NS25/EW13

I have no idea what his name is. But he has daughters, and was asking me what Teacher's Day gifts he could get for their teachers.

He had a fist on my stomach and I felt a little embarrassed at the way it vibrated at his touch. It was my first time but it wasn't even painful, just a little ticklish. What is the meaning behind this, he was asking, and I started wishing I spoke as easily as I wrote. 

But even if I told him everything he wouldn't understand my grief; he had two breathing versions of what I lost. While he was etching into my skin the date that she left, I wondered if he had tattoos symbolising his own daughters. If he did, they were probably their initials or birth dates, which was still a whole existence more than mine.

I came back a year later but he wasn't there. Another young lad tattooed my semi-colon, and he took a picture of it to post on their Facebook page. But it didn't mean anything because he kept silent the whole time, never asking me what this tattoo meant to me. 

Last April I returned, with a brilliant idea and a poly friend's rough sketch. My first tattooist was there, and we spent some time coming up with the final draft. I told him I wanted a triangle made of flames and roses and feathers, symbolising the friendship between the two most significant boys of my life and I.

The feathers were the hardest to render, until he eventually suggested making it a whole one instead. It fed me another brilliant symbol: that my hurricane was always made of just one chunk, unlike my rose and I who were made of different bits and pieces. My tattooist made some changes in the drawing on his computer until there it was: our love triangle, laid out before me.

This last tattoo was the most painful for me, physically and probably emotionally. I know it's painful babe, just tahan, he kept reassuring. It only reminded me of the voices at the hospital, telling me it would be alright when I was nearly screaming. I tried my hardest not to flinch even a little after that.

Again, he asked me what it meant and I told him the significance of each side. But I never got to elaborate; once again, I wished I spoke as well as I wrote.

I boarded the train at City Hall again three hours after I entered, with an aching shoulder and a broken heart. It wasn't even the start of this tattoo come to life.

Next station: NS24/NE6/CC1