Little Tim

Once upon a time, in the beautiful town of Paintstopia lived a little boy named Tim. And though the town was full of colourful characters, the story is really about him.

In all of his seven years on earth, little Tim had never once learned to colour right. But, for all his callousness, he loved to colour. And the colours loved him back. Colours red, yellow, blue and those resulting from mixing those hues rejoiced as he scribbled and splashed, etched and daubed across the boring white page.

Boxes and boxes of crayons, tubes and bottles of paint, sketchpens and pastels, chalk and pencils, all complained. Being used without a purpose made them feel drained. Shapes and forms shuddered as they were erased with every brush stroke that he made. Desks and floors and walls all cried in vain.

But little Tim coloured on.

He coloured when he ate, he coloured when he played, he coloured when he could, and he coloured when he shouldn't. In fact, if he would paint you his dreams, you could bet, he coloured when he dreamed.

Teachers tried to correct him. His mother did too. But Little Tim wouldn't understand what to do. Why was he being asked to colour within the lines when he could have much more fun breaking the rules? 

A meeting was soon called in Paintstopia to find a way and it was unanimously agreed that Little Tim couldn't stay. He was far too rebellious for his own good. Why couldn't he colour with discipline as all little boys should? His mother cried and cried and his teacher pleaded, his friends tried and tried but the paints people didn't budge. 

He must be banished to the moon, they decided. He must never come back, they announced. Just like the colour thief, who, last year had been sentenced. Just like the colour chief who'd been mixing wrong colours. Away they must go, must go, must go.

And so the townspeople painted a rocket. They made it silver with red patches. To blend in yet stand out when it lands on the moon. And all of them agreed, it would be pretty soon.

Little Tim didn't know what going to the moon would mean. He was only worried about why his mother didn't want him to be seen. So he traded his clothes for a dark black cloth and hid in the shadows till he couldn't find himself too. 

But the treacherous moon shone full and bright, pouring a pail of white till it was all a murky gray. Little Tim must be sent away. 

The morning he was to be sent, didn't seem like a good day to go to the moon. Shouldn't he wait till until it was much after afternoon? But the townspeople voted no. Little Tim must go, must go, must go.

So little Tim wore his red suit with a yellow tie, shiny green boots and a blue hat and sped off away from the earth in a blaze of orange. Even as his town cheered, even as his mother wept.

By the time he reached the moon, it was sunny, and Little Tim had to put on his purple visors that made him look funny. But he wasn't aware of it as he fell down deep in a sea of silver and emerged as the tin man, leeched off all colour. 

He peered down below and wished he could see his mother, his school, his town, his friends. But all he saw was patches of green on blue and blue no end. He turned around and there was the sun, showing off its yellows and red. But all the silver around him, filled Little Tim with monotonous dread.

Soon it was night and dinner time and the black ate up the moon like an apple. 

Little Tim, with nothing to do, danced around on the silver platter, sloshing and splashing and running around. Soon the navy blue of the sky was filled with little Tim's footprints and fingerprints and silver angels. And the moon wasn't only full, it wasn't even round. 

But little Tim was too tired to see the damage he had done and so were the townspeople, who thought they had won. So all of them slept till the sun came scurrying up to wipe off all of little Tim's mistakes away. 

It all must have been a dream thought little Tim as the bright white of the day greeted him. He looked down again and this time he saw the world gift-wrapped by a rainbow ribbon. Oh, if only he could touch it, thought little Tim, as he reached his tiny hands out on a whim.

What happened next was magic, plain and old. Little Tim had caught the rainbow and found his pot of gold. 

With colours in his hands and the stark blue of the sky stretched out in front of him like a canvas, little Tim started working away as fast as he could. 

He picked the violet and splashed it with glee, mixing it with with the yellow with carefree abandon. He took the red and painted butterflies, and some indigo he borrowed for the flowers. The green recreated the grass he so loved so and with the blue he made water. And looking at all the orange that was left with him, he painted a million suns on the horizon.

The people of Paintstopia couldn't believe their eyes. How had they brought upon them the wrath of chameleon skies.

One by one, all of them lined up outside the pharmacy. Seeing weird colours could only mean they were loony.

The sky was a mess, it didn't make sense.

Only little Tim's mother stood outside and stared at the sky that looked more and more like her son's paintings that hung on the fridge, while Little Tim lay perched atop the invisible moon to stare at his artwork that would be wiped out by the next morning. 

The boy they had banished was going to colour the skies in every imaginable shade and tint thereafter.

Little Tim, meanwhile, lived happily ever after.