Work Text:
Happiness was yellow. It’s yellow like the sun in the early mornings where beautiful faces wake up to the singing of the birds, to the touch of sunlight, or simply by the blaring of their alarm clock. It’s yellow like the sand on the beach where kids come to play and make sandcastles, where the treasure was hidden underneath, where families take photos and make memories. It’s yellow like all the toys the kids bring to the playground, like the candy in the candy store across the park, like the hairpin Blaze found on the side of the road and thought that it was pretty.
Happiness was yellow. And Blaze wanted to be yellow.
“Blaze what are you doing?!” His mother exclaimed as she rushed towards Blaze and took the paintbrush out of his tire. His mother scowled at the child as she examined the yellow-covered room.
The room, from ceiling to floor (she wouldn’t even ask how he reached that) was covered in gooey almost-dry yellow paint and some were spilling on Blaze’s toys, clothes, and furniture. She was going to have a hard time washing those.
Meira looked down at her son and asked calmly, “Blaze, why did you do this?”
Blaze looked around the room and pondered what his mother was so upset about. It was just yellow. It was just Happiness. Did his mother not want him to have “Happiness”?
Blaze looked back at his mother’s teal eyes. He tilted his head and replied, “I was just trying to be happy, mom.”
“Wha--”
“Happy is yellow, right?” Blaze said, rubbing some paint off his cheeks and extended it to his mom. “Like dad… He’s happy in whatever he does. It’s because he’s yellow, right? Like the sun and the sand… Why can’t I be happy too?”
“Oh, sweetheart…” Meira didn’t know how to reply to that. Her son wanted to be happy. Was he not happy now? Was he not happy here? With her?
Meira rubbed some of the paint off her son’s body and pulled him into a hug. Blaze was confused when his mother started sobbing as she squeezed him tighter. Did he say something wrong? Why was his mother sad? She doesn’t have any blue on her and she was surrounded with yellow, so… Why was she sad? Was happy not yellow?
Without knowing what to do, Blaze just hugged back. He let his mother cry and sob as he held her, letting her lean into him as her sobs became more violent.
Now, Blaze knew that yellow wasn’t happy.