In The World Of Shadows

“Today we will learn about shadows. I know, I know, you all have been wondering, what are they, why do we only see them at night and oh-so-many other questions that are in your mind will be solved right now.”

The class quietened up. They had always wanted to know about the fascinating, cool but weird, and sometimes irritating shadows. 

“Close your books. It is going to be an interactive lesson today. Good. Now come on out in a single line. Remember, SINGLE LINE!”

The class gets excited and haphazardly runs off. The teacher, Ms Wright sighed. Now there was just one thing to do.

Ding-Ding Ding Dong

The PA bell echoes through the school and all the classes are quiet as a mouse, trying to listen to the announcement, anticipating which of them is going to be called to the Principal. Everyone is pinpointing the naughtiest person in class in their heads. 

“Good afternoon everyone! Sorry for the disturbance. All students of grade ‘6-Scientists’ are requested to reach room 313 immediately.”

6-Scientists is baffled. Now the whole school knows that they are going to be punished. Perfect!

Once the class comes back in, Ms Wright says, “I was going to make it an interesting lesson, unlike other teachers. Now you leave me no choice except to go back to the normal BORING way of teaching. No problem. This was your choice AND as a punishment, you all will be required to prepare for a surprise test on ANY of the topics we have done in the year so far TOMORROW. Now open up page 56 of your books.”

Groaning, slightly shouting at themselves for their mistake, class 6-Scientists do as they are told and get ready for the ‘boring lesson’. After half an hour of listening to Ms Wright, the class gets overjoyed to hear the bell ring. 

“Okay class, to sum it up, shadows are made when the path of light is obstructed by an opaque or sometimes a translucent object. I hope you will be ready for tomorrow’s test. Have a nice day!”

Eric, the brightest student in the class was pondering about shadows when he reached home. He realized something, Ms Wright had told them everything about shadows, but she had missed the point when she had to tell them about the weird lights that the shadows had. Now, dear reader, Eric wasn’t a normal person like you and me. He didn’t know what were colours. He didn’t know what was blue, green or even yellow. He just knew the world as your parents, or probably your grandparents, knew the film world when they were waddling like a little toddler – black and white. For Eric, the Sun was white, the soot of the chimney was black and everything else was a unique shade of grey. But when he saw the shadows, so colourful, so beautiful, he was mesmerized. 

You must be thinking, dear reader, that I am talking only about Eric. No. His whole world saw the ‘colours’ in the same way as he did. And they were satisfied.

Unlike, OUR shadows, their shadows were all colourful, each reflecting the inner mood of the person. A calm being, like a rabbit, had a blue shadow, while someone ferocious, like a lion, had a deep, tomato red shadow.

Eric called up his teacher and asked her, “Ms Wright, I forgot to ask in the class, why are shadows with so many ‘lights’? I don’t understand why these lights are not there in our normal world?”

“Eric, dear, it is true that I didn’t tell you about the lights. Well, firstly, they are not ‘lights’, they are colours. You know, like we have black and white, there are many more colours. Now have you seen the shadow of a newborn baby?”

“Yes.”

“The colour that you see from its shadow, is called YELLOW. It represents that the baby is happy and cheerful. When the baby is sad, the colour changes to brown and when it is irritated, it becomes purple.”

“How many colours are there?”

“Eric, there are innumerable colours. As many as you can think of, probably even more than that. Remember, whatever I have told you today is something that is beyond the scope of your books or even the books of any of your seniors in school. This is something that my family and I have been working on and what we have discovered till now. You must not discuss it with anyone else.”

“Sure, ma’am. Thank you for sharing all this with me.” Eric disconnected the phone, satisfied with Ms Wright’s answer and ready to think more about the colours.

A FEW YEARS LATER

“Eric, where have you been? We have been looking for you all over the house, we were about to call the neighbours.” Eric’s mom, Jenny embraced him in a hug and then resumed the interrogation.

“Mom! I was in the park on the corner of the street. I just went there for a walk. See? I even messaged you?” 

Jenny was surprised. Just a few seconds ago, there were no notifications on her phone but sure enough, Eric had messaged her.

Eric had gone to visit the park every day. It was like an escape for him. An escape from his world. He felt that her could do anything there, he could be himself, he could dance if he wanted to (if ever he could). And he could sing his heart out (again if he could sing). All of a sudden, he remembers his conversation with his 6th-grade teacher, Ms Wright. He remembers her telling him that there were colours and the colours held an unknown mystery. Eric was spellbound again. He went into thoughts so deep that the Mariana Trench would have to be scaled twice to reach his level. That was the reason why he was late home.

Dear reader, I hope you’re not getting bored? If you are, just read on, you know, the deeper you dig into a story, the better you know and understand it.

A FEW MORE YEARS LATER 

Eric was now a man. He was 22 years old and was about to get a job. Oh! Sorry, I forgot to tell you all, in Eric’s world, there were just a few jobs – the regular job (one which most of the people got), and the irregular (things like a teacher, doctor and all that).

Eric was someone who wanted to explore both these areas, so he had decided to start with the irregular job. Unfortunately (as a blessing in disguise) Eric got the regular job because of excessive participation in the irregular ones.

On his first day, everything he knew, everything he wanted to know, basically his whole world WAS CHANGED.

I will not go on to describe his job and his first day, but yes, I will show you his job description:

JOB DESCRIPTION FOR A SHADOW:

SHADOW NAME: Eric

PERSON’S NAME: Eric Mathew

RULES:

1. Never talk to people.

2. Always impersonate the person you are assigned to.

3. Never show any emotions.

4. Elongate/Shorten yourself according to the surroundings of your person

NOTE: Anyshadow who doesn’t follow these rules will be tried in the Shadow Court and WILL be punished. All rights of punishments are reserved by humans. Any violation of the Protocols as per Shadow Act 0000 B.C.E. will result in the total anhelation of the Shadow realm by humans.

Thank you, dear reader, for reading the story of the person, Eric, who changed the relationship of the Shadows with the Humans. I will now take your leave.