The sun burns me.

It’s a lonely existence, having to keep to the shadows, the sidewalks, the marked paths. I don’t know what it feels like to break the rules and run barefoot through the grass, like so many of you.

I don’t know what it’s like to taste the sweet red fruits of summer; to feel the caress of a soft, comforting blanket; to roll in the leaves as a child. It’s okay, I don’t expect you to. You’re a human, not a monochromatic. You’re made of flesh and blood and a beating heart, whereas I am a living shadow.

They used to make fun of me at school for being different. For being a “tar baby.” A freak. Gasoline. The devil. A demon. A horned freak. Unnatural. A vampire. They would ignore me because I was “imaginary.” I know they did it because they were afraid of me, and it didn’t matter, because I was afraid of them too. I couldn’t bring myself to hurt them. All I could do was wrap my thin tail around myself, and cover my horns as best I could with a hat.

They learned my other weaknesses later. They would assault me with colored pencils by putting shavings where I wouldn’t see them, bumping into me with markers or paint or their binders or colorful mittens, just to hear my skin sizzle.

I took the back roads home through darkness, and stepped neatly over yellow lines. I wished I could join the legions of graffiti artists, but the best were always the most vivid, and the grayscale ones were just plain. Like me. Black and white and grey and plain.

Some days I couldn’t take it. I would run away, my black shoes slapping on the faded asphalt of the streets and my grey skirt flapping behind me, tangling between my knees, teasing me until I fell and skinned my elbows or my palms or my knees and the thick tar blood would come oozing out of the gashes onto the pavement and stain it. I tried to saw off or break my horns; I tried to clip my tail with wire cutters, but to no avail. My body was fundamentally stronger than the human tools I used – I was built to rule their creators, to force them to bend to my will.

Tough skin doesn’t protect your emotions. Anyone can rip you open and expose all of your darkness to the world. Your ability to kill has no effect on your mettle to do so. It doesn’t matter to humans that all it would take from you is a brush of your tail against their throat for them to die, and that a sidelong glance from you ought to make them shiver.

It used to.

Humans used to cower, but times have changed. My race has grown lax and no longer commands the respect it once did. Humans gained intelligence; started hunting us; persecuting us like witches by bringing light and color, our greatest fears, into our homes of darkness. They drove us off our thrones, out of our palaces, and into hiding. Many only survived by taking refuge in dark alleyways and abandoned houses. It was disgusting.

My ancestors’ books say nothing of terrorism from our race. I always believed the ancients to be the wisest of all, the ones who formed themselves from the nothing, gave themselves shape from the shadows. They were the perfect archetypes of our race, the founders of all, and they could do no wrong in my eyes. The only reason humans feared us was because they did not understand us. Now they don’t fear us because they believe they understand us, and once a human understands something, it fades away into science’s mockery.

In time, I grew an emotional shell to match my skin. I no longer buried my fear under shrouds of black and grey. I took on the ancients’ scornful pride, and became more of a bully than I ever thought I could. I walked down shadowed streets with my head held high. I looked humans in the eye when they talked to me. I didn’t back down when they tried to discriminate against me, and treat me like a lesser being. I am not a lesser being, I told myself. You are above them, and they know that, and that scares them. I let my wire-thin tail trail behind me in its loosely curled L, the spade on the end bobbing just above the ground. I no longer tried to hide myself under swathes of cloth, veiled in burqas and long, dark robes. I didn’t try to fit into the daylight, either, and instead became a creature of the night, just like the ancients. I took what I wanted from the humans, not that I needed any of it.

 I filled my home with colorful posters and packaging, lively furniture and brightly colored paintings and knick knacks. Sometimes I would run a white-gloved hand over them and wonder what they felt like to humans. Colors are beautiful. Colors are dangerous. I pretended it didn’t burn me when I pressed my cheek to them.

Humans aren’t so different, I learned.

The sun burns you too.