sounding the Last Post. Tan had long since observed her at market, startling traders and purchasers alike with her cacophonous enquiries as to the price of fruit. Come each Thursday, he would follow her at a distance, wearing a large hood in order to disguise his wolfish features. When passers-by did catch a glimpse of his face, they would merely assume he was a student.

  Tan dreamed of nothing more than walking hand-in-hand alongside Baginga, rather than skulking ashamedly in the shadows behind. He dreamed simply of holding her bags, of complimenting her attractive (if not quite stunning) features and of, when necessary, defusing the occasionally heated situations that arose when people mistakenly assumed she was shouting at them.

‘But Baginga is beautiful and popular’ Tan would consider sadly upon waking; ‘and we have nothing in common but our ethnically non-committal names. Besides which, there’s no getting around it, I look like a wolf.’ He had, however, begun to formulate a plan to change his fortunes. It involved approaching Baginga under a full moon, and attempting to secure a full guarantee of unconditional love by morning. Failing this, he could thereafter constantly pretend to be on his way to a fancy-dress party.

  Two weeks later, right on cue, the sun began to set and, as if in a hurry to get there, a huge full moon barged its way above the horizon. Quite painlessly, Tan’s incisors shrunk to assume less threatening proportions, whilst the hair on his face and body retracted into his body, leaving his boyish features untarnished.

Wondering, as ever, at the de-wolfing process, Tan once again thought that he really should go to the doctor about his condition. He’d been meaning to since he was about 6, when his school nurse had tagged him ‘an abnormally early developer’ but had never quite got round to it. He also, in retrospect, found himself puzzled at the ongoing lack of concern from his parents regarding the matter but, realising he was in danger of destabilising the author’s already precarious plot, he instead set about preparing for that night’s meeting.

  It was fully dark by the time Tan reached Baginga’s doorstep and, after some nerve-fuelled hesitation, he rang the bell.

“I’M COMING!” came the instant thunderous reply. Somewhere down the street, an awoken baby began sobbing.

Tan had viewed this place at least a hundred times before, but the prospect of actually setting foot inside the premises caused him to resort to his nervous habit of tugging his cheek-hair. The fact he had no cheek-hair at present caused him to resemble an escaped lunatic when attempting the feat.

‘Oh look – an escaped mental-patient’ thought Baginga, upon opening the door. ‘Albeit one with gloriously smooth skin’.

“May I borrow some sugar” blurted out Tan, slightly over-anxiously. He’d been led to believe that this was how people set about meeting new women.

“ARE YOU A NEIGHBOUR?” replied Baginga. Somehere in the next street, a terrified cat fled for its life at this sudden burst of noise.

“No. I was just passing.” Tan began to wish he still resembled a wolf. At least it would give him something to talk about. “I have a sweet tooth,” he added, by way of explanation. He bared his teeth as proof.

‘That is the most wonderfully even set of teeth I have ever seen’ thought Baginga. ‘Why, I doubt they could chew their way through strawberry mousse.’ The thought filled her with a rare attraction for this stranger at her door.

“WOULD YOU LIKE TO COME IN?” she ventured kindly. Two streets away, a beleaguered family clambered into their wartime-era air-raid shelter in response to this perceived siren. Tan, however, was as happy as a cat with a choice between wool and milk. He followed Baginga’s comely (but not quite traffic-stopping) posterior into the hall…

  Once the conversation began, it flowed as naturally as an alpine stream in spring. They spoke of civilisations, marine biology and manicure techniques, among other things, adopting, at times, a downright flirtatious tone. At first, coming from Baginga, this sounded more like a threat, but Tan found himself able to fully appreciate the radiance of his beloved once he had clad himself in ear-muffs, upon the pretext of feeling the chill.

As for Baginga, she found herself ever more captivated by this charming baby-faced stranger although, having found him some sugar, she was a little surprised to see he had no apparent interest in it, apart from the occasional mouthfuls he would consume to ease her puzzlement. Above all, she was glad to find someone who would listen to what she had to say without then recoiling in terrified shock, scrabbling to preserve his newly incapacitated eardrums. She herself had little awareness of her abnormal aural volume, having long since become used to it. Indeed, she took at face value Tan’s reason for the ear-muffs and, perturbed by this failing in her hospitality, proceeded to increase the central-heating 7 times over the course of the night. By 4am, they were therefore both sweating like rapists, which contributed to an atmosphere of sensual expectancy.

  “YOU KNOW” began Baginga, “I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE TO KISS YOU, OH STRANGER AT MY DOOR”. Next door, old Mrs Reisinger arose and showered, mistaking this racket for the call of her alarm clock.

Tan, however, replied falteringly. This was perhaps the opportunity he so craved.

“But… would you want to kiss me still if I were not so physically appealing?” he ventured nervously.

“YOU WILL ALWAYS BE APPEALING TO ME TAN” came the booming reply.

“Even if I had welts the size of scotch eggs?”

“YES MY DEAR”

“Even if my nose was desperately crooked, one eye was an inch higher than the other and my hair was styled in yesterday’s fashion?”

“YES HONEYCOMB, YES!”

“Even if I looked like a wolf, er I mean…” Tan thought furiously, as not to give himself away; “a Thompson’s gazelle?”

“WELL, A THOMPSON’S GAZELLE WOULD BE ALRIGHT. ANYTHING BUT A WOLF REALLY…”

  And Baginga began to tell the story of how she lost her parents fifteen years beforehand. Of how, as a child, she had been with them on a family picnic in the Cotswolds when a rabid wolf, having escaped from a local high-security zoo complex using a surprisingly sophisticated lock-picking technique taught to him by a corrupt visiting part-time zoo (and wax-museum) inspector, had approached the idyllic scene. Of how, having mistaken Baginga’s mother and father for tasty morsels (it had long since been ascertained by local cannibals that Baginga’s mother and father would be gristly and bland to the palate), he had snapped both their necks before realising his mistake, apologising profusely, and eating the local chief bell-ringer instead. And she told of how the wolf was hunted down and blown up with plastic explosives, whilst the part-time zoo (and wax-museum) inspector escaped justice on a legal technicality. As for the local standard of bell-ringing, it was never the same again.

  And now Tan realised that Baginga hated, hated with her every fibre, that murdering beast, along with all of his lupine kind. Temporarily forgetting the grave implications of the story for himself, he crossed the room with the intention of comforting this most lovely (if not quite breathtaking) girl and giving her the kiss she desired when something terrible happened. Outside of the house, the top of the sun peeked over the skyline and at once began to dispel the comforting dark. Inside the house, hair began to sprout from every part of Tan’s body, his ears began to shift position and his teeth began to assume canine proportions once again.

“No!” cried Tan and, before Baginga could ascertain what was happening to her new friend, he turned and fled from the house, leaving his coat hanging on the back of a chair.

“WAIT!” bellowed Baginga, even by her standards. “YOU FORGOT YOUR COAT… AND YOUR SUGAR!”

All down the road, car and house alarms sounded in response to Baginga’s cries, as Tan sprinted towards home, desperate to avoid seeing another living soul.