The VIP Werewolf of Orange

There appears to be another strange phenomenon on the rise - humanoid animals wearing clothes or acting in a manner otherwise specific to humans, They usually resemble wolves or canine entities. These beings are sometimes conflated with Skin-Walkers or Werewolves, but I think that they better fit the descriptions of the medieval Cynocephalus (dog-headed men). The case that I have to regale you with today pertains to one of these anomalous anthropomorphic animals.

## The Incident

It was a warm day in the Spring of 1982 when a Chapman University student in her late twenties by the name of Tessa Dick pulled up at an intersection in the community of El Modena in California’s Orange. Tessa is the fifth ex-wife of the renowned novelist and science-fiction writer Philip K. Dick, who had passed away earlier that same year on March 2nd due to a stroke. She sat, waiting for the light to change. Her car did not have air conditioning, and so she had rolled the window down to get some fresh air. What happened next was truly bizarre, and Tessa wrote to a paranormal investigator called Linda Godfrey about it thanks to a connection made between them by Michael Mott, the co-host of ‘Unravelling the Secrets’ - a weekly online conspiracy theory radio show on which Tessa had recently appeared as a guest. This is how the event played out according to Tessa:

‘*A black limousine pulled up to my car, and the rear window went down. I saw a beautiful black German shepherd sitting there, in the back seat of the limousine, next to the open window. I could see the dog’s head but not his body. I was looking at the dog and smiling, and the dog was smiling back at me. He looked intelligent, and he was clean and well groomed. I thought that the owner of the limousine simply had a very beautiful dog. Somehow, without knowing how or why, I simply knew that the dog was male.*

But then, just before the light turned green, the dog casually put his arm on the window ledge, and he had a hand. My jaw dropped and the dog smirked. I thought he was chuckling, pleased with himself that he had shocked me by showing me his hand. It looked like a human hand with fingernails, well-manicured and coal-black skin like his hair. His arm had short black hair like the hair on a dog’s front leg, but his hand was hairless. And the arm had an elbow and shoulder like a human elbow and shoulder.

The light turned green and we both drove away. I never saw that limousine or the dog again. I tried to find some kind of ape or monkey with a face like that, but no such animal exists. And of course dogs don’t have human hands. So what did I see? Now I think that the dog owned the limousine, rather than being the pet of a human.*’*

After hearing this story, Linda Godfrey asked Tessa if she had noticed any clothing or perhaps a wristwatch on the creature, but the answer was no - not even a dog collar. Interestingly, Tessa apparently didn’t feel frightened, only ‘shocked and curious’. She was especially dumbstruck that such a creature would appear in a city and would be riding in a car, rather than roaming the wilds somewhere far from civilisation. The city of Orange is flanked by Santiago Oaks Regional Park, Irvine Lake, the Cleveland National Forest and the Santa Ana Mountains, meaning that the phantasmagorical furry (sorry I just couldn’t help myself) would’ve had plenty of places to go.

Apparently the sighting felt both personal and intentional to Tessa, as would probably be inferable from the deliberate nature of the anomalous entity’s behaviour - such as waiting to reveal its arm and then smirking at Tessa’s shock. ‘*I have always thought that the sighting was meant specifically for me… but I don’t know whether to take it as a gift or a threat*’.

## 'I Wonder Out Loud If All Of Us Are Real'

Tessa also says that she wishes she could have told her husband about it before he died. Linda, upon interviewing Tessa, certainly agreed that he would’ve enjoyed the story. A 1991 New York Times book review of the man’s biography quoted him as musing ‘*In my writing I even question the universe. I wonder out loud if it is real, and I wonder out loud if all of us are real*’. Amusingly, Linda remarked that this is a valid question, ‘*especially if some of us are wolves with hands*’.