Shifting Colors

When I was little, the world was full of color. I remember the colors more than anything. More than the shapes, or even the feelings that came from these memories. The colors were the feelings. They were the memories. I could name these colors, but doing so would steal from the power they hold. I could describe them, but to be honest, I don’t think you’d understand. 

It’s okay, really, I don’t expect you to. You’re only human, after all. The human who understood left this place a long time ago, and I don’t blame her. But I do miss her. When she left, the colors faded. Sadness can do that to someone, I’ve learned. But I suppose that if you can hear me out, I can try to explain just how powerful color can be. It saved me, perhaps it can save her too. 

The day I met her, the room was very bright. Was it always that bright? Well, that day it was. I was playing amongst my siblings, my mother staring at me from across the room. It was an emotionless stare, one often associated with our kind. My brother scratched my nose, catching it as he swiped at the toy beneath my paws. I gave him a stern glare, another of our prize-winning expressions, and he scampered away. 

The large door opened, revealing more light. My siblings, all 5 of them, scuttled underneath the platform that people tend to sit on. A chair, I think it’s called. I started to join them, but a sweet smell caught my attention. Not a food smell, but… different. Were there even other smells? I guess so. Curious, I turned, peeking my head out from under the chair, and saw a tiny human. Wait, can humans get that small? Mother said she saw a small human once, but I didn’t think they’d be that small… This one was about half the height of the one behind her. 

She had long, wavy hair, with a face that had a grin so big, I thought it might touch her ears. Our kind has never been good at smiles. And those eyes… big and curious. She stepped into the room, radiating a light that was different from the ones overhead. It was warm, inviting. I was drawn to it. I stepped out from under the chair, towards the little girl. She smiled at me, then looked to the normal-sized human behind her, who nodded. Her grin grew as she turned back to me. I think it went past her ears. 

That day was White. The best, the brightest. 

I’m sitting in the light of a sunny window, sprawled out on the floor as she dangles a scrap of yarn over me, tickling my whiskers. My paws reach for it, lazily, the warmth of the sun lulling me into a sleepy kind of joy. Her smile is still there, big as ever. She’s missing a couple teeth now, and she’s a little taller, but she’s still my girl. 

I get bored of the string soon, and she picks me up, dancing over to the couch and putting me gently in her lap. I rattle my voice, a sign of affection, but soon I drift off to sleep in the light of the sun’s golden hour, in the lap of my little girl. This scene replays in my mind, and there have been many like it. I call those days Yellow. 

One day, I went outside. She often spent her days out there, but for some reason she didn’t let me come. Until now. She walked out, only she left the door open this time. She turned, looking at me expectantly, her familiar grin stretching across her face.

 I’m nervous. Why should I be nervous? I’ve been trying to bolt out this same door for months now! Slowly, I walk across the threshold, my paws meeting a gritty stone, then I see the spikes of grass. She’s standing in the middle of them. Shouldn’t that hurt? They looked kind of poky to me… Well, if she could do it, then so could I.

 I pawed at the spears first, jumping a little as I found that they were soft, and bent with the breeze. I stepped into the grass, then ran to catch up with my girl, who had walked to the middle of the patch with a blanket under her arm and a book in her hands. I rubbed up against her ankles as she draped her blanket across the spears, kneeling down, opening her book. I settled by her feet, enjoying the light breeze and the comforting sunlight. Her hair was covering her face a little, but I could still see the smile she had, the smile she saved for getting lost in a world of words. I never could understand those very well… Words, that is. They seem kind of boring to me, but if she likes them, then how bad can they be? 

I looked past her, to a large tree rustling with long, hanging branches, filled with green. They brushed the grass, combing it like my girl does with her hair in the mornings. It was beautiful. I heard some kind of tweeting, coming from the tree, so I left my girl to investigate. 

Stalking through the strips of grass, I saw what was causing the ruckus. A bird! I’ve seen these things before, but only through the window… but look, this one was so close! I climbed up the tree, jumping a good five feet to the lowest branch, but the stupid bird just flew away! Cheater. Sounds like a challenge then. 

Ten minutes later, I ran over to my girl to show her my prize, dropping it at her feet in triumph. She peeked up over her pages, then screamed. What was so scary about the bird? I took it back and brought it elsewhere. More for me, I guess. That day was Green, happy and full of life. Well, except for the bird. 

As the years passed, my girl got a little taller, a little quieter, she got some glasses and some new clothes, but she always kept her smile, and she always kept it only for me. She was mine, and I was hers, and that was all we needed. Well, I thought so, until Boy started coming over. 

Boy was this super tall dude who just showed up one day, and he stole all my smiles from her. I’m not even sure where he came from, and really, he was kinda smelly… but my girl liked him, so whatever. 

But there was this one day, I was sitting on the front porch on the steps, and Boy shows up in his big loud metal box, with a bunch of pink flowers in his hand. They looked like the same ones that grew in the backyard, in the big poky bush, but I don’t think that Boy was the brightest. Who knows, the backyard is probably where he got them. 

But he seemed all happy and such, he even said hi to me, which was weird. He was all smiley until he rang the doorbell, then he started to get all sweaty, and his hands fumbled with the flowers in his hand. I watched my girl come to the door from the window, and she looked all confused until she opened the door. Then she smiled. My smile! Rude.

 So Boy hands her the flowers, and then she takes them, and with her other hand she takes his, and they walk to his big noisy box and drive away. Wait… she left me? Is that even legal? Whatever. I’ll just catch some birds without her. 

I was in the second phase of the Stages of Grief, where I was in denial, pondering how she had the AUDACITY to just leave me like that, when stupid Boy’s stupid headlights came around the corner of our street, and then she was back. She was back! I ran up to them, meowing from the sidewalk as he opened the door for her. I turned to walk up the sidewalk with them, but I looked back and they weren’t following me. Oh, come on. 

They were still holding hands like a couple of weirdos, and they were smiling at each other. Then, after a moment, their smiles touched, and then they touched again, and- ew, gross. I walked back to the front door to wait for my girl to come to her senses and let me in.  

Too many minutes later, Boy’s headlights disappeared, and my girl came up the steps, smiling, her face the pinkest I’ve ever seen it, her hands clutching the bundle of flowers like it was a bird or something. She let me in, and giggled the whole time as she got ready for bed. That was Pink, one of my least favorite colors, although I guess it could be worse. At least she was smiling.

Well, Boy kept coming, and all of a sudden it felt like I was in second place, fighting this smelly guy for her affection. Come on, we all knew he wasn’t as cute as me… but she seemed to think otherwise. 

So a few months passed, but one day while I was waiting for Boy and my girl to come home, the headlights came around the corner faster than normal, and the box screeched to a stop. She stomped out of the car, slamming the door behind her. They were shouting at each other. Wait… that wasn’t supposed to happen. Nobody talks to my girl like that.

 I stalked down the driveway to talk some sense into him, but he drove away, my girl running to the front door with tears streaming down her face. And just like that, her smile was gone. Red, my actual least favorite color. 

For weeks after that, she didn’t do much. Didn’t see her friends, didn’t eat, and her smile left her. I wanted to help, but I didn’t know how. Stupid Boy! I could have told her he’d break her heart… 

Tears would fall down her face every night before she went to sleep. I would snuggle her, vibrating my voice in an attempt to comfort her, but something in me knew that I couldn’t replace him. Why? Why did he have to come and mess everything up? We were all we needed, just her and me. Why couldn’t that be enough? 

Months went by, and she didn’t get better. She started getting sick more often, started being moody around her family, she even snapped at me a couple times… those hurt the most. Blue. A time without smiles. 

By that point, a couple years had flown by, like a lazy bird who was too tired to go very high. Eventually, I think she had gotten over Boy, but something else was wrong. That was when I realized that all the color had left her. 

She would smile when people came to the door, but it was forced. She lost herself in books, in music, anything to distract her from living. She wasn’t there. She left me, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I brought her a mouse once, because I was too tired to find a bird. She smiled a little, but it wasn’t real. 

I stayed by her side through it all, and she would stroke my fur as silent tears fell down her cheeks. She wasn’t always sad, though… sometimes she would take up sewing or cooking, anything to fill the void, and sometimes it would work, but most of the time it wouldn’t. Gray. I didn’t think anything could be worse than Red, until now. 

And so the years passed, and I found that I was growing old. It hurt to wake up, it hurt to eat, and I spent most of my days lying in the sunny spot of her bed while she did schoolwork. The void was still there, but she seemed to be better at distracting herself from its demands. Snow fell on the ground outside. I wondered what snow would taste like, but I was too tired to find out. 

One night, my girl was looking at me, and I looked back. Here she was, all grown up. I’m so proud of her. She stayed strong through it all. She gave me a small smile, a little like the ones I used to know. But in her eyes, I saw… Well, I saw myself. My fur was gray, and my eyes were cloudy. I had a nick in my ear from that time the neighbor’s dog came over to play, and a scratch on my nose from my brother. That was so long ago… Age had caught up to me, just as it did to her, only she bore it better.

 Her eyes turned glossy then, and she picked me up, cradling me in my arms, and started weeping. I held her close, remembering the colors. White, yellow, green, pink, red, blue, gray… but now the colors were growing darker, and I knew that my time with her was up. What comes next? Is there anything after this? Black. 

Epilogue:

I can see. Why can I see? It was very bright, and I couldn’t make out any shapes at first. But then, my vision cleared, and blobs turned to shapes, shapes turning into something familiar. Is that… Is that my girl? She looks so grown up… but yes, that’s her. And she’s smiling. Oh, how I’ve missed that smile.

She’s with a man, and he’s grinning at her in a way that Boy never did. And in her arms is a small child, with another tiny human next to her, looking down at the baby. She looks at the little boy, then at the girl in her arms, and her smile is as wide as the day we met. Maybe wider. She’s happy… I close my eyes, finally allowing myself to rest after all these years as the colors blend together for the last time.