THE FIRST ANDERS, a white male, woke up and discovered that he had taken on a deep, undeniably chestnut color. He gradually realized it at first, then suddenly, first as a sensation, as he reached for his phone, noticing that the morning light was doing something strange to the hue of his arm, and then with a shock, as if there was a momentary certainty that someone else was in bed with him, also male, darker in color, but this, as frightening as it was, was certainly also impossible, and he was reassured by the thought that the other moving simultaneously with him was not a separate person but simply himself, Anders, and relief flooded him because if the idea that someone else was there was just a figment of his imagination, then naturally the idea that he had changed color was also a trick, an illusion, a creation of the mind born on the slippery halfway point between dreams and wakefulness, only now he had his phone in his hands and had reversed the camera, so he saw that the face looking back at him was not at all his own face.
He got up somehow from the bed and was about to rush to the bathroom, but then forced himself to calm down, and his steps became slower, more measured and calculated, even though he didn't know if he was doing this to take control of the situation, to force reality to return solely through the power of his mind, or because running would have frightened him more, would have turned him forever into a hunted prey. The bathroom was reassuringly familiar and miserable, with cracks in the tiles, dirt on the plaster, dried toothpaste that had spilled on the outside of the sink. The interior of the medicine cabinet was visible, the door with the mirror half-open, and Anders raised his hand and brought his reflection before his eyes. It was not the Anders he knew.
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