by Litte, Jane
“You keep saying that and yet you’re still here.” He held out his hand. “Come.”
Despite her annoyance with him, she found herself reaching for his hand. She snapped out of it in time and slapped his hand away. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
His smile dimmed a bit, but stayed in place. “Then I’m sorry to have bothered you. Have a good night.”
He pushed away from the doorway and turned away, giving Marnie an eyeful of his back as he walked away. From what she could see that was not covered by the tank top he wore, his back was entirely covered in tattoos. Peeking from his left shoulder blade were the burning yellow eyes of a dragon. The colors—blue, black, green, red, and yellow—looked so vivid and bright on his skin that when he reached for the mop again, his muscles flexed, making it look like the dragon had jumped.
“Hey, wait,” she muttered, but he didn’t look up. She reached for the paper bag in the front pocket of her hoodie, pushed down the bag to reveal the top of the bottle, and broke the seal with one hard twist of the cap. “Christ.”
With a sigh, she lifted the mouth of the bottle to her lips, tilted it at an angle, and swallowed a healthy gulp. She fought the cough as the bourbon threatened to burn through her throat and esophagus. She had never drank straight out of the bottle before. This was a new low for her. She pulled on the bottle two more times, thumped her chest with her fist, and reached for the door handle. The little bell tinkled as she opened the door, but Mr. Back Tattoo did not turn around.
The girl sitting at the front counter—her black hair tied back into pigtails and her eyelids heavy with glittery blue eyeshadow—raised her head to look at her, smirked, then returned to painting her nails. She looked like the slutty-goth version of a Catholic schoolgirl. And if there was one thing Marnie knew, it was how to be the perfect Catholic schoolgirl.
“I’ll take that cup of tea, after all.”
Mr. Back Tattoo spoke rapid-fire of what sounded like Cantonese to the girl. The girl rolled her eyes, slid the strap of her messenger bag over her head, and slammed past Mr. Back Tattoo on her way out.
“My baby sister Mei,” he said. “She’s a bit headstrong, I’m afraid.”
“Trust me, I know. I’m a high school guidance counselor.” She bit off a curse. “Was.”
He glanced at the bottle she was still holding in her hand. Chagrined, she immediately capped the bottle and stashed it in the front pouch of her hoodie.
“I was let go,” she blurted out. “Not because I was drinking or anything. I was going through some personal stuff . . .” She bit her lip. Why was she telling him any of these things?
Her eyes became blurry with tears. She tried to blink them back, but soon they were running down her cheeks and she was wiping them with the sleeve of her sweatshirt. If Mr. Back Tattoo noticed the tears, he gave no indication.
“Here.” He pressed a warm San Diego Chargers mug into her hands. “That’s chamomile. It’ll soothe you. Let me just lock up so we can get started.”
She could only stare at his back as he walked to the door. “You’re doing my tattoo after hours? Is that normal?”
“Of course not.” He grinned and turned the locks. “I close up every night at nine o’clock on the dot so I can be home in time to put my mother to bed. Tonight I assigned the task to my sister.”
Marnie shifted uneasily and brought the mug up to her lips but did not drink. She blew on the hot surface as she surveyed the reception area. It was well-lit, clean, and looked more like the waiting room of a dental office than a tattoo parlor. There were eight large portraits of nude, artistically posed women Asian women on the white walls, each of them covered with strategically placed tattoos. Each frame had its own light source, a spotlight to enhance the contract of color against the olive brown skin of each woman. They all looked high fashion and professionally done. Meanwhile, the proprietor thought she was a homeless person. It was not the first time in the last fifteen minutes that she felt shame.
“Nice pictures,” she mumbled, nodding at the far wall. She placed the mug on the counter and pulled at the drawstring that secured her hood. “Maybe we should do this some other time. I mean, I haven’t showered today”—which pained her to admit,—“and I’m sure you wouldn’t want to work on a dirty . . . um . . . canvas.”
“I have a shower in the back.”
“Oh.” She swallowed hard. “Convenient.”
He was leaning against the locked door with his arms folded over his chest, watching her. He was standing so still he could have been a statue. She willed him to blink. He did not.
“All right,” she said after a moment. “Let me take a shower so we can get started.”
“I’ll get you a towel.”
She nodded and he pushed away from the door. She found herself breathless as he approached her and her pulse thrummed like a tuning fork in her throat. He moved with a feline grace she had never seen in anyone before. She bit her lip. When he lifted a hand toward her face, she flinched.
“It’s all right,” he said, pushing her hood off her head. “You have nothing to be afraid of. I won’t hurt you.”
But he would, she knew it. She forced herself to remain still as he swept her hair out of her face. His nearness was making her light-headed. She was sure she didn’t smell so great and fervently hoped he wouldn’t say a thing about it. He, on the other hand, smelled clean and woodsy and male like . . . Irish Spring or something.
He took her hand and led her down a narrow hallway toward the back of the store. Though she was dimly aware of the way her hand was engulfed in his, Marnie was able to observe a few more pieces of the art hanging on the walls. If they were his work, he was brilliant. She didn’t know much about art—Eric was the art buff—but she was sure these were gallery-quality. It was obvious he really cared about his work. She also appreciated how everything looked so clean and sterile. It went a long way to assure her that she could get a quality tattoo here without having to worry about getting an infection and dying of sepsis.
He pointed to a door on the left, which was adjacent to another door that had the familiar neon-green EXIT sign having over it. It was, however, secured with a heavy-duty padlock.
“That has to be violating some fire code or something,” she muttered.
“Crackheads,” he said. “We had a break-in last month. You can never been too careful these days.” He handed her a towel.
Marnie couldn’t help but bring the towel to her nose. It was soft, neatly folded, and smelled like Tide. Her eyes began to burn with tears again and she held the towel against her face until she could get herself in control.
“You go on in,” he said. “I’ll be out here, setting everything up.”
“Okay.”
The bathroom was a small cube, maybe eight feet by eight feet. There was a toilet, a sink with a mirror above it, and a shower stall with glass doors and walls. There were no windows. The light above her head was a soft yellow, suffusing everything with an amber glow. She pulled the bottle of Wild Turkey out of her pouch and placed it on the counter. While she removed her clothes, she avoided looking at the mirror. She dropped her dirty clothes on the floor and entered the shower stall. The initial blast of cool water on her face and head made her yelp, but did a good job waking up her senses. As the water gradually warmed, she washed her hair and soaped her body, taking care to work up a lather before scrubbing her face. She liked the smell of his soap.
She stepped out of the bathroom a few minutes later wearing a bathrobe that was hanging from a hook on the back of the door. It was a little big, but she wrapped the sash around her waist twice and tied it tightly in the front. She wrapped up her hair in a towel and stashed her dirty clothes in a plastic bag, which she found under the sink. Now that she was clean, she just couldn’t stand the idea of putting them back on right now. She glanced wistfully at the bottle of Wild Turkey on the counter, but left it there.
When she entered the session room, which reminded her of a docto
r’s exam room, he was washing his hands at the sink. She looked around and found that he had set up everything they would need on a little tray next to a chair that looked like a dentist chair, but shorter and not as wide. On the tray, there were little bottles of various colors, sterile pouches containing tubes and needles, latex gloves, a spray bottle, a jar of what looked like petroleum jelly, and several tiny cups about the size of a thimble. She gulped and felt light-headed with panic. She took a step back and stumbled into a black leather stool, which caused her to fall on her ass.
He was at her side within seconds, pulling her up. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah.” Her face was hot and beet-red, she was sure, with mortification. She didn’t realize how much taller and just . . . bigger he was than her. He had to be a few inches over six feet. Large men made her nervous. She cleared her throat. “I’m all good. What’s next? Jeez, I don’t even know your name.” She tried for a chuckle and hoped it didn’t sound hysterical.
“Hey, you’re shaking. It’s all right.” He put his hands on her shoulders and gave them a squeeze. “My name is Michael.” He reached for a binder on a shelf behind him and gave it to her. “Do you want to look through this while I finish setting up? Everything in this book is my sister Mei’s design. She’s very talented.”
She opened the binder and tried to ignore him as he cleaned and prepared an instrument that looked like the unholy child of a glue gun and a tiny jackhammer. Each page contained a drawing of various flowers, all colorful and intricate in their own way. There were images of roses, daisies, orchids, and while they were all pretty, nothing really grabbed her attention. It wasn’t until she came upon a picture of a lily that she stopped and stared. With a shaking hand, she touched the plastic sleeve that held the drawing and traced each petal with her finger. The entire image was about six inches and maybe five inches wide from petal to petal. The leaves and stem were black, as well as the pistil and the pollen, but the petals were starkly white, outlined with black. It was breathtakingly beautiful in its simplicity . . . something she could proudly wear on her skin.
“You’ve found something?” he asked a moment later.
Without a word, she handed him the binder, pointing to the page that had the image she wanted. He tilted her chin up with his knuckle and searched her face. “It’s a fine choice. Why this one?”
“It’s . . .” She shrugged. How could she put it into words? “It called to me.”
He nodded. “I’ll prepare the stencil. Have a seat. I’ll be right back. Do you know where you want it?”
She bit her lip. A tattoo wasn’t really something somebody should get on impulse. She thought about asking him to place it on the side of her body, along her torso, but she didn’t have a bra or anything to cover up with and just the idea of him hunkered over her naked body made her dizzy. The leg or the arm weren’t the best places for it, either. She wanted to be able to cover it up just in case she had to go to a job interview or something. The thigh was too close to . . . no. It would have to be on her back. If she wore a backless or a low-back dress, the tattoo would be stunning. Of course, she would have to lose ten to fifteen pounds first . . .
“I’d like it on my right shoulder blade.”
He met her eyes and nodded. “All right, I’ll need you to straddle the chair, turn your head to the side, and lay your cheek on the back cushion. You’ll need to lower the robe so your entire upper back is exposed. I’ll be back with the stencil.”
Marnie took off the towel from her head, hung it on the back of a chair, and shook her wet hair. She searched the immediate area for something she could use to put up her hair and found a pencil, which she used to secure her bun.
Taking a deep breath, she approached the dentist chair, placed her legs on either side of it, and exhaled slowly as she lowered herself onto the chair. The leather felt weird on her bare parts, so she pulled up the hem of the robe from the back, slid it between her legs, and sat back down. It took her a bit to undo the knot on the belt of the robe because her hands were shaking so badly, but she managed it, sliding off the robe from her shoulders until the terrycloth was gathered around her elbows. She looked down at her bare breasts and covered them up before leaning forward to lay her cheek on the leather, wrapping her arms loosely around the back cushion. She forced herself to concentrate on how the leather felt against her skin as she began to breathe deeply: inhaling, holding it for three beats, then exhaling until all the air out was out of her lungs. Inhale, exhale. If there was one thing she got out of the obscenely expensive therapy sessions that she took after Eric filed for divorce, it was how to breathe properly.
“Don’t move,” Michael said. “You’re perfect just like that.”
She froze. She couldn’t help it. She had never felt so vulnerable in her life. He could do just about anything to her now and she wouldn’t be able to do a damn thing about it. She glanced over her shoulder and watched as he pushed the black leather stool up to where she was. When he sat and placed one gloved hand between her shoulder blades, she closed her eyes and released the breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes.” She heard a ripping sound and the sharp smell of ethyl alcohol wafted to her nose.
“I just need to clean the area little bit. I’m sure you did a good job in the shower, but it’s important that the skin is disinfected. This will feel a little cold.”
She gasped as he began to wipe the area with the alcohol pad. She willed herself to relax, to let go and trust that this man knew what he was doing, but with him being so close to her, his thighs wide open and almost cradling the lower part of her body, she felt as taut and tight as a guitar string.
“I’m going to apply the stencil now. I’m going to spray a little bit of water . . .” He touched the side of her torso. “I need you to relax, my lily. This part won’t hurt a bit.”
She could feel the heat of his body against her back. It radiated from him in waves, caressing her skin like ghostly fingers. She was tempted to lean against him and curl into him like a cat seeking affection. It took all of her control to resist against it. She might be feeling this way about him, but to him, she was just another paying customer. She glanced down and stared at his knee. If she wanted to, she could reach down and brush it with her fingertips. He was that close.
She hissed as cold water misted over her overheated skin and craned her neck over her shoulder as he pressed what felt like wax paper against her back, which he smoothed over her skin with the help of something that looked like a tiny paint roller. She couldn’t see much past the long, nimble fingers covered in latex and once again, she was afraid. She was really putting an awful lot of trust in this man. No one knew where she was. And she was all alone with him.
“All right.” He peeled off the transfer paper. “I have the stencil laid out on your skin. Would you like to see what it looks like before I begin the line-work? I can take you to a mirror.”
She swallowed. If she got up from this chair now, she knew there was no way she was going to return. It was already taking up all of the courage in her reserve to stay exactly where she was. “You’re the professional. I can always sue you if you give me a wonky tattoo. My sister is a lawyer.”
“Good to know.” He patted her back. “Now here’s the important part. I want you to listen carefully.”
She bit her lip. “I’m all ears.”
“No matter what, don’t hold your breath. You can pass out that way. I want you to breathe evenly through your nose, a steady inhale and exhale. The first minute or so is the hardest part. I won’t lie to you, you will be in agony. It’s not going to be a pricking pain; it’ll be a slicing, burning pain. But you must keep breathing.”
“Umm . . .” She gritted her teeth. “Dude, you suck at pep talks.”
“It’s not meant to be one. It’ll hurt. The sooner you accept the pain, the sooner you’ll be able to embrace it. You can cry out, if you want to, but it’s impor
tant that you stay still. Line-work is crucial to holding the tattoo together.” He applied jelly to her shoulder blade and began to rub the area. “Most people are bothered by the sound of the tattoo gun, which is a loud buzzing noise. I can put on music, if you wish.”
“No.” She reached down and gripped his knee. “Don’t leave me.”
“Don’t worry, my lily. I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here.”
God, his voice sounded so good; deep and velvet-smooth. Maybe if she concentrated on it, she’d be able to coast through the pain. It was like aural chocolate. She still couldn’t believe she was going to go through with this. She had to be drunk. No, that wasn’t true. She had never been more sober. She had never been as alert, as aware of her surroundings than she was at this moment. “I’m ready.”
But a second later, she wasn’t. The moment he turned on the tattoo gun, the buzzing noise he described instantly began to tear into her calm.
“Wait!” she gasped. “Wait!”
The tattoo gun was switched off. “It’s all right, sweetheart. It’s all right.”
Marnie slumped face-first against the back cushion of the dentist chair, defeated. She was such an idiot. Why did she think she could do this? She had never been brave a day in her life. She thought she was ready, that she could finally jump into something scary and exciting for once in her life, but that was a lie. She couldn’t go through with this. She should just put on her clothes and slink back home with her bottle of Wild Turkey.
“My lily . . .”
“Marnie,” she muttered into the cushion. “My name is Marnie.”
“We don’t have to do this, Marnie. I can see you’re not ready. I pushed you into it. I apologize.”
She wrapped her arms tightly around the back cushion and sighed. He didn’t push her into anything. The truth was, she was just sick and tired of the way her life had been going for the past few months and jumped onto the first opportunity for change. The change wasn’t necessarily Michael; it was the urge to do something . . . different. The tattoo was going to serve as a beacon of her new life.