Marie pressed her nose to the cold, glass pane and looked at the snowflakes drifting past her window, oh, so lightly. All was white and looked a fairyland to her. What peace lay in the snow-covered trees and the white rooftops. Marie felt safe at such times, secure in her knowledge that she would not be ridiculed for not knowing her colours. White was truly beautiful.

From the time she could remember she knew herself to be so different from the others. Her world was different. They did not believe her when she pointed out the colours she could see. They laughed at her for being twelve and yet getting mixed up. She felt so alone.

It all started when she had been five, and her mother had asked her to get a spoonful of medicine from the red bottle on the window sill. She remembered, shuddering, her mother choking on the medicine and in a fit of delirium, screaming at her, "What have you done?"

Then it had all ended... her childhood days of gay abandon. No one had said a word. All she remembered in the years thereafter, were eyes. . . accusing eyes of everyone around...staring at her mutely. . .eyes that she could not meet. . . even though she did not know what she had done. Her father's, her two sisters' and even her little brother's... eyes that tormented her. There were visits to the doctor, who peered at her eyes and showed her many pictures.

"What will she know?" a jeering voice interrupted her thoughts.

"She won't know the difference."

"We may as well give her this dull, grey one."

"Let's choose our favourite colour."

Her sisters and brother were opening the parcels. Oh, she remembered, it was New Year's Day, and there would be gifts for all of them on the dining table. She took a step forward and stopped at the doorway. She could see the lovely pink one ... that pretty blue one. Their peals of laughter shut her out. She turned away suddenly.

Quickly, she picked up a shawl and hurried outside. Here in the white snow, she felt safe. She went to the park. "Where's Isabelle?" she asked the other children.

"Oh, she...must be somewhere around."

"What do you want with her now?"

"She's not one of us."

Marie walked away, plucking blackberries as she went. She found Isabelle sitting by the pool, looking intently at her reflection. She started, then, seeing it was Marie, beckoned to her.

"What are you looking at?" Marie said peering into the water.

"Look," said Isabelle, pointing at the twin images in the murky, ice-flecked water," Our faces are almost of the same colour."

"What do you mean?" exclaimed Marie.

"Well," blurted out Isabelle," They call me black, and they don't share their tiffin with me."

Marie pulled her plait and said, "Here are some blackberries. We don't need their lousy tiffins."

Yes, she thought, I'm colour blind. And glad to be so.

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