Animals

“You've brought the wrong colour apple!” snarled the white rabbit from behind his desk, and continued chewing on his oversized carrot. Gary was talking to an employee of the Bureau of Animal Affairs. He stared enviously for a moment at the rabbits’ carrot and said, “Pardon me sir, an apple is an apple, is it not?”

The rabbit scoffed. “Are all Grey Rabbits this dense? You don’t get it? Unbelievable. Get out of my office, please. I have lots of work to do”, he said, laying his carrot aside and attempting to look busy examining the other apples on his desk.

“Where shall I get the right colour apple then?”, asked Gary.

The rabbit looked up and, in a surprised fit of anger at the audacity of Gary, picked up some of the apples from his desk and said, “You see these?! RED! Each and every one of them. Now look at yours, what colour is your apple?”

“Green.”

Almost immediately, the employee fired back, “Exactly! Green! Not Red. Now get out.”

Gary, collecting the remains of his dignity, left the room.

Outside, he walked past the long line of animals, each brandishing their own apples, waiting to present them to the Bureau officer. Some were talking to each other, others were silent. Most notably, the rabbits, most of them white rabbits, a few grey like himself, seemed to be enjoying a very pleasant conversation amongst themselves. Unlike him however, each had a red apple, some even had more than one - different shades of red, a combination of green and red apples, one even simultaneously held a green, red and yellow apple together.

At the very end of the hall were the ironically, silent crickets. They seemed nervous; they didn’t have any apples at all.

This wasn’t the first time Gary had been rejected for having the wrong colour apple, he had heard the same line of clichéd excuses for denial many times before. He had after all, inherited his useless green apple from his parents, and although there were many other ways to obtain the red apple he required, none were within his reach without sacrificing a great deal of pride. He had almost mastered the art of resisting the growth of an immense amount of resentment for his green apple. Almost.

As he walked past the crickets, one of them whispered, “Pssst. Hey, buddy. How’d it go, any luck?”

Gary shook his head.

“That’s alright”, said the cricket. “Maybe soon they’ll change the rules. Maybe, they’ll even start a program for green apples, and they’ll become valuable. It’s still better than not having an apple to show at all”, he said, looking downward in disappointment. “The important thing is to stay positive, y’ know?”

The grey rabbit tried his best to seem as if he agreed, and left. When he reached home, it was already late in the afternoon, and he was tired. Gary placed his green apple on the bedside counter, and lay down.

“What utility does the colour of an apple serve anyway”, he thought, as his resentment began bubbling its way to the surface. “I’m no different to those other grey rabbits, or the white ones for that matter, all laughing away today, not a worry in the world. The only difference is, they inherited red apples, and I green.”

He’d already attended hundreds of appointments, each ending the same, some politely, others, like today, not quite so amicable. Albeit, they were all the same - after all, he had the wrong colour apple. His next appointment at the Bureau was scheduled for the tomorrow morning.

“Perhaps I’ll steal one”, he thought. “Perhaps, I’ll even lie. What utility does the colour of an apple serve, anyway? What utility do pride and dignity serve?”

Gary yawned.

“To hell with you, green apple, yet you are all I have.”

“Tomorrow”, he thought, and fell asleep.