Chasing Colour

“It’s aspirational,” she said, about my name. “Having you made me feel like everything was vivid again. Like I could see beyond the two-toned, monochrome world we live in and glimpse just a bit of the richness I could see before.” 

She meant that literally. 

Ever since the virus that had swept around the world 30 years ago, everyone (and their offspring) had lost the ability to see more than black and white.

Yep, an entire world of colour blind people. Or at least that’s the short-hand description. 

In more detail, it’s something to do with a genetic mutation in the retinol tissues that disrupts the signals being sent to the part of the brain that processes visual imagery.

Or something like that. 

But straight up, no one’s seen a colour in 30 years. 

Except, of course, if they’ve seen me. 

Yeah, that’s right. My Mom’s the “genius” who decided to name me “Colour,” in a black and white world.

I don't know, maybe she thought she was being humorous. Or cool. Or worse, clever. 

But naming me after something that's basically gone extinct has prompted a lot of awkwardness for me. 

Like when I’m in Starbucks and the lady behind the till asks for my name for the order. And I tell her, “Colour.” And she giggles politely and then looks up at me, waiting for me to give my real name. 

And when I say, “No, no, it’s actually Colour.” She looks at me with a strange mix of confusion and wariness and then types the name so slowly you think she’s never spelled the word before. Or doesn’t trust that the computer will even accept the entry.

And then most of the time, when my drink’s ready, the barista squints at the drink label, makes a disgruntled face, and then just calls out, “Iced Oat Matcha.” Then leaves the drink on the very edge of the counter, away from all the other drinks. Presumably, so it won’t contaminate them with it’s weirdness? 

Or worse, when I go to the community centre and some old retiree is working the membership desk. And my name comes up when they scan my membership card. And then they get this glazed over look in their eye that undoubtedly means the next words out of their mouth are something like, “Ah, colour. I remember it well. You know, back in my day…” 

And then they’ll proceed to tell me a story about when a colour “just dazzled them” or “was so bold, they couldn’t believe he’d worn that to his cousin’s wedding.” Like I get what they're talking about. Even though I’ve never seen a colour in my life. 

But, you know, all this would be fine. I’ve been dealing with it for 16 years. 

Except that thing happened last month. 

And now I’m starting to think that maybe the weirdness of my name is starting to seep into me. Like being called “Colour” for so long has made my brain so obsessed with what one is, that I’m starting to think I see them.

Like, I think I saw a colour.

I can’t be sure. 

It was night. And I was with Tito and he smokes a lot of pot. So sometimes I think I can get a contact high just from being around him. Even if he’s not smoking.

But we were looking up at the sky. Like at the stars or whatever. And we were trying to count how many we could see in one small section by making a rectangle with our fingers and holding them up to sky. 

Because that night, it was really dark. And we were out at the park; the part where there are no street lights. So when you looked up, it seemed like there were 100,000 stars in each square inch of sky. 

And I was staring at them, all mesmerized and stuff. And that’s when things changed.

Well, not everything. 

But that’s when I noticed it. The sky part, started to look different. Like it still looked black, but there was something else too. Something deeper, maybe richer about it. Like it was made up of something that wasn’t just black. More alive, brighter even. 

Now I know what you’re saying, is "blacker" really a colour? 

But I’m telling you there was something different about it. 

Like someone turned up the volume on it. Like how with caramel, it’s really sweet and delicious and everything. But if you put a bit of salt on that thing, it becomes next level. Like you can taste the caramel more. 

That’s what I’m talking about. 

Anyway, I tried to tell Tito about it. To see if he was seeing the same thing. But he just started laughing and said, “Yo dude, I see colours all the time. Like when I’m in the garage smoking with my uncle Willy…” But that’s when I stopped listening, because uncle Willy puts some weird shit in his pot and you can never trust what comes out of Tito’s mouth after he begins a story like that.

But when I got home, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. 

My mind kept turning it over. Because it wasn’t just like something I saw with my eyes. It gave me like, a feeling. Something new and tingly. 

So I began Googling people who’ve claimed they’ve seen colours, just to check if this was all ok. But that only brought me to a bunch of weird TikTok videos that involved some guy talking in really fast whispers about government coverups and watermelon cleanse diets in what looked like his grandma’s basement. 

And I didn’t want to end up like that. So I tried to stop thinking about it. 

But I couldn’t stop. Not the next day. Or the next. Or the day after that. 

And I was beginning to do strange things. 

Like I’d find myself staring out the window during math class. Watching a bird hop from branch to branch on a tree in the courtyard. Just fascinated by how it could land on the branch so lightly that the branch wouldn’t even move. Like how did birds get so light?

Or at lunch when we were sitting out on the grass, I'd be staring so intently at every single blade. Noticing how the sun would catch right on the tip. Almost like a little ball of fire. So when you looked at a bunch of blades together, it was like looking at a bunch of lanterns all being held up by tiny grass rods. 

Stuff like that. 

Finally, I cracked and told my Mom. 

Because like, what else was I supposed to do? 

She was sitting there on the couch reading a very her book. One titled something like, “Visions of Near Forgotten Future: 5th Edition.” 

And when I told her about the night in the park, about the stars and the sky, she looked up at me with a tiny little frown on her face. And then she stared at me for a moment and slowly took off her glasses. 

“And you were with Tito?” she said. 

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, but not like that. We weren’t doing anything.”

She squinted a little. Like she was trying to remember something, then said, “Well, how did it make you feel? When you saw this thing you saw?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Like, confused at first. Like, ‘how is this possible?’ But then curious, I guess. And maybe excited? Like it was so cool and so amazing to look at that I didn’t want to look away. Like the more I looked, the more and more detail I could see. And that made me even more excited. And that made me want to look even more.”

“Hmmm,” she said. “Like wonder.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Well,” she said. “Sounds like colour to me.”

“But do you think I’m going crazy? I can’t stop thinking about it. I keep staring at stuff, like I’m waiting for it to, I don’t know, show me something again.”

She stared at me again with that scrunched up frown on her face. Then she smiled and leaned forward. 

“No. I think you’re just like the rest of us,” she said. “Chasing colour in a black and white world.”

And I knew she was trying to tell me something. Like she was saying something without really saying it. 

But I didn’t understand it. 

So I just said, “Wait, what do you mean? Are you talking about me? Or what I saw?”

“Huh” she said. 

And she looked off into the distance for a minute. 

Then smiled to herself, “Works both ways.”

And she picked up her book and started reading again.

...

So that’s where I’m at. Chasing colour, I guess. 

And it’s funny because I can’t stop thinking about this thing Tito said that night. Right when we were leaving the park. 

“Hey, you’re name’s Colour.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m aware.”

“No, like you said you saw colour up there. Like, you’re colour too. So it’s kind of like you’re looking up at yourself.”

And I thought it was just the pot talking. 

But now I don’t know.

Hmm.

Colour.