Paper Cups

White.The unforgettable color of those cruel paper cups. So white that they startle my now grey conscience.So impeccable and spotless, unlike my bruised hands, that I can't not hate them. At the age of five,when I was an unaware little boy whose life had been sold to the tyranny of a li'l tea-stall, I couldn't understand why I dreamt of paper cups so often. They would shake me by the collar of my tattered shirt and would say scary things in my ears, not letting me sleep.They would sneak up behind me while I bathed in those tin boxes they had told me were bathrooms.Now I know they had lied. Just like those white cunning paper cups I hate. They had said they would treat me better. But now all they do is remind me of the smell of boiling tea, and tea, I hate. For it did burn holes in my life. Holes in the shapes of those cartoons you grew up watching and I did not. They came half-empty and half-full with fake promises of better days. But all they brought was the smell of tea, that sat boiling noisily on the stove all day. All they brought along was the scent of cologne those men wore to work. They'd roll down their windows of their air-conditioned cars just enough to yell out my name. I'd fumble up to them with a hurry in my footsteps and paper cups in my hands, eagerly wanting to buy my way out of that rickety tea stall. And so I have finally. But I don't drink tea out of paper cups ever.I ask them to get me coffee. Because coffee isn't bad. It's not like the tea. It's not like those paper cups. Unforgettable. Discomforting and white.