The Child with the Wrong Colour Clothes

Once upon a time, not so long ago, there was a village way up in the mountains.

In this town a baby’s first birthday was a special occasion. Everyone in the village would join the baby’s parents in a grand feast. They would sing joyous songs and dance furious dances before the parents revealed the baby’s clothes.

It was a very important moment for the village and its people. Because the Colour of the clothes, would be the Colour the child would wear its entire life.

Either Red or Blue.

Everybody in the village was working in a mine. This mine had all sorts of valuable and beautiful gems and the villagers would dig them up, clean them and cut them into elegant shapes. Everyone in the country had heard of their beautiful gems and the villagers were very proud of this, indeed.

The Reds were working in the mine. They were good at digging tunnels and sniffing out the finest of gems. They had a remarkable sense of smell and well-built, strong arms. It was said that they could smell a diamond buried a mile underneath them and dig it up in less than an hour.

The Blues were working at the workshops. They would take the rough stones and turn them into the loveliest of jewels. They would clean them and cut them, bringing out their hidden beauty. It was said that they could spot a single molecule of dust on a gem and they could draw the most intricate of designs with just one line.

In this little village lived a boy named San. At his first birthday his parents announced that he was a Blue.

San was kind and smart. A happy child, indeed. Always smiling.

 But the more he grew up, the more odd his clothes looked to him.

“Mom” he asked one day “why are you dressing me in Blue?”

“What do you mean, San?” his mother seemed startled and fidgety. “You are a Blue, like me.” She looked to the ground, tying San’s shoes. “You were born this way. Like all children are either Blue or Red.”

San wasn’t satisfied with this answer, but kept it to himself. His mother looked too uncomfortable to keep asking about it.

He tried to ask his father next.

“You are a Blue because your sight is so good.” his Red father frowned. “Much better than mine.”

“But, dad… what if I like to sniff out stones, like you?” San asked.

“Don’t be ridiculous.” his father cut him off. “Blues have elegant, refined hands and you are a Blue.” He pointed at San’s hands before going back to his newspaper.

After than San was too embarrassed to ask. He understood what he was told, but he couldn’t quite feel it.

He wasn’t smiling to his parents, like he did before.

Whenever he looked in the mirror, he would flinch. He thought that his clothes made him look as pale as a ghost. He felt uncomfortable and itchy every time he wore them, but he tried not to show. If he was not wearing Blue, then what could he possibly wear after all?

When San went to school, during his gem crafting classes, he would often peak out the window. That day the Red children were having their Sniffing lessons. They all looked radiant with their Red clothes and their hands were wide and sturdy. He looked down on his own scrawny hands.

‘They look so weird’ he thought to himself and closed his fist. He managed another glance towards the Reds.

‘How nice it would be to smell the ground’ he took a deep breath.

As soon as he heard himself inhaling, he realized what he was doing. He abruptly lowered his head and covered his nose and mouth with his skinny hands. ‘Oh no, the others will hear me’ he started to sweat.

“Everything ok, San?” the teacher interrupted the class and turned to him.

‘Oh no, no, no’ he almost cried. “Sorry, teacher I… uhm…swallowed a sneeze.”

The other children giggled, but the teacher seemed satisfied with this lie.

‘They almost caught me.’ he thought. ‘Why do I have to hide? It’s so unfair.’

He took another quick glance at the group outside, but quickly decided against it and turned back to his book. ‘Silly thoughts’ he closed his tiny fists again.

During recess he went and sat under the big tree as usual. He would always spend time there by himself. He didn’t feel like playing with the others. He used to have a lot of friends when he was younger. He used to be a cheerful child, until one day he noticed a friends clothes.

“Can I wear your jacket?”San had asked.

His friends looked at him puzzled “Of course not” they exclaimed after a moment of silence. “It’s Red and you are a Blue. You are not supposed to wear red.” they looked at him funny.

He remembered his parents and suddenly he couldn’t bear having his friends look at him like that.

“I was joking” he lied and laughed nervously.

From then on he never mentioned such things in front of others. But his clothes grew more uncomfortable day by day and he was afraid he couldn’t hide it anymore. So he decided to spend recess alone.

“Sorry, I need to study gem cutting” he would tell them as he was going to sit under the big tree, holding a book he didn’t intend to read.

His friends would nod and say “Wow, he’s such a diligent Blue. A true Blue!” and would let him be.

‘That’s for the best.’ he would think and try to read his book. But his mind always drifted away from the pages.

‘Would I look nice in red, I wonder?’ the thought would often pop in his head, before he caught himself and push it aside.

He was desperately trying to concentrate on his book that day as well, when he noticed two children coming towards him.

“Hi” the girl gave him a friendly wave as she stood in front of him. She was a Red in the same year as San. They hadn’t been introduced before. “My name is Ai.” Her black hair was up in a ponytail and her brown eyes almost sparkled. She had the typical strong built of a Red.

“And this is my brother Yu.” she continued pointing at the boy behind her. They looked alike. He too had black hair and brown eyes. But contrary to his confident sister, he looked timid and meek. He was much younger than Ai and San. At least five years. He was hiding behind Ai, holding the end of her sleeve and glancing shyly at San. He was a Red as well.

“He is in year One, so he’s a little shy.” she grinned from ear to ear. She looked very tall, as she was towering above San.

“Can I help you?” San asked a little stunned. Nobody had come to talk to him for a while.

“I saw you looking at us from the window during class…” Ai’s words made San freeze. “…and I was wondering if you’d like to hang out with us.”

She sounded friendly, but San could feel cold drops of sweat running down his back.

“Well, I.. ”he swallowed and took a deep breath “I was… sort of reading this book…”

“Then we’ll sit here with you!” Ai interrupted him, swiftly taking a seat under the big tree. Both San and Yu were staring at her unsure of what to do next. “We’ll have lunch here. Is that ok?” she grinned again.

From that day on Ai would show up at the tree for lunch, with Yu always at her side. It took a while for San to get used to them. He didn’t want people to know his secret thoughts. Not at all.

But Ai was carefree and kind as she was loud and funny. So not before long, they became friends. They would chat about their favourite trees and laugh about their mischievous pets.

“Say, San?” Ai asked him during one of their lunches a few months after their first meeting. She was stuffing a big piece of bread in her mouth “Have you made plans for our practicals next month?”

“Oh” San was caught off guard. Every summer after grade 6 Six they had do a month long practical in the mines. “No, I haven’t made any arrangements yet.” he wasn’t particularly keen on going after all. He was trying so hard to keep up with being a Blue, that he was constantly exhausted.

“Do you want to go to the same mine as me?” she suggested slamming her hand on the ground. She was obviously very excited about that possibility. “I know one that has a workshop too!”

“Let’s see after we take our summer exams.” San avoided to give an answer.

“I’m sure you’ll like working with me. It will be fun.” she seemed to have made up her mind already.”Would you have to clean and cut gems?” suddenly she sounded more serious. “I’d like to do that too. I bet I would be very good at it.” she added taking another bite of bread. She said it quite casually, but she narrowed her eyes a bit looking. However, San was too shocked to notice.

“But you are a Red.” he said almost instinctively. “How could you do these things? Your hands are too wide and clumsy to work in such a fine detail and you don’t have an eye for these things.” His voice sounded a bit too stern perhaps, but he couldn’t help it. He was feeling annoying for some reason.

“That is nonsense.” Ai stated with a serious and clear voice. It pierced right through San. For a second he couldn’t find an appropriate response. ‘But everyone says otherwise’ his mind screamed. But Ai spoke before his mouth could do the same.

“You should be able to do whatever you like. Yu here likes both digging gems and crafting them into beautiful shapes.” Her tone relaxed as she petted the younger boy. He smiled in return.

“I do like them both!” the child exclaimed happily. He seemed oddly unlike his usual timid self. “Smelling gems and digging is fun, but so is cutting them and turning them into jewels!”

“But…” San was about to say how he couldn’t possibly do both, but Ai’s intense look stopped him. He simply got up, his book in hand. “I need to go to the library for the exam. I will be busy studying for next week. See you guys later.”

And with that he left. How could they say such things? They aren’t possible, he though, that’s not how the world works.

He went back in his classroom and sat on his desk.

“Were you hanging out with those Reds again?” the other Blues teased him.

“We were just arranging our practicals.” San mumbled looking at his hands.

“You are being weird sometimes.” he heard the others say but he pretended he didn’t listen. He went back to trying to read his book. The scent of rubies and jade came back to his mind, but he pushed them away once again.

The day of the exams he was feeling sick to his stomach, but he tried not to show. He had studied all there was to study and he had done all the exercises. But he still felt a sense of dread every time he tried to revise. Like the words on the page were going to suffocate him or the small cutting tools were going to slice his head open.

“Congratulations, San!” the teacher told him the day he gave him his results, but San didn’t smile. He did what he was supposed to do, yet it all felt wrong somehow. He felt dizzy in the classroom with all the other Blues celebrating. His clothes felt itchier than ever. He excused himself and went to the toilet.

He turned on the faucet and splashed a bit of water on his face. He then looked himself in the mirror.

‘I look so horrible in Blue. I look like a ghost.’ he thought and closed his eyes.

When he opened them again Ai was standing behind him. He turned around startled.

“What…”

“I am going to go for a walk after school.” she cut him off like always. “Come with me?” she asked, but it sounded more like an order.

San was confused. He assumed Ai would ask him about his grades.

“Uhm… Well…” he began to mutter, but Ai spoke over him yet again.

“I’ll wait for you after school!” And with that she ran off. San was left to stare at her back, speechless.

‘At least it might be a good distraction.’ he decided.

When he finished class, Ai was already at the school gate waiting for him. She was alone.

“Where is Yu?” San asked her. He realized that was the only day he had seen her without her brother.

“He already went home.” she responded somewhat solemnly. “I thought we might talk alone.”

“Hm?” her answer left San even more puzzled, but he didn’t say anything. Ai started walking and Yu quietly followed her.

‘Talk? About what?’ he wondered.

“San?” they had already passed the last houses of the village before Ai broke the silence. “Do you sometimes think that maybe our Colours are wrong?”

San stopped dead in his tracks. Ai turned to face him, her voice steady and clear.

“I mean, what if you are a Red, but you like Blue better? Why would you have to keep wearing Red just because it was decided by someone else before you could even talk?”

San tried to master the power to say something as Ai continued.

“Or what if you want to wear a different colour all together? There are so many of them after all. Why do we have to limit ourselves like that?”

San glanced at the ground “But that’s how we must be for the village to prosper.” He clenched his fists. They felt smaller than ever. “And even if you want to change, a Red would look so odd in Blue with their wide hands. How would they even be able to do the fine cutting? And a Blue in Red? They would look so strange with their slim arms. How could they possibly dig up gems?”

Tears formed in San’s eyes, as Ai gazed pierced through him. She took his hand in hers.

“If I tried to do the cutting do you think I wouldn’t be able to make a fine shape?”she asked. San lowered his gaze and remembered the time Ai had made a tiny bear out of wood. The detail in its ears and nose was the best out of any woodcarving his Blue friends had ever made.

“Do you think my eyes or my hands wouldn’t be able to make it?”Ai looked at him straight in the eyes. San thought of all his classmates that were wearing glasses. Ai’s sight was probably better than theirs.

San looked back at her. ‘She is so determined.’ he thought.

“I think you can make it.” he finally answered. He tried to mimic Ai’s resolve, but his voice trembled a bit. “But it will be difficult. The other villagers won’t like people randomly switching clothes and jobs. What if they look at you strange, talk behind your back or even start calling you names?”

San was so scared he was now trembling. But Ai smiled and gripped his hand tighter.

“It will be scary the first time, for the first people. But gradually the village will get used to it.” She looked up in the sky. “If I need to fight now, so that my brother can live happy later then it’s worth it.”

San finally understood. He understood why Ai had approached him with Yu that day under the big tree.

San was scared, but he was not alone.

He wanted to run, but he squeezed Ai’s hand back instead.

Ai turned back to him.

“Do you want to do our practical together?” she asked with a warm smile.

“Yes!” San smiled too.

A few weeks later they both arrived in the mines. They had met up earlier in a nearby abandoned house. San gave Ai his Blue clothes and Ai gave him her Red ones.

When San first saw Ai in Blue he thought she looked a bit strange in them. Her arms were too muscular arms and her shoulders too sturdy. But once she turned to look at him San saw her eyes. He had never seen Ai’s eyes shining like that before. She was beautiful.

“You look so nice, San! Look!” Ai pointed at an old mirror.

San turned to the mirror and saw his own reflection. It was dusty, but he had never seen himself clearer before. His arms were too thin compared to the other Reds, but it still didn’t feel wrong. He was beautiful.

“Let’s go!” he grinned back to Ai.

They walked into the mine holding hands.

The story about the strange boy and the strange girl who changed Colours is widely known these days. People from the village and beyond still talk about their struggles and their persistence. And all of them agree that they looked happier in their true Colours.

What became of them is unknown, but it is said that there are two precious jewels that have their names. The most beautiful and beloved treasures the village had ever produced. The jewels called “Ai” and “San” are still kept in the house of the greatest craftsman and digger the village has ever seen. A man who could sniff gems hidden miles away and then cut them into the most glorious of sculptures. A man in Purple named Yu.