A seasonal tale

The first sign that Enrique Fidesco had of anything untoward was the sight of Angelo lying down in a corner of the field, gazing at an open Spanish Dictionary in a manner which suggested he probably wasn't about to chew it to pieces. Although, when he looked back on the whole sequence of events later, there had been many such signs, which he had ignored.

The second sign was when Enrique took the President of the San Sergio Bullring to look at his prize-winning herd. Up until then, Enrique had considered Angelo a rather bog-standard Toro. He wasn't weak, he wasn't small, but he wasn't especially strong or muscular either. He was just ordinary.

So when Angelo wandered up and started talking, in perfect Castillian Spanish, about how hot it was and how it would be a good idea to go down to the beach, Enrique was at a loss for words. The only thing he could think of was to pretend that nothing had happened. He hastily walked the President away from his field and asked if he wanted something to eat.


The San Sergio Bullring wasn't the biggest bullring in Spain. But they were regular customers. And Enrique had to keep his customers happy. So when the President asked whether he could buy Angelo for his "fighting spirit", Enrique agreed.

Now, a week before the big day, Enrique was starting to regret the decision. They had come to a mutual understanding, and it would be a shame to let that go.

"What actually happens in a bullfight," Angelo had asked, when Enrique had gone to give him and the other bulls some feed.
Enrique had been so gobsmacked that he'd stood there speechless for a several minutes, before eventually telling him to "Read some Hemingway". That, he had hoped, would be the end of the matter. He thought that Angelo's power of speech was probably one of the periodic pangs of guilt he had for breeding bulls for this purpose, and thought no more about it.


But it hadn't been. And now, staring across the field, Enrique was filled with panic. This morning, he had almost thought of ringing the San Sergio Bullring and telling them that his bull could talk. But that thought had been hastily put to one side, because of two reasons.
1) The staff of the Bullring would think he was insane.
2) If they didn't think he was insane, the animal rights activists - and the media - would get to hear about how he willingly sent a bull which could not only understand but could speak Spanish, to die in the ring.
Neither of which were particularly appealing prospects.
"You know," Angelo said, in between two mouthfuls of grass. "I don't like this Hemingway guy."
"Why not?" Enrique asked dumbly, and pointed at the novel lying on the grass. "Where - where'd you get that?"

"Look what he says," Angelo said. "He says: I must say that of all the animals I have observed, none has less expression in its eyes than the bull. I should say, changes its expression less; for the bull’s is almost always that of brutal and savage stupidity. What a prick, eh?"
"Well," Enrique said. "That's one way of looking at it." He did not add that when he looked across at his herd, he frequently had very similar thoughts to old Ernest, wondering almost every day why he had not taken the job in the IT Company he was offered a few years ago, and with it, the girl of his dreams. Still, he couldn't complain.

"So," Angelo said. "Tell me what happens in a bullfight. I stopped reading at the "savage stupidity" part."
"Well..." Enrique said. "Well..."
He did not add that so far, he had only been to one bullfight, and had left halfway through. He preferred to send others to "represent" him as a breeder, but it was actually because the whole process made him feel sick. He was happy to eat beef, but he stopped short at bullfighting. He did not like to give too much thought to the deaths of animals, whether it was on his dinner plate or for entertainment of a few sadists, as he thought of most of his customers. Maybe it was an unethical stance, but it was one which was - sort of - working for him. Yuck.

"Never mind," he said finally. "You'll find out when you get there."


A week later

The heat is stifling. The dust in the Arena has been raked over, the blood from the events of the day before washed away. In the silence you may be able to feel the presence of the participants of various fights, bellowing in pain, or screaming for help after being speared by the horns of an angry bull.

There are six bulls in total. Killed by three matadors, or at least, that's the plan. Beyond the arena you can hear the sounds of an animal rights protest. Enrique has a front-row seat, sweat dripping down his face, as the first bull steps out into the arena. He is feeling weak with anticipation and apprehension. On one hand, being rude to the matador might end Angelo up with an even more painful death than he would already. On the other, Enrique would be famous. The guy with the talking bull.

He imagines himself flying around the world with billions of dollars. "You're the guy who taught his bull to talk like a human, isn't that right?" "Does he speak English?" For a moment, he imagines that Valeria, the gorgeous Moldovan girl at the American IT firm, knocks at his door and invites him to leave this shitty ranch in the middle of nowhere and go and live with her.

On the other hand, Angelo might not say anything at all.
The Paso Doble starts up. The first bull starts to run around a bit. The Matador steps out into the ring - god, what an arrogant prick this guy is, Enrique thinks, having had the misfortune of being invited to a banquet where he celebrated killing a hundred bulls. A bit like Angelo. Maybe they'll get on with each other. Maybe once Angelo has seen the Matador, he will stop criticising Enrique's dress sense. "Put on something a bit smarter! We're going to a bullfight!"

Poor bull no. 1, Enrique thinks, trying to force himself to look at the carnage in the ring, and remembering what exactly it was that made him so reluctant to go to any more corridas. He gets up. It's too bad, that being a VIP spot, there isn't a hot dog stand or something nearby, he thinks. The VIPs get brought their own hot dogs.
"Very graceful, no?" the President says. "You must be proud. Your bull performed well. One of the best I've seen."
"It's not my bull," Enrique says. "Got a few more to go." Angelo is Bull no. 4. Great, so I've got to sit through a few more of these and not only that, but pretend that I'm enjoying this "fine art". Maybe talking about how gracefully the Matadors stab the bull will prevent me from actually having to look, Enrique thinks.

An hour later, and time for Bull no. 4. I can go after this, he thinks, feeling violently sick. Come on, Angelo. Come on. Maybe we can both go home. Maybe we can have a drink in a bar afterwards. Maybe I'll invite the Matador as well. If he's still alive.

Angelo comes out, to cheers and then gasps of horror and dismay.

The President gasps. He stares at Enrique accusingly.
"What?"
"Look what he's wearing."

Angelo is decked out in a sparkly blue suit reminiscent of a Seventies TV presenter. The hair by his horns is spiked like a teenager's. As the Matador stares at him he looks around dismissively.
"Can we change the music?" Angelo says, loud enough for the whole crowd to hear, as the crackly Paso Doble is piped around the ring. "I mean, this is shit."
"Wha'...what did you say?"
"You know ... something like - the Eye of the Tiger. That would be better."
"No," the Matador says, gazing at Angelo with a look of confused terror, and half-heartedly waving his cape around. "No. No. It wouldn't."
"Why not? What music do you like then, Westlife or something? You can't tell me you enjoy this garbage?"

The President of the Bullring turns to Enrique with a look of fury. "What...what...what did you do?"
"Nothing," Enrique says, shifting uncomfortably in his seat, as he begins to hear shouts of "This is a travesty!"
"I didn't do anything..."

When Enrique stares into the ring, he sees the Picador approaching Angelo. I hope he remembered my advice about the Picador, he thinks, as the stupidly-dressed man waves his lance around threateningly. Just don't go near this guy.
"The weather isn't the best for this sort of thing, is it?" Angelo says, with one eye on the blindfolded horse. "That hat and everything. Your horse must be hot."
You idiot, Enrique thinks.
"Yes, I bet your horse is hot. Very hot indeed." Angelo speaks sleazily. He turns around and winks at Enrique. Goddamn it, guy, step away from there! Get back from the Picador, what did I tell you before?
"You must agree with me about the music, yeah?" The Picador doesn't reply. The audience are on the edge of their seats. Some of them are horrified.

"Yes," the Picador says finally, after about a minute of opening and closing his mouth again. "I do. Let's change it to something else."
"What?"
"I don't...know. Maybe Girlfriend by the Killers."
"I've heard that song a bit too much," Angelo says. "How about one of the 90s club classics, you know, like Moving Too Fast..."
"I don't care! Go away! Stop talking to me! Stop! I don't care..." The crowd watches in amazement as the Picador almost falls off the horse. His face has turned a horrible colour.

"We should put this bull back in the pen," the President says. He picks up his whistle. Enrique is sitting forward, trying to listen to the "conversation". Out of the corner he notices a cow who looks suspiciously like one of his dairy herd, standing patiently in one corner. She has a flower on one of her horns. Enrique keeps quiet, in the hope that nobody will notice. Near the cow, he can see a television crew approaching. Maybe it's because of my prize bull. I'm going to be on television. I'm going to be rich.

"Hang on," Angelo shouts, up to the VIP box. "Guys?"

Enrique watches in horrified fascination as Angelo puts his head through a hole in his blue sequinned suit and emerges a moment later with a few small darts and a samurai sword, which looks suspiciously like one Enrique ordered off the internet a few months ago, but which never arrived.
"Guys? When do I get to use these?"

"Good God," the President says. "Get it out of here! Just get it out!"
"I did my research for this bullfight thing," Angelo says. "I've got all the gear. I want to use it!"

The next moment is one that Enrique, and everyone else watching, will wish to forget for ever, as Angelo charges towards the Matador with the darts in his mouth. The Matador's screams in pain as the darts fly into his back, and then the sword ...
"No! Not the sword!" the Matador yells, as he falls to the ground. "No! No!"
"Well, why not?" Angelo says. "I thought this was meant to be a fight to the death between man and beast?"
"Yeah! But - ow ... ow ... ow ... not like this ... ugghh..."

It's like a car crash nobody can look away from. Which is sort of the point of a bullfight, Enrique thinks, trying to think about something philosophical to distract from the bloody scene in front of him. A scene which he, as the breeder of this bull, will be held ultimately responsible for.
"I didn't know he was like this," he gasps to the President. In all the time he "knew" Angelo, he knew nothing of his murderous tendencies. He thought that he was just like any other bull. Where did it go wrong?


But when Enrique turns his attention back to the ring, Angelo and the cow who came to watch are both gone, leaving only the dying Matador in the centre, and his shocked and astonished entourage.
"I think I better go," Enrique says. "You know. The bull. I need to find him." He gets up, but instead of looking for Angelo, sprints to his car, and once inside, presses the accelerator down as hard as possible, driving at full pelt across the countryside. Trying not to look at the cows. Maybe this could be the start of a new life ... yeah, right. On the run. He'll go back home, collect his things, and go somewhere, Brazil or something, change his name ... and try never to think of this again ...

I badly need a drink, he thinks, after three hours of driving, unable to bring himself to go home or even to stop anywhere. He stops outside a small bar on the outskirts of a village he's never heard of in his life, and walks in.

His heart plummets when he sees Angelo and the cow who appeared at the bullring, in the corner, enjoying a bottle of beer between them. The talking bull who could have brought him such fame has become a liability. Unable to stop himself, Enrique walks over to their table.
"Angelo, what in God's name were you doing there? You killed the Matador! And now you're sitting down and drinking beer!"
"I know," Angelo says. "It's good to even things up occasionally. I bet it was the most entertaining bullfight anyone had ever been to. Isn't that what they're always talking about? The element of surprise. The element of danger."
"Yeah," Enrique says. "I guess. But ... where did you get the darts? And the suit?"
"You'll see," Angelo says cryptically. "But how about we get pissed first, eh?"