Colour My Shadow

Chapter One - Shadow

Trying to teach chess to a Shadow is difficult.

Not my shadow, a Shadow. i.e., one of the scarily 3D grey figures - smooth, grey humanoid figures - that I see, but no one else seems to react to. It's like, an imaginary friend. But... I know they're real. They've got to be, I'm fourteen, nearly fifteen, not five, and I'm definitely not crazy. Not in that sense, at least - give me sugar, or Boost... well, it's your head.

Anyway, Shadows. I can't really describe them. They don't seem to have any features -  at least not when I remember them. I guess thinking back on their faces is like trying to remember a dream, you can't remember whether that detail is the dream, or your imagination filling in the gaps. As far as I can tell, they're more like an outline filled in with solid colour - well, solid grey, I guess.

If I had made them up, I wouldn't have made them grey. They'd be colourful, rainbows, like my drawing, because colour is life. Grey is bleak and soulless. Black? I can handle black. It's good for outlines, and you need black. It's a colour that goes with everything else, and nothing. Grey? Nothing will ever go with grey, it just sucks the colours from its surroundings.

The Shadows. They don't like the cold. They can stand it, sure, but, especially when its cold, they won't step outside. They get easily confused, like earlier, when I tried to explain what a rook was for. But I just sighed and packed the game away. I needed to leave for school, and he faded, recognising the dismissal.

Rosa

Well, for a first diary entry, that was pretty failed. At least if anyone saw it, I could pretend it was... a story, or something. I could hardly say it was the truth.

I slid the journal into the pocket of the overcoat. It was grubby, long, and definitely not in fashion. It was warm though. Good for sitting aimlessly on a wall to escape imaginary friends who didn't like the cold. They usually didn't annoy me - but then again I usually didn't have a splitting headache.

One lone Shadow, braving the cold, slipped outside. I was surprised; after early November and before late April, they usually wouldn't come outside. There it was again. Usually. I saw a shimmer in the air - like a cloth, thrown around his shoulders... a cloak? I usually... dammit.

 He jumped up on the wall beside me, tilting his head; he began to mouth words at me before I shook my head at him. His head dropped, disappointed, and I realised where I'd seen the gesture before. He was the Shadow I had tried to teach chess to. 

I looked up and down the street. There was no one within earshot, but I lowered my voice anyway. People tend to develop supersonic hearing when you are talking to yourself.

"Hello," I smiled at the Shadow. "what are you doing out here? None of you seem to like the cold."

He shrugged, pointed to me, and shrugged again. I frowned. You have to be good at charades to talk to Shadows; they have to mime if they want to communicate. I guessed that meant he wanted to be here, with me, even if it meant being outside. Or maybe he wanted a chess rematch. I smiled at the thought.

He shivered, and hunched his shoulders pathetically, huddling up to me. "Oh, come on! If you're cold, you should have stayed inside." He looked up at me; although I was sure, if he stood, he'd be taller than me, he was curled in on himself and looked miniscule. "All right then." As soon as he was near enough, I shuffled my arms out of my coat and swung it round his shoulders.

It was cold- sorry, freezing- and I was shivering not long after I'd given the coat to the Shadow. It was kinda ironic - give a jacket to someone who's cold, get cold yourself. I hopped off the wall. No point being out here, cold.