As a kid, I was often taken by Mum to Gran’s for a sojourn, on which I had great fun playing games with my cousin and other kids of the village. Oldest of the pack, I was made Queen.

One wintry day, the pack decided to build a fire to stay warm. A girl sneaked a lighter from the family kitchen, and a boy started a bonfire with it. As Monarch, I was in charge of the grand project, sending members of the pack to go and forage for firewood. There was no lack of it in the countryside in winter, grass, twigs and branches here and there. Seated by the crackling fire, stoking it with twigs and grass, I was basking both in the warmth of the blaze and in the glory of queenhood. The flame was leaping bigger and higher. I thought we were doing a great job.

My subjects kept working hard, lugging back more kindling. We felt on top of the world as if we had all become adults and were able to keep ourselves warm independently.

All of a sudden, with a loud “boom”, the blaze blew up. OMG! It was the first time I had been so close to a blast. My subjects, alarmed by the extraordinary commotion, all came rushing back to the scene, which petrified them. I was not scared, but I was just feeling terribly embarrassed. Queen of the pack, I was humiliated.

A boy went home and fetched a mirror. Looking in the glass, I found that I had blackened from head to toe and that my eyebrows and eyelashes were nowhere to be found. My cousin ran all the way home and alerted Mum. Instantly Mum, with our kith and kin on her heels, swarmed to the scene. They all burst into hysterical laughter while I was crying my heart out there.

Eventually, they took me to the village barber’s, where I had some of my burned hair shorn. Except for the tarnished image, I was all right otherwise.

Later on, we came back to the spot to investigate the cause of the accident. It turned out that the lighter had by chance dropped into the fire. The explosion had been triggered by the device. I hated lighters!

After that incident, I did not want to be Queen of the pack any more. I abdicated the throne and was succeeded by a boy, who became King of our pack. I did not envy him anyway. We were still having great fun frolicking together about the hamlet, even though the invisible crown was no longer up there on my head.