“Come here, Ugly Dog.”
He wagged his tail and leaped into my lap, plopping down without hesitation. I could feel the warmth of his body. I could feel the little rhythm of his heartbeat through his chest onto my thigh. That beating told me a story. That little ugly thing told me not to give up.
The therapy people eventually gave him to me to keep because he was getting old, and I ate as long as he was in my lap. He became my dog, a constant companion and helper. He was my thing to love while we waited for her. I made a collar for him in crafting class that had his name stitched into it.
UGLY DOG
That’s what we did for a while, Ugly Dog and me. We lived there in that weird place. We ate and waited for Janie. We went to group, to hear those people whine, and waited for Janie. We took our medicine and waited for Janie.
It happened in such an odd way. The moment she came back was like a moment out of a movie or something. Ugly Dog and I were in our room. Nurse Martin had just left. I had asked her if I could open my window. There was a metal grating on the other side of the glass, so nothing could possibly get in or out. As if I would ever jump out. That was what crazy people did. Besides, the day wasn’t sweltering for once, and I wanted to smell the fresh air. Nurse Martin said it was okay. It was in the opening of the window that I first saw her.
A girl, about the age my Janie would have been, was wandering the streets just below me. She was skinny and wearing a hooded sweatshirt, too hot for the time of year. That’s the part that made me look closer. My Janie always was cold, even in the summer. Her hands were ice all the time. As I opened the window, Ugly Dog yipped. The sound made her look up at us, and that’s when I saw who it was.
My Janie!
It was she. My daughter was looking for me. I just knew she was. Janie was older, her skin was pale, and she was thin all over. Her eyes, those big doe eyes of hers, were different in so many ways but hers truly. It was my Janie. My baby girl had come home.
I ran out of the door and made for the elevator, Ugly Dog hot on my heels. When I got to the bottom floor, the front clerk asked for my ID bracelet before I could leave. We had a system at the house. All those who could go outside wore a green bracelet. We were deemed low risk. The others, blue, red, and yellow all had restrictions. I wore a green bracelet, so the man behind the counter let me and Ugly Dog through.
“Be back by curfew, Mrs. Chen,” he shouted after me.
I waved him off and hurried down the street to where I last saw Janie. When I found the part of the street directly under my window, there was no one. I scanned the area. No Janie in sight. I almost wept right there, but no. That would be something the worm did. Not me. I would look for her.
Ugly Dog and I ran a block here, a block there. Cars roared past us. One or two honked when we crossed the street before the light came on. It took us twenty minutes of sprinting and panting and dodging crosswalks before we found her. She was standing alone at the corner of two streets. There was no one around her, but she looked terrified. A silent horror face was slapped across her features.
We ran to her, Ugly Dog and I. As I got closer, I could see a car full of men creeping up toward her. Down the other street, a group of bad boys were closing in. Everyone knew those sorts of boys. You saw them on the news. Blood always followed them. Some of them had the bad tattoos on their foreheads. The ones that said the word ‘greed.’ She was in bad trouble if those boys were after her. My vision tunneled, so she was all I could see. My daughter was in trouble, and I wouldn’t leave her.
Ugly dog and I crossed the street and closed the gap between us before the bad ones could get to her. My first thought was to wrap my arms around her. I did, frightening my poor Janie. She jumped underneath my embrace.
“Oh Janie! I’m here now. Mommy’s here. I’ve got you.”
I hugged her. Danger or no, this was my baby. A mother’s arms ache to hug her children, and mine had been aching for ten long years. She felt warm and alive in my grasp. I was so happy in that moment. Ugly Dog danced around us, yipping like a crazy.
Somewhere in our rapture, I remembered the danger. I pulled away from her astonished face to see the bad boys only yards away. Ugly Dog and I had surprised them, but I wasn’t sure for how long. We had to get her away from them.
“You leave us alone. This is my daughter! I will kill you.”
My threat fell on the ears of the evil. They didn’t care. Strange, terrible smirks crossed their faces. One started talking to the other.
“You think we can get anything for the old bat?”
“Na, probably not much other than what she’d sell for dog meat.”
Ugly Dog growled. It wasn’t a ferocious sound, more like a blender rumbling on a low setting. I grabbed Janie’s hand and pulled her away from the boys and down a side street that would be hard for the car to follow. Ugly Dog ran right along with us, barking up a storm. I pulled the little metal whistle from around my neck with my free hand and started blowing it with everything I had. The people with the uniforms gave it to us in case we were in trouble. Boy, was I ever in trouble.
I figured between Ugly Dog’s barking and my rape whistle, someone would hear us. We ran through several back alleys and side streets before we found other people. Janie and I were breathing ragged and thankful when we turned a corner and saw a small crowd. Plus, there was a cop car. It was parked next to a coffee joint, and the cops looked up when they heard the commotion. We were in front of the patrol car in seconds. Ugly Dog danced around my feet, barking like a triumphant hero. The bad boys had disappeared back into the shadows somewhere. Safety helped me think clearly once again.
“Officer, we were being followed,” I said, out of breath. “I’ve been looking for my daughter here, and these bad boys started chasing us.”
“Your daughter?”
The officer looked at me in an appraising way then at Janie, obviously searching for a resemblance. He appeared skeptical.
“I know I don’t look old enough to be her mother, but...”
“Wait a second. Miss, remove your hood, if you please.”
He was talking to Janie, and she seemed afraid.
“Is she under arrest?” I asked in her defense.
“No, but...”
The cop removed her hood and we all gasped. There, where my Janie’s beautiful black hair used to be was a shaved bald head. Not only that, but she didn’t have a mark on her, not one tattoo proving who she was. All of her life, her entire life, was gone from her skin, as if it had never happened.
“Miss, are you all right?” asked the other cop in shock.
“Yes, I think so,” said Janie.
“You have no tattoos.”
“I know. They went away.”
“They went away? I see.”
“Do you know your name?”
“Jane,” she said with a tiny, unsure voice.
Something in that voice, in that declaration of self, snapped me out of my trance.
“Jane. See, I told you. My daughter, Janie. She is my daughter. She needs to come with me now.”
I grabbed her hand again and tried to pull her away, but the cops stopped me.
“Is this your mother?” they asked.
I looked her in the eyes, and for the first time, I saw her looking at me. She was searching my face for something. I couldn’t tell what she was searching for. Janie shouldn’t have to search. She should just know me.
“Miss? Is that your mother?”
With the tiniest shake of her head, she whispered, “No.”
In that instant, my heart fell into my gut. Even my vocal cords slipped down somewhere dismal inside of me. All of that, the past ten years, and my daughter didn’t even know me. I tried to speak and couldn’t find my voice. Darkness engulfed my vision as things began to tunnel. All I could do was look at her with all the hurt I was feeling. All of it welled into my eyes like liquid torment. She must have seen it. Who couldn’t?
“I’m so sorry. I just don’t r
emember you. I don’t remember anything.”
“B-but. I’m your mother. I’ve been wait-waiting for you.”
I didn’t feel the cop search me. Numbness seemed to dominate my system. He could have slit my throat, and I wouldn’t have cared. Somewhere in space and time he lifted my wrist and read my wristband.
“Says here she’s a patient at Caring Touch Psychiatric Center. How did you get out, Mrs. Chen?”
“I-I-I have a green bracelet. Green bracelets get to leave.”
The lips I owned were tingly. My eyes couldn’t leave hers. It just wasn’t possible. They were the same but different. Bigger and a different color than I remembered, but then again, we changed as we matured. It was the bit inside that looked like my daughter. No, not just looked like. Was. This was my daughter. No doubt existed in this universe.
“Okay, I see. Hughes, take Mrs. Chen and her dog back to the center. I think Miss Jane should come with me. It isn’t safe in this part of town.”
He put her in his patrol car and I watched, paralyzed by the whole experience.
“Janie?”
We locked each other in an unbreakable gaze until the car sped her away from me. During that time, her eyes told me volumes. Volumes of apologies. Volumes of confusion. Volumes of sorrow.
I went back to the center without a fuss because I knew the truth. I finally knew the reason why my daughter had been gone so long. For so long, I had pondered what could possibly have kept her away. Now, it was so transparent, I couldn’t believe the answer. Amnesia. She hadn’t come home because she didn’t know where home was. She didn’t know who she was. All of her life had been erased from her skin somehow, and that’s how she became lost. The loss of her knowing love was almost more than I could bear.
There was no use fighting the cops. They had guns and big laws. What did I have? An ugly dog and a rape whistle. I knew where she was, though, and we would be a family again. I told anyone and everyone who would listen to my story.
Once word got out on the news, I tracked down news people and gave interviews about my missing daughter and how the police were keeping me from her. She had no memory, and they were keeping us apart. What right had they to keep a mother from her lost daughter?
Everything got big and inflated, like a balloon about to burst. People lost their minds about Jane, thinking she was all sorts of things. Angel, demon, an object of ridicule, a thing of praise, everything except what she really was, which was a scared girl who needed her mother. Well, she was an angel, but she was my angel.
When the story got too big, people stopped listening to me. That’s when I knew I had to find her and get her away from all those scared and confused people who could cause a lot of damage. Not to mention, those bad boys were still out there, still wanting to hurt my Jane.
I sold my little wedding band at a pawnshop and bought some bear mace and a second hand dress. The pawn lady didn’t mind about my green bracelet. She even held the things in the back room for me because I couldn’t bring them back to the house without them getting taken. Pawn lady was a mother too. We understood things, we mothers.
The morning of Jane’s trial, I went to pawn lady’s shop. I changed into the dress in her back room and pocketed the mace. Ugly Dog and I walked five blocks to the courthouse, where we waited among the throngs of crazy, scared people. I was resolute. I was determined. So was Ugly Dog. We would save her or die trying.
It was stifling to be around so many people. The place was an odd mix of cement buildings, car exhaust, and the grass lawn where most of us stood. Asphalt and humidity was a combination that could make anyone crazy. I found no friendly faces in the crowd.
It was then that a young black man moved next to us. His demeanor was soft, if not nervous. His eyes darted around, not finding purchase anywhere he liked. I could feel warmth coming from him. It was like cocoa, like kindness.
“You, young man.”
He turned his gaze downward at me.
“You know my Janie?”
All of the oddity and nervousness of his face vanished as he smiled. It was a good-boy smile.
“Yes, ma’am. I met her in a hospital. I was hoping to see her again.”
“I’m her mother.”
His features turned curious, not skeptical like everyone else did when I said that. Just curious and polite.
“You want to help me help her?”
“Yes. I definitely do.”
“You’re a good boy. Stay close with us.”
Just then, there was a strange noise off to our left, some kind of commotion that most of the people around us didn’t notice. Ugly Dog did, and with a loud alarm of barking, he ran toward the ruckus. I grabbed the boy’s hand; my other hand was on the bear mace in my pocket. He jumped a little at first, but he grabbed me back. Together, we chased Ugly Dog through a side alley and away from the crazies.
Chapter Five: Dakota
These days I’m considered a criminal. Back before the Big Day, tattoo artists were...well, artists. It was a profession that was out in the open and paid for their artistry. The jobs could be as simple as a bumblebee on someone’s ankle or as complex as a memorial scene that covered their entire body. I supposed if someone wanted something like that today, I could technically deliver what they wanted. No one would, though. No one does anymore because every bit of skin that is marred is a piece of their life taken away.
Let’s just say Judgment Day wasn’t as advertised when it happened. It was before my time, but I read the old texts that predicted seas as blood and the dead walking the Earth. None of that stuff happened. The event was far subtler than anyone expected. We all were tattooed now, from the day we were born until the day we died; our story was written in the beautiful hand of our Maker all over our bodies.
Every major event of our life was etched in perfect script all across us. Even as our skin aged and sagged, the words read just as true as the first day they were scrawled. It seemed like a little thing at first to have your life written across you, but soon the message hits home. Judgment Day was really the end of anonymity. No longer could criminals hide their crimes. If a body washed ashore, the murderer’s identity was plainly etched on their skin. When a girl cried rape, not only was the story etched on her skin forever but on her rapist’s as well. A policeman’s job transformed from collecting evidence to learning to read the nearly extinct art of cursive handwriting.
These days, nothing could be forgotten. Sure, if you went to grab a coffee, nothing about such a mundane thing would appear on your skin. However, if you wanted to forget how embarrassing your one-night stand was or lie to a boyfriend about it, you couldn’t. Everything was known, and everything was in the open. Not to mention that your memories no longer faded or glossed over with the silky nostalgia of time. Every person remembered everything etched on their skin with unwavering clarity. That was a wonderful thing if you were reminiscing about your honeymoon in Belize, but what if all you wanted to do was forget that awful person who broke your heart? Sorry, time didn’t heal those wounds anymore, and that’s where I came in. That’s where the Maker and I disagreed.
I spent my young life learning to copy the Maker’s handwriting, and I was good. I was damn good. People came to me in tears, begging for relief. They couldn’t bear to remember this or that anymore, and I helped them. I expertly removed the strip of skin with the unwanted memory, fixed in a new strip of clean skin, and rewrote that part of their life. When I was finished, the skin looked untouched and they didn’t remember whatever it was that I had cut away. This was what a tattoo artist did these days, and it was, of course, illegal.
I may be a criminal, but I’m a clean criminal. I don’t cover up crimes, and I don’t buy clean skin off flesh dealers. Those people are scum and murder for their stock. All my stuff comes from donors who are prepped and paid. Besides, the cops know me and know to leave me alone. I run a legit business, and the mayor herself was a friend of mine. I helped to wipe away a sad miscarriage for her, and she repaid
me with protection.
My legit business was one of piercing and body jewelry. Dakota’s Jewel was the name of it, and I lived in a pretty spacious loft above my place. The front counters offered all the latest styles of cheap China bangles that the college girls liked. The back ones had some nicer things and some wooden tribal pieces from Africa that interested the aficionados. We did decent business, but the tattooing was really where the money came from.
It was a Sunday night when the girl walked through my door. I had sent Robert, the pierced kid who worked for me, home early for the evening because Sundays were always so slow. Sunday had become a holier day again, and few ventured out to this part of the city then. I was going to close shop up early when a ghost moved in and rang the little bell above my door.
“We’re closing up,” I said automatically as I turned around.
The look of the girl stopped me where I stood. She was slight and trembled a little on her feet the way a new fawn might. She was covered from head to toe in hospital scrub pants and a hooded sweatshirt pulled close over her head. Big brown eyes stared at me from under the hood, like a deer lost in a concrete jungle. Her sneakers were a few sizes too big on her feet.
I tensed. “What’s your business?”
“Business?” she squeaked.
“What’s your game, girl?”
“I d-d-don’t have a game.”
“No one wears a sweatshirt in Dallas in July unless they are hiding something. Now, out with it.”
My muscles were braced to reach for the gun I kept behind the counter. I almost flinched when she reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. With quivering fingers, she held it out to me.
Tattoo Page 6