New York, 2070
After decades of interracial marriages white people are virtually non existent in town. The plans of those with the most progressist views on multiculturalism were finally realized, by means of promoting interracial relationships racism was eradicated by eliminating its first source: white people. The few remaining ones decided to move to smaller towns in the countryside. From one of these villages was Catherine, an all-American girl with blonde hair and blue eyes, a tall and toned body. On top of this all, she was also very smart, so after graduating with full marks in a prestigious university she started working in an equally prestigeous company, with a great salary and a bright future in front of her. As part of her contract, however, she was supposed to spend one year in a branch of the company in NY for an internship.

She wasn’t so eager to move there but she was vary determined to have the job of her dreams so she carried on.
As expected, all her colleagues were of mixed race, all the possible tints of brown were there, so she really stood out. This didn’t go unnoticed by the powerful department for ethic policies. Of course, they couldn’t prevent white people from applying for the jobs there so they applied other techniques. First, they called her for an introductory talk about the working culture there and they pointed out that their dressing code was a key factor to make everybody look equal to each other. Catherine pointed out that she was wearing what she was supposed to wear, but they replied that this didn’t only apply to clothes. “For example, you might have noticed that nobody has blonde hair here, I think your hair makes you stand out too much. The guys have commented about that too, we don’t want unnecessary distraction here. Why don’t you dye them black?” Catherine tried to resist, saying that that was her natural look but they made her understand that there was no point in debating this point. Contrasting the official directives about cultural diversity was a serious crime.
They paid for her visit at the hair saloon. After they were done with her, she stared at herself, hiding her disappointment for the whole situation. Her hair was now raven black, with a slight curl to it too. It didn’t look like her but she had to admit that she looked very cute. “How long will the color last?” she asked. The African American lady working there stared at her and said “I thought you knew this, but the package you were given included a permanent treatment, so you’ll have to wait for your natural hair to grow again and it will take a couple of years to reach that length. You can always dye them blonde of course but it will look very unnatural and it won’t last given the quality of the pigment we gave you”.
When she knew this, she bursted into tears “I hate them soo much!”. She was forced to be a brunette for the foreseeable future. It didn’t look half bad on her, but she felt like she was becoming just one of the many brown girls in town.
Her colleagues complimented her a lot about her change in style.

After a while she was offered free tanning sessions, coupled with melanin pills. The reasons were the same as before: a temporary measure to make differences less visible. This time she complained more but they threatened her to go through disciplinary procedure so she had to give up.
The change was much more severe this time. Week after week, her skin started to turn darker and even her irises turned to blue to a deep green. Now looking like a young Latina Catherine was finally fitting in properly. Some of her colleagues even started calling her Catilina, as it was now more fitting, they said. She hated this but carried on.

She was actually starting to enjoy the atmosphere of the city, so alive, so rich in possibilities and chances. She even started dating a black boy she met in a party. The guy was very surprised to see that she wasn’t actually a Latina girl but a white girl temporarily looking like that. “I knew such things could happen but man, this is crazy!”. She made clear to him that their relationship was only temporarily as her family would never accept a black boyfriend. She didn’t say that of course. “So, the procedure is only temporarily, right? Why don’t we play a bit with it? ” “What do you mean?” “Why don’t you darken a bit more your skin, curl your hair and add a few more adjustments so you can look like a full blooded black girl? Wouldn’t we be a lovely couple?” The idea sounded crazy but also turned her on. “Sure, we could give it a try” she said.
Her hair was now frizzy like a black girl’s hair. Doubling the dosage of her melanin pills and tanning sessions she acquired a full cocoa tan. Even her eyes got richer in melanin to the point when they looked dark brown.

She still wasn’t used to see herself like this each time she saw herself in the mirror but sure it was fun. She now blended in perfectly in the multicultural society she lived in and she and her boyfriend made a very beautiful couple!
Her boyfriend even convinced her to undergo a special cosmetic treatment that made her nostrils look larger and her cheekbones lower. After some more weeks, her skin tone also darkened further to a dark brown tone.
Even if she didn’t want to admit this to herself, she was really aroused by her new looks. Without even realizing it, she even picked up the accent of her boyfriend. She just looked like a happy black girl with a black boyfriend.

When the year was over, she was starting to be fed up with her life and just wanted to head home. She contacted a doctor to figure out how to reverse all the procedures done to her but to her disappointment it turned out to be a very long and expensive procedure. She needed at least 6 months for her skin to return to her natural color now that the tan was so deep and the same went for her eyes. As for her nose, a new cosmetical surgery procedure was necessary, and, not being supported by the government, as it went against the ethnic policies, it was very expensive. So, her only choice was to extend her internship to save some money and to undo the changes. Quite scared about this, she came back to her boyfriend and lied by telling him that she was enjoying her time there and was planning to stay there one more year.
However, they spent the following months wasting money on expensive restaurants, fancy holidays, drinks, so she couldn’t save any money in the end. She kept on extending her internship by “just a few months” which never seemed to be enough. In the meanwhile, she kept on taking melanine pills and tanning session as it was required by her job so the pigments kept on going deeper and deeper into her skin.
One day her sister, worried for her, decided to pay her a visit as she wasn’t replying anymore to messages. So she went to her address, and ringed the bell, surprised to see another surname by hers.
It was a Sunday morning, so Catherine was still sleeping with her boyfriend. She slowly opened the door and went completely shocked as she saw her sister, who didn’t recognize her. “Is Catherine living with a girlfriend? A black girlfriend?” erupted her. “No, wait, Anne, I’m just a friend crushing at her place for the night, I…” “You know my name? Wait, is that… No way, Catherine!” – and fainted.
Catherine panicked and called her boyfriend for help.
When her sister woke up, they had to explain her everything. She couldn’t believe Catherine had done such a thing to herself, “How could you let this happen to you, look at you, you are a black girl!” “It’s just temporary” – Catherine tried to reassure her. “This is such a shame for our family! You can forget about ever coming back! I’ll make sure your old boss know this!”
As her internship couldn’t be extended more and she lost her old job she had to desperately look for a menial job in a fast food restaurant in order to pay her rent. Still, given how expensive it was to live there she really struggled to pay off everything so she became more dependent on her boyfriend, who was now better off financially. Every time she mentioned him the procedures necessary to reverse her changes her boyfriend asked her, disappointed, wether she thought that there was something wrong with being black. Not wanting to upset him, given how dependent she was on him, she stopped mentioning this.
At some point, she had to renew her ID card. When she showed up at the office to sign the papers she was stopped by the clerk, a fellow black girl, who smiled at her and said “So you were a white girl?” “Er, I made a few adjustments” “Well done! But this needs to be registered, we need to change your race to African-American!” “Really?” replied Catherine, scared “Sure, but that’s good for you! You can apply for a special support for transracial people, it’s a new project of the city administration!” As she was eager to increase her entries, she gladly signed the procedures.
As part of the project, she had to attend black culture courses, to write essays and even to take a trip to Africa in search of her new origins.
She felt she was living a lie, as she never really wanted to stay like this but she just needed some money now.
Once gathered the necessary sum, she started to apply the procedures to reacquire her looks and applied for a reverse change in her ID status accordingly. However, with her disappointment she found out that officially reversing her ethnicity from black to white was almost impossible as it was thought that black people should be thought to accept themselves, instead of changing who they are.
She was sent to a psychologist who confronted her like this:”
“What don’t you like about being black?”
“But I’m not black!”
“I see a black girl sitting here now”
“These procedures… I didn’t want them in the first place, I was forced by my employers!”
“Are you saying that the office for ethnic policies did something illegal?”
“No, of course!” she replied, scared
“Then, why did you apply for a change in your ID status? Did you only want the financial benefits? This is a serious crime, you know? You could go to prison for this!”
“No, please!” she cried
“Good, then I see you just need some therapy to accept your new ethnicity, Changing your race is a really intense experience, many oriole encounter phases of reject but I’m sure you just need some more help to accept who you really are, am I right?”
“Yes” she said meekly
“Good! Then proceed this way, please!”
In order to cure her ethnic dysphoria they proceeded with intensive remodeling of her neural networks, by making her respond positively to comments on her new looks, by giving her a bias in favor of other black people, even by altering her linguistic centers to make her accent more credible for a black girl. They even altered her body shape making her figure fuller.
When they were done, she suddenly felt different. When she was explained the changes, she had to hold her tears back and say “Thats gud!”
Back home with her boyfriend she said, all worried “They did make me something! My mind feel weird! “”I know everything, it’s gonna be ok, we’ll work this out, babe! I love you even more now that you’re black forever!” It was true, she had no hopes of ever coming back. “I’m so scared, I don’t wanna be a black mama foreva!” “Shh, it’s ok, you are beautiful, you know? We’ll have kids and you’ll stop thinking about this!”
So it was, her daughter looked a bit lighter than her, which often was a matter of laughter with her husband.
She still often cried to sleep but her boyfriend helped her a lot in accepting her new identity.
One day, she picked up her daughter from kindergarten when she spotted a blonde little girl hugged by her mum. She thought that that could have been her life and hid her tears. It was too late now, there was no going back.
Once you go black, you never go back.






