“Just wanted to ask why you’re watching me like a hawk and if it has anything to do with my fiancée or your girlfriend asking you to keep an eye on me?” I said. His eyes widened in terror and he held his hands up as if I was going to attack him.
“Whoa, slow your roll, Tay. I was just doing the big brother thing. You know, looking out for my future sister.” I didn’t believe that for a second.
“Uh huh, sure,” I said. Now I was the one crossing my arms.
He caved in two seconds.
“Okay, fine. Dare told me that you were having a hard time and to look out for you. But I was doing that anyway. Because I love you. You know that, right? Even though you and Hunter aren’t married yet, I already consider you my sister.” Well, damn. Now I was going to get choked up again.
“Dammit, Mase,” I said, wiping my eyes.
“Aw, shit, don’t cry,” he said, wrapping his huge arms around me, but not enough to suffocate me in his chest as he gave me a hug.
“That wasn’t supposed to make you cry. I was hoping that would make you feel better. Dare is gonna kill me.” I laughed through a sniffle.
“It’s okay. I seem to be sorta emotional right now,” I said, wiping my eyes with my sleeve.
Mase rubbed his hand over his hair.
“So, yeah. I’m here for you. Okay?” His face got a little red and then he stepped away from me.
“You’re such a dork,” I said.
“Takes one to know one,” he replied with a wink.
“Mel, do you have a minute?” I said the next time I was at the center. I’d made sure to approach her when she wasn’t too busy and it was a relatively quiet night.
She looked up from her computer and pushed her glasses up on her nose. Her curly hair was still in its ponytail, which would get wilder and wilder as the night wore on, but it was subdued right now.
“Sure, what can I do for you?” She shoved some papers and folders aside and then pointed to one of the chairs in front of her desk.
“Yeah, I just…” I twisted my fingers together and screwed up all my courage.
“I’ve just been having a hard time lately. When I go home and everything. It’s like, I hear all these stories from all these people who are hurting and in these awful situations and it’s hard to turn that off when I go back to my regular life. I can’t stop thinking about them and what else I should have done or could have done.” I stopped myself there so I didn’t start rambling.
Mel sat back in her chair and smiled.
“You remind me so much of myself when I was your age.” It couldn’t have been that long ago; Mel was only in her late thirties, or early forties.
“I know exactly what you’re going through. But if you want to do this job, you have to learn how to shut off that switch when you walk out the door. Or else everything here is going to bleed into your other life. I know it’s hard. What we do isn’t for everyone, and a lot of people burn out after a few years.” She leaned forward and rested her hands on her desk.
“I’m here anytime you need to talk, and if you need to cut back your hours on the phone so that you can take care of yourself, that’s absolutely fine. And if you decide you can’t take calls, that’s also fine. There are plenty of other things to do here.” She gestured around the room, which was overflowing with files and cabinets and boxes of various items. It wasn’t messy, exactly. Just crowded.
We both laughed.
“Are you propositioning me to clean your office?” I asked.
“If I did, would you?” she asked.
I shrugged one shoulder.
“If you asked nice enough.” I’d worked with her long enough to know that I could banter with her like this. Not so much with my boss at the library. That was a more subdued environment.
“Ah, well, as much as I would love to have a clean office, I can’t make you do something that I should be doing myself. But, if you could do me a favor and take those donations and put them in the back room, that would definitely help with the space issue in here.” The boxes were full of clothing items that were donated from local stores. It wasn’t much, but every little bit helped.
I got up feeling a little bit better. Mel patted me on the shoulder and we both picked up a box to drag back to where the donations were sorted. Some things we got were, ah, less than desirable so we had to go through everything first.
For the next hour, Mel and I sorted, chatting about this and that. The night ended with me and two other volunteers working on a design for a fundraising campaign. I hadn’t talked to any victims, and I did have some guilt about that, but it was nice to have a night where I didn’t feel like my heart was being ripped out of my chest.
“Have a good night?” Hunter asked when I got home. He was already in bed and reading. I slipped off my clothes and got in, just in my bra and panties. He quickly put the book aside.
“Yeah. I talked to Mel about everything. How I have a hard time being on the phone and so forth. She was really nice. I think I’m going to take less hours on the phone if I can. Until I build up a tolerance to it, maybe? I’m not sure. I just need to learn how to separate my work there from my life here,” I said, kissing the spot on his chest where his heart beat.
“That’s good. I’ve been worried about you, Missy.” He took my hand and kissed it, then placed it back on his heart.
“Thanks, but I need to figure this one out on my own, I think.” I thought he was going to argue, but he nodded.
“I can understand that. But you let me know if there’s anything I can do, any way I can support you.” This. This was why I loved him. Because he took care of me and let me do my own thing when I needed it.
“I really, really love you,” I said.
“I really, really, really love you,” he said with a smirk. He was trying to outdo me.
“Hey, so I think we should do our tattoos this weekend.” It was a decision I’d made the other night when I couldn’t sleep after thinking about some of the clients at the center.
“Really?” I nodded. He beamed at me and I knew I’d definitely made the right decision. My mom was going to kill me, but this was important. To me. To him. To us together.
“Cool, okay, I’ll start looking around. I haven’t gotten one in a while so I want to find someone who’s good. I’ll ask Summer.” His friend from class had a ton, so she was sure to know who the good artists were.
“Sounds good,” I said, moving my hand and resting my head on his chest. His fingers tangled in my hair. I sighed and closed my eyes.
Things were going to be okay.
“Are you sure you’re up for this?” I asked Taylor as we stood outside of Mainely Tattoo and Piercing. Punny name aside, Summer told me this was the place in Maine to get a decent tattoo. She was good friends with the owner, Rush. I looked at a ton of his stuff online to make sure he was the real deal.
“Uh huh,” Taylor said, nodding her head jerkily and looking up at the sign above the door as if she was looking at the entrance to Mordor.
“Missy¸” I said, turning her toward me. “You don’t have to do this. We can turn around right now and go home.” She bit her bottom lip, which was sexy as hell, but then shook her head and squared her shoulders.
“Nope, I’m doing this.” With that, she turned on her heel and reached for the door, holding it open for me. I flashed back to the first time she’d seen all my tattoos.
“This one, you can see is a seven. It’s a lucky number in many cultures. This is your standard horseshoe. Sailors used to nail them to the masts of their ships to help them stay out of the path of storms.” I turned my back to show her the scarab beetle right on my spine.
Having her see all of me like this was somehow more intimate than if she saw me fully naked. She didn’t know it, but I was showing her parts of me that I didn’t show everyone else.
“You’re really mixing up your mythologies there, Z,” she said and I looked over my shoulder. The nickname zinged in my brain and I rolled my eyes a
t her.
“I’m all for diversity,” I said, trying to blow the whole thing off, but deep inside I was freaking out. I wanted her to like my ink, because it was such a huge part of who I had become. I nearly swallowed my tongue when she got off the bed and walked toward me.
Her fingers reached, as if she was going to touch the beetle, but she stopped herself before they got that far. I couldn’t read the look in her eyes.
“So there you have it,” I said, turning around quickly. “And then I just have a little star on my foot. So that’s my ink history. Now show me yours.” I smiled, just imagining what she could be hiding under those clothes. I’d probably lose my fucking mind.
“Sorry, dude, none to show.” She put the distance back between us, as if she was slamming a door in my face.
“I wasn’t asking about your tattoos, Missy,” I said, leaning forward and bracing my arms just outside her sexy legs. I was screwing with her again. Messing with her was the best part of my day.
“Why, Hunter, are you asking to see my lady parts?” she said sweetly. Her voice when right to my dick.
“Asking is putting it mildly,” I said, telling the truth. Her eyes flicked to my mouth and back to my eyes, as if she couldn’t decide what to do. Her cheeks flushed and she was so damn pretty.
“You’re just messing with me. You said you didn’t screw girls you liked,” she said, her voice not quite as strong as she probably wanted it to be. I looked down and saw that she had the sheets clenched in her hands. Ha, score one for Team Hunter.
“Oh, Missy, if you only knew,” I said, leaning forward like I was going to kiss her. I was so fucking close, but then I pulled back and walked out the door.
“You coming?” she asked because I’d clearly zoned out into the memory.
“Yeah, I’m coming.”
I hadn’t told Taylor ahead of time what I wanted to get. Rush had a fair amount of ink himself, mostly portraits, but he had a few traditional American tattoos, including an anchor on his arm, as well as sparrows flying on the backs of each of his hands.
“You are not getting that,” Taylor said as she leaned over my shoulder to look at the printout I handed to Rush.
More than the stars, written in her handwriting. It had taken some sneaking to get all the words without her knowing. I knew what people said about relationship tattoos, but I didn’t care.
“Yes, I am,” I said, turning to her. She was pissed, but I kissed her angry mouth anyway.
“You know that if you get that, something horrible is going to happen and then we’re going to break up and you’ll have that branded on you forever,” she said, jabbing her finger at the paper. Rush’s eyes flicked between us, unsure if he should intervene or just sit back and let us work it out.
“I want this branded on me forever,” I said, taking her hands. A tiny part of me had hoped that she would see it as a romantic gesture and love it, but I knew my girl better than that.
She yanked her hands out of mine.
“Yeah, you say that now!” The entire shop was watching our little display. The other artists had even turned off their tattoo guns so the buzzing that had been constantly in the background went away.
“Do you want to reschedule?” Rush said, giving me a sympathetic grin.
“Hell, no. Ink me up.” He looked at Taylor, who crossed her arms.
“If he wants to be an idiot, I guess there’s nothing I can do to stop him.” I grinned at her and I could see her fighting a smile.
“You are crazy, you know that right?” she said as I took her in my arms.
“Yup. Crazy for you, baby.” She rolled her eyes, but then smiled.
“You don’t have to do this. You don’t have to do this to, like, prove that you love me. I know you love me. I’ve never doubted that.” I shook my head.
“I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for me. That’s all.” I shrugged and her arms curled around me. Finally. I rested my chin on her head.
“I want your words on me forever.”
It only took Rush a few minutes to do the tracing for my tattoo. Then he asked Taylor about hers. She pulled out a printout as well.
“I want something like this. I really like how the watercolor looks,” she said. I hadn’t been allowed to see hers either.
“Wow,” I breathed. It was beautiful. A peacock feather, but as if someone had done it with watercolors, the colors bleeding into one another and dripping a little. It was perfect. Rush asked her where she wanted it and she lifted up her shirt.
“Right here,” she said, pointing to an area right on her ribs. “I want it to go like this.” She took the picture and positioned it so that the feather was lying vertically on her side, as if it had been placed there.
“And do you want this size?” Rush asked. The design was about nine or ten inches long and several inches wide. Not huge, but not small either.
“Yup,” she said, putting her shirt back down. Rush smiled at her and shook his head.
“That’s gonna hurt like a bitch for your first one. You sure you wanna do this?” Taylor just gave him a look. I had been on the receiving end of that look many times. She might be small, but that look was terrifying.
He rubbed his chin and looked at her.
“Okay, we can do that.”
It took a while to even get to the tattooing part. We had to fill out paperwork and he had to trace the designs and then transfer them to our skin.
Taylor said she wanted to go first for some insane reason, but I talked her out of it. I wanted to give her one last chance to back out before it was too late.
I was getting the words tattooed on my forearm, where I could see them all the time. Taylor balked at that, but then caved in, muttering under her breath.
“This would be pretty easy to cover up. Uh, if the need ever arose,” Rush said, looking from me to Taylor and back. I put my arm up on the table for the transfer.
Taylor grumpily took another seat, which happened to be a rolling chair. She scooted over to me and held out her hand. I moved the arm that Rush wasn’t going to be tattooing toward her and she twisted our fingers together.
“More than the stars,” she said with a smile. Finally.
“More than the stars,” I said under the buzz of the tattoo gun.
Okay, so everyone says that they’re scared of tattoos because of needles, but a tattoo needle looks nothing like an actual needle. More like one of those applicators they use for airbrush makeup. I only knew about that because Renee went to a wedding last summer and had gotten it done before she went.
Hunter’s tattoo took a little over an hour. Mine was going to take a whole lot longer because it required more color and detail.
“You ready?” Rush asked after he’d positioned me on the table. My shirt was hiked up and I had one of my hands behind my head. It wasn’t the most comfortable position, but I was going to suck it up. I was doing this.
“Yup,” I said. Hunter moved into my line of vision, on the rolling chair, and squeezed my foot since he couldn’t really hold my hand.
“You can do this, Missy. No big deal.” He winked and then gave me a panty-melting smile. I didn’t even feel the first touch of the tattoo gun. It was a buzz against my skin and then a quick dash of pain.
“Oh. That’s not so bad,” I said, looking at Rush.
“We haven’t even started, baby girl. Let me know if you need a break.” I nodded as carefully as I could because I didn’t want to move and mess him up.
So, it wasn’t the worst pain I’d ever had, but after a while it became annoying. Plus, my arm started to ache from holding it in a weird position.
“You wanna get up and stretch?” Rush asked. I said I did and Hunter helped me off the table after Rush wiped me down.
“Doing okay?” Hunter asked as I gingerly rolled my shoulders and turned my head. This was a marathon and not a sprint.
“We probably have about another hour and a half to go,” Rush said, looking at the design. It was a lit
tle weird showing everyone in the shop my belly, but I’d had to do it when I’d gotten my belly ring. Still, that had taken a lot less time.
The next hour and a half lasted what felt like an entire day. By the time Rush cleaned me up, slathered something on me and then put what looked like plastic wrap over the tattoo, I was done. So. Done.
“Do you need me to carry you, baby?” Hunter said. He only rarely called me that and it kinda drove me crazy. I just gave him a withering look and tugged my shirt down.
Ow. Seriously. Ow. Moving hurt. Everything hurt.
“Make sure she eats and if you have any questions or problems, please let me know,” Rush said as he gave the aftercare instructions to Hunter since I was still too focused on the pain on my side. It was kind of like a sunburn, only worse.
Hunter helped me out to Sassy and lifted me into the passenger side, buckling my seatbelt for me.
“Ow,” I said, pouting. He kissed my lower lip.
“I know, Missy. But I’m gonna take good care of you.” I raised my eyebrows because there was no way in hell I was up for any kind of sexual activity.
“I swear, if you even breathe on me in a sexual way, I’m going to hurt you,” I said, wincing as he hit a pothole in the parking lot and I bounced in my seat. I wanted to use every single curse word in existence right now.
Why did I think this was a good idea?
“I definitely wasn’t thinking of that. Something more along the lines of making you tea and rubbing your feet while you lay in bed and watch whatever the hell you want on TV.” Now that sounded more like it.
I looked over at him and he smiled at me.
“I know what you need,” he said with a most smug smile. I hated that he did and was so pleased with himself about it.
“I guess,” I said, pretending apathy.
“You know I do,” he said, pretending to sing.
“Ugh, shut up and drive,” I said, closing my eyes and resting my cheek against Sassy’s cold window. He’d finally conceded that his car was officially dead, no bringing it back, no resurrection. We had to make the time to find him something else. I wanted to go to a dealership, but he was all fine with buying something off to a Joe Six Pack from Craigslist.