The Devil's Color is White

     Originally written on February 15th 2013


     There was once a town, where everything was white. The houses, the schools, the grass, the flowers, the clothes, everything. White was pure, clean, pristine. White was beautiful. White was Right. No one questioned this rule, as children grew up seeing white on their parents and the parents grew old seeing white on their parents. It was engraved, it was accepted and it was expected.

     And yet, the day came when a foreigner arrived. He was a traveller, looking for a place to settle down. He came in a red car, wearing a blue shirt and brown pants. He slung a bright orange backpack on his back and his slippers were neon green. 

   “Ugly!”

   “Hideous!”

   “Disgusting!”

     The locals voiced their confusion and disgust. They were shocked, horrified and afraid. This man was nothing they had ever seen before, different.

     The traveller, unaware of how his vibrant colours were somehow defiling the beauty of white, walked into a nearby inn. He stood at the counter, a sharp contrast to the pure white surrounding and asked for a room. The innkeeper wrinkled her nose in disgust and showed him the way out.

   “No coloured man will defile the whites of my inn. There is no place for tainted people here!”

     He walked out, confused and deeply saddened. Was it so bad that he was different? Was his colours Wrong? Was it a sin to be different? Maybe he needed some white clothes, a white pair of slippers, a white backpack. He needed to blend in, to belong. To be one of them.

    Suddenly, a spark ignited. Maybe there were others like him? Or maybe someone who didn’t mind his colourful ensemble? Those who would accept him for what he was, an individual.

     So, he wandered the streets, knocking on white doors, asking for a family to accept him, in exchange for some different colours that he considered beautiful. His optimism backfired. The nicer ones politely declined while some shut their doors to his face. And the ones so unwaveringly devoted to their pure and beautiful white threw white paint, water and even acid on his face and clothes, screaming words filled with hatred and malice. He would run from them, his spark of hope slowly dying each time it happened.

      One day, as he was sitting under a tree, nursing his fingers, bleeding from scorching acid thrown at him a few seconds ago, a little boy came to the traveller, carrying a white puppy with him.

   “Would you like to touch it, Mister?” the boy asked, flashing an innocent smile. The traveller smiled as brightly as he could, and stretched his bleeding fingers towards the beautiful, white pup. A drop of crimson blood fell on its ears and staining its fur. The boy gasped, not from horror, but from surprise, as the red on his puppy was something he had never seen before. It enthralled him. The traveller smiled sadly. At least a child could find wonder in his foreignness, he thought. Will acceptance come soon after? He played with the boy and his puppy, his spark of hope growing into a small fire. When he finally closed his eyes to sleep that day, the fire was burning slowly, but firmly. Orange flames dancing in his mind’s eye.

     When he opened his eyes later, the sight that greeted him was one of pure terror and heartbreak. A mangled lump of white smeared with red lay in front of him, remnants of what became of the little puppy. The white puppy he tainted red. Before his mind could even respond to the terror in front of him, he felt a sharp thud at the back of his head and hot liquid ran down his head and into his eyes giving him the visions of a bleeding red. As his knees, palms and finally his cheeks touched the ground, he heard them.

   “We knocked out the coloured man! He’s unconscious!”

   “Carry him to the town hall! We’ll burn him there for everyone to see. That’ll teach him for tainting my son and the dog with his ugly colour!”

     Ugly. Tainted. That was what he was to them. And as his consciousness began to drift away, he wondered about the pure, pristine and ever so beautiful white and how the white that everyone else idolized was the one he would forever deem the Devil’s colour.