Authors: Riley Jean
“Yeah, a tattoo. Nineteen’s a big year, we gotta make it memorable.”
I eyed him doubtfully. “Nineteen?” It didn’t seem like a big deal to me. Not like twenty or twenty-one.
He lifted a shoulder as he unlocked the barred doors. “What? I missed eighteen. You didn’t get your first ink without me, did you?”
“No,” I said, following him into the shop.
Lexi and I had gotten belly button piercings last summer for my eighteenth birthday—a huge middle finger to what could have been my wedding night. She had to use her fake ID since she wouldn’t turn eighteen until October. We went back for her actual birthday and she got a pink butterfly tattooed on her lower back. But I just came for moral support. Back then, a permanent mark was where I drew the line.
He turned on the lights and I finally got a good look at the place. It was clean. The electric purple walls were covered with band posters, client photos and clusters of mini sample tattoos framed in black. He directed me to a orange leather couch that had seen better days, and handed me a few more sample binders.
“Look around. I have an idea, but first see if anything catches your eye.”
* * *
I was going to do it. I was going to get a tattoo. Tonight.
The only problem: first I had to decide what to get.
Ricky left me alone to wander around the store and flip through sample books. I spent half an hour going through illustration after illustration. Tribal graphics. Skulls. Asian symbols. None of those were really me. The stars were pretty cool, but they seemed too trendy. I considered a simple script, but couldn’t narrow it down to one word or phrase that covered it all. How does one define themselves in a single tattoo? There was too much I wanted to say, and too much I had yet to figure out. Maybe that’s why many people never stopped at just one.
“Don’t even think about it,” a voice snapped me from my thoughts.
“What?” I was standing over a book at the counter and looked down to realize my fingertip was tracing the lines of a cursive letter G. My hand sprang away from the page like it was covered in a layer of spiders instead of thin, harmless plastic.
Ricky rolled his eyes at my ridiculousness. “Okay, since you obviously haven’t made a decision, here.” He hefted a book on top of other. It was his personal sketchpad—
a Ricky Storm original!
My insides were giddy to see what tattoo Ricky had designed just for me.
The image stared back at me, calculating, ready to pounce. Its long body oozed power and elegance wearing a brilliantly detailed coat of jagged stripes and soft fur over muscle. Two glowing yellow eyes held a predatory gleam, captivating and terrifying all at once. The animal was so lifelike I almost expected to hear it growl. Down to every last detail, it was absolutely breathtaking.
I hovered over the counter for a better inspection, entranced. “Why a tiger?” I asked. Realistic was his best work, in my opinion. And it was a beautiful piece of art. But I knew Ricky and he didn’t like that kind of praise. He didn’t want me to merely admire it, he wanted me to understand.
He stood behind me, staring at the drawing from over my shoulder. “Tigers are fierce. Strong. They fear nothing.” I could feel his eyes on my profile then. Assessing. If he was nervous for my reaction, he hid it well. “It made me think of you.”
“I love it,” I breathed and turned to face him with the book in my hands.
He smiled tentatively down at me. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. And I know just where it should go.”
I lifted the sketchpad and pressed it against him so the tiger displayed across his chest.
“Right here.”
His face twisted in wry amusement. “Very funny, kiddo.”
“I
wish
I was any of those things you described. But I’m not.” He was extremely biased to believe I deserved to wear that symbol. It was all Ricky.
He
possessed those traits. Not me.
“I know,” he said to my surprise, and placed his hands over mine to slowly push the book back towards me. “Which is why you need the tattoo.”
I studied the image again and tried to see everything Ricky intended, as well as my own immediate interpretation. Strength. Fearlessness. Power. Grace. Maybe I wasn’t those things, but I wanted to be. And Ricky wanted to give that to me. He was teaching me how to defend myself and how to carry myself to be in control. Now he wanted to give me my very own protector to wear.
It was easy enough to read when the light bulb clicked on for me. Ricky wasted no time before turning a couple pages forward in the book.
“Then I had another thought,” he muttered. And he came upon the image of a rose at half bloom. My eyes widened on the lovely sketch, feminine and soft. It was such a polar opposite from the tiger it threw me for a loop.
“How did you know?” I asked, unable to tear my gaze from the picture.
“I just know,” he said quietly. “It’s like that quote. You always stop to notice the roses and shit.”
It was true. Roses had always been my favorite flower. These days every other girl wanted something more modern or exotic, but my preference remained with the classic beauty. I loved them even though they were delicate and grieving. I loved them long before Vance mispronounced my last name and dubbed me Rosie. Believe it or not, I had even grown fond of the nickname.
Which reminded me… Ricky wasn’t the first to associate me with the rose. I almost brought up the funny coincidence before I realized that was probably a bad idea. He put a great deal of thought in this drawing to make it personal. I wouldn’t attribute it to somebody else.
“You didn’t choose a color,” I observed. The stem and leaves were green but the petals themselves—although shaded into velvety elegance—were without hue. I knew that colored roses symbolized different things. I wondered if he had been unable to choose one for me. “Unless…”
“White,” he said, measuring my reaction. “I thought it should be white.”
White… Purity. Chastity. Innocence. I blushed at the thought of how fitting it was.
In one sense, a single white rose was right for me. But in another, it felt wrong.
“I love this one… except…” I hesitated, “I’m torn on the white.”
The barest trace of a smile appeared, as if my uncertainty had greatly pleased him.
“That’s exactly what I thought you’d say. I just wanted to show you my initial thought process with these first two sketches. Here’s my final idea.”
He flipped ahead a few pages again and landed on another image of a similar rose. Like the first, it was partially bloomed with new petals peeking out from its silky bud, and lightly kissed with droplets of glittering dew. It had the same long, thick stem that curled at the end and clusters of green leaves on each side. But this one was partially colored. The rose was still mostly white, but each petal was slashed with deep red, jagged lines, giving it a more unique and tortured appearance.
“It’s called a tiger-striped rose.” He explained how they blend two colors to get the hybrid effect. Apparently these flowers usually had a more random, marble pattern instead of those distinct animalistic markings. So his design was one of a kind.
“Just a little creative freedom,” he said.
When it dawned on me what he had done—combining the two images and their symbols—I couldn’t control the face-splitting grin that took over. It was classy. It was edgy. It was elegance and strength. It was innocence and anguish. It was…
“Perfect.”
* * *
I decided to put the rose over my right shoulder blade. That way it’d be easy to cover if necessary, yet not a place too intimate for Ricky’s hands. My work shirt had to go. Fortunately I was wearing a tank top underneath, so I just lowered the straps. I was too anxious about the needle to care that Ricky was going to see more of my skin than people typically saw. It was one of the more tame spots a tattoo could go, I reasoned. Besides, he was a professional.
I wrapped my hair up in a messy bun and straddled the high back of his client chair, leaning forward to give him access to my bare skin.
“There’s nothing I love more than a blank canvas,” he mused, slapping on a pair of latex gloves.
“I’d never let anyone else be my first,” I replied, too nervous to be embarrassed by my inadvertent innuendo.
He chuckled and fiddled with his supplies, testing the machine and doing whatever he needed to do to get ready. Unfortunately I’d caught a glimpse of the sharp tool lying in his work station before I sat, and I feared that seeing it in his hands would make me change my mind. The angry buzzing sound alone made me tense. So I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on breathing.
He rubbed some kind of gel over my shoulder area. “Relax. It’s your first time. I’ll be gentle,” he said, returning my suggestive comment.
“Gentle?”
I snorted. “I saw the size of that thing.”
This time he barked out a laugh. “Be brave, kiddo. Like a tiger.”
I meant to growl, but it came out as a tiny little rumble.
“Cute.”
“Shut up.”
Yeah. It hurt like hell.
But a funny thing happened while that needle was hammering away at my flesh. I felt myself changing, strengthening. Overcoming a past fear. Defining a little piece of myself. Letting the jagged lines pierce deeply into my skin and fill my entire being.
Through the whole ordeal, I concentrated on all the things my tattoo stood for. Strength. Fearlessness. Power. Grace. And I tried to be brave. I refused to submit. This time I would show fortitude in the face of pain—physical or otherwise. So I gritted my teeth and didn’t cry or complain while the needle stabbed my skin for what seemed like hours. I was in control and ready for a fresh start. There was nothing left to lose, therefore nothing left to fear.
* * *
I stood in front of the double-mirror, twisting and turning to admire my new tattoo from all angles. My skin was a little red and swollen. But that didn’t hide the fact that it was absolutely gorgeous, a real work of art. A soft and delicate rose with edgy and powerful stripes running through each petal like veins. Wearing it immediately made me feel a newfound strength.
“You like it?”
To the general public, Ricky Storm had exactly two expressions: stoic and pissed. Unless the ladies were into that sort of thing, I could only assume there was a third side to him, too.
But I refused to believe anyone ever saw
this.
The way his smile touched his eyes slightly more than his mouth.
This
look was reserved only for me.
I looked at up him with my big brown eyes dancing in delight. For the first time he didn’t feel like just a big brother to me. He felt like a friend.
“I
love
it, Ricky. This is…” I shook my head at a total loss. “You’re badass. You know that, right?”
His lips twitched. “So the rumors say.”
I turned back to examine the mirror. “Well, I’d like to think I know you better than the average rumor mill. And I say you’re badass.”
Just as he was wrapping my shoulder in gauze, my cell vibrated. Who in the world would be texting me at this time of night… or morning…? I pulled it open to read.
Vance: Just making sure you’re safe. Text me when you get home?
I shook my head, amused. Speaking of rumors, it looked like Vance was still a little paranoid when it came to the notorious Ricky Storm and his big, bad motorcycle.
Just as I was about to respond, the phone was snatched from my hands.
“Ricky!” Suddenly feeling like the little sister again, I jumped on my toes, trying and failing to retrieve my cell. He used his arms and turned his body to block me while he read the text.
“‘Just making sure you’re safe,’”
he scoffed. “What the fuck? I’m safe.”
“Safe as jamming a giant needle in my skin!” I threw at him, still trying to grab back my cell. “If you didn’t want my friends to worry, maybe you shouldn’t have kidnapped me from work!”
He laughed and held it over my head, putting forth only minimal effort to keep it out of my reach. “Is this from the guy in the apron?”
“His name is Vance and he’s nice! Don’t be a dick!”
He looked back at my phone and started pressing buttons with his thumbs. “What else you got in here?”
“Ricky! Stop!”
“This thing is ancient! It doesn’t even have touch screen!”
My measly little body wasn’t strong enough to bring him down. But that didn’t deter me from trying as I shoved and grumbled and grabbed for it.
“Give me… my… phone!”
He froze. The way he went from warm and playful to rigid in a split second told me that he had discovered my archived folder.
“The hell?” he said crossly. His eyes darted from the screen to me. “You kept his texts?”
I stood still, knowing by the hard set of his jaw that playtime was over.
“Yes.”
His eyes tightened in the corners. “Why?”