Grey

I have this light beside my bed that changes colour; I watch it from time to time, making its way through the selection of lights inside it, never settling on one, never giving any hint that it is sick of changing its colour over and over. It unsettles me, I think, to see an inanimate object mirror so succinctly my own existence. Who was this light, an insiginificant thing that I owned, to force me to face myself? Why was it here that I had to find my own reflection? An object of trickery, changing its skin to show you what you wanted, to be all things to all people, to always be able to show them their favourite colour. Why did I have to be this light?

But the real trouble came after, when I was sick of the mocking glow of its soft light and I switched the thing off, feeling powerful. Why hadn't I just let it glow? The sad truth that met me in the absence of its light was enough to knock the wind out of me: underneath its changing pallor, the light was grey.