The Brightest Light of Sunshine

Part 1 – Seed

I’m usually not one to make spur-of-the-moment decisions. If anything, I ruminate for weeks about whether this choice or the other will lead to disastrous consequences that will eventually ruin my life.

Like that one time I spent five full days pondering if I really needed those shoes only to find out they were forever out of stock when I finally decided I wanted them.

But this is different because I know I want this.

Damn it, I do.

I’ve been thinking about it for literal months—my dads gave me a thumbs up when I Facetimed them about it, and so did my cousin Aaron and my best friend Emily, the only people whose opinion I fully trust. They didn’t call me crazy or tried to wipe the idea from my mind, which I assume is a good indicator that this is a rational thing to do.

So why am I hesitating now? At the very front of the tattoo parlor, of all places?

There’s a guy inside. As much as he’s trying to look engrossed in whatever is on his laptop screen, I know he’s spotted my awkward nearby presence and is now wondering why the hell I’m standing still in front of the shop.

To be fair, I’m wondering the same thing.

I decide that taking a few seconds to scan him from head to toe and calm my nerves in the process won’t hurt—or head to waist, since the counter hides everything else.

Mysterious Tattoo Guy has got the whole bad boy look going on, which I guess is fitting for someone who tattoos people for a living. What do I know? This isn’t my kind of place, and maybe that’s why I feel so itchy everywhere.

A black t-shirt with the logo of the shop hugs his chest and does nothing to hide how ripped he looks. As I continue my perusal of Tattoo Guy, a question pops into my head—is it possible for arms to be bigger than a human head?

Well, I might just have my answer right there.

Both of his bulging arms are thoroughly covered in ink down to his knuckles. I spy a couple of tattoos on his neck, too. His short, dark hair with a wave is tossed backwards carelessly, but a loose strand falls over his forehead. Is it brown? Black? I can’t tell from here.

What I can tell is that his orbs are as dark as night, because suddenly he lifts his head, and our eyes lock. Great.

Without giving myself another second to think, I push the glass door open. I’ve had enough time to mull this over, and I’ve made my decision.

I think. I hope.

“Hi,” I greet him with a small, nervous smile.

“Hey, there.” He gives me a much easier grin, like he’s used to skittish weirdos walking into his workplace on a daily basis. “What can I do for you?”

I clear my throat and look around quickly. The place looks and smells clean, which I guess is everything I could ask for from a tattoo parlor. The shop seemed smaller from the outside, but now I notice the narrow, well-lit hallway at the back leading to a wider space full of a few stations mostly hidden from view by large screens. The buzzing of a tattoo machine echoes in the walls, so the place mustn’t be empty.

As the best-reviewed tattoo parlor in town, I expected to see a whole queue at the door when I got here. But that’s not how this whole thing works, I suppose.

“So… I, um…” Nope. No hesitating now. I’m already here, aren’t I? “I’d like to book a tattoo appointment, please.”

“Sure. Got any designs in mind?”

His gaze doesn’t move away from mine. He doesn’t look down at the short hem of my summer dress or at my exposed arms. Nothing. But still, the fact that I have his undivided attention, that he’s noticed me at all, makes my blood rush to every corner of my body.

Hot waves of nervous tension pulse through me until they trigger my usual response—a rapid heartbeat, uneven breathing, and a dry mouth.

Calm down. Jeez. He’s being perfectly civil.

“Just a short quote.” That I’m now too self-conscious to say out loud. “And it would have to go on my ribs.”

“It would have to go on your ribs?” he asks in an amused voice.

My cheeks flush and I suspect I look like a tomato salad right now, but I ignore my body’s natural response for my own sake.

“I can’t get it in any visible places. I’m a ballerina,” I explain.

“I see.” The glee isn’t gone from his eyes, and for some reason it makes me feel nervous. I take a step back, hoping he won’t notice.

He does.

“I have a free slot at ten in the morning on Friday. That works for you?” He sobers up at once, not lifting his gaze from the laptop screen. I almost feel bad about it. I shouldn’t be on edge like this, damn it. It’s been four years.

It’s been four years three days ago, actually, which is why I’m about to subject myself to the torture of painful needles and unremovable ink. Even though I can still hear his rough voice and his dark laugh in my head, the memory comes a lot less frequently.

And now it’s as bad a time as any other to allow it back into my system.

Thanks to years of intensive therapy, I know the walls aren’t closing in on me right now. I know my head is playing tricks on me, and that I’m not in some imminent danger. I’m aware of all this, and yet my lungs still close and sweat still clings to my skin and my breathing is still labored.

Clarity hits me then—this is a terrible idea.

“I’m sorry,” I manage to let out among the growing panic rising in my throat. “I… I don’t think I’m ready yet.”

“Okay.” To his credit, he doesn’t pressure me into making the appointment anyway nor does he try to convince me that my nerves will go away the moment I sit on the chair.

A beat of silence in which my feet can’t move and my words don’t come out passes before he speaks again. “Are you all right?”

The unexpected concern in his voice pulls me out of whatever place I was being dragged into, like an anchor at the bottom of the darkest sea.

I can’t believe I’ve lowered my guard like this again.

“Yeah, all good.” I give him an awkward smile that doesn’t reach my eyes. “Right. Okay. I’m… I’m sorry for wasting your time.”

Curiosity fills his gaze, but he doesn’t press. “No worries, sunshine.”

Funny choice for a nickname, because my head feels like a raging thunderstorm right now.

Without saying another word, I turn around and exit the tattoo parlor. Only when I leave the block do I manage to breathe easily again.

Yep, totally a mistake.

I don’t care what happened to me four years ago or how far I’ve come or how strong it made me—I’m not going back there to ink the reminder in my poor skin forever.

***

Callaghan

“Yo, Cal. Who was that?” Trey, my guy at the shop and my closest friend since high school, comes up to me with a scowl on his face. He’s been tattooing our friend Oscar for two hours straight, and what better way to clear his head than to bug me at the front?

“Some girl wanted a tattoo but chickened out at the last second,” I tell him without taking my eyes off the huge windows at the front. It’s pointless—I know she’s not coming back.

I could tell tattoos weren’t her thing the second I spotted her standing outside with that indecisive look on her face. But hey, I’m all for trying new things, especially if my business profits from it.

“Ah, classic.” He sits his hipster glasses higher on his nose. He insists they’re normal-looking glasses, but I’m not buying it. Trey is a goddamn trend-follower if I’ve ever seen one. “Did you know her?”

“Didn’t ring a bell.”

Trey shrugs. “Weird. This place is small.”

Warlington isn’t a small town at all, but I get what he means. Warlington University’s campus is only ten minutes away, and the guys and I know everyone who strolls by. The fact that our parlor is the most popular and best reviewed in town helps—frequenting Danny’s, the most crowded bar in the area, also does.

Everyone, college kids or not, can be found at the bar on a Friday night. And on Saturdays. And on Sundays. And well, pretty much every other day of the week.

Everyone but tattoo-on-my-ribs girl, apparently.

I really shouldn’t call her that. Having worked this job for a decade, I know people have different opinions about tattoos. I never judge, as long as they don’t judge me. Someone has yet to call me a criminal or some shit to my face because of my—perhaps—excessive amount of ink, but I guess my six-foot-three wall of muscles makes them think twice. Good.

“Is Monica still coming at five?” Trey asks. I check our schedule on the laptop. “Yeah, she hasn’t canceled. She’s all yours. I’ve got Aaron in—”

The words die in my throat as the door opens. Speaking of the devil.  Aaron greets both of us with a fist bump when he reaches the front desk.

“Yo.” Trey grins. “Wasn’t your ass here last month?”

Aaron puts his hands up in fake surrender. “Guilty as charged, man. I saw that skull with the snake coming out of its eyes Cal posted last week and I had to get it on me.”

Trey snorts and I break out in a small grin. “Come on, Big A. Let’s get it over with.”

Aaron follows me to my station and instantly removes his t-shirt, messing his short brown hair in the process. He’s here so alarmingly often that he already knows the drill.

As I prepare his skin, he rambles about whatever the hell happened at the gym yesterday. I have no clue who any of his gym buddies are or why this Maddox dude getting a new car is such a big deal, but he’s one of my closest friends, so I listen politely.

Aaron Allen used to be a business major at Warlington University four years ago before he graduated with honors. Now, he owns a tapas restaurant near campus that is filled to the brim every single night. And he doesn’t even work there—he simply comes up with all the business strategies and deals with the finances.

I’ve gone to him for business advice on occasion, which is why I give him a little discount on all his tattoos and why he’s here every few months, probably. Quid pro quo, or so they say.

It’s not until I’ve got the first half of the tattoo done that he changes topics. “Hey, quick question. Did a girl with shortish blonde hair come by earlier?”

I don’t lift my gaze from his forearm as I tell him, “Stop pestering women around town.”

“Gross.” I can’t see him, but he’s definitely making a face right now. “I was asking because she’s my cousin, you fucker.”

At that, I look at him. Only one girl came by the shop today, and she did have shortish blonde hair that reached past her shoulders. “Why are you asking?”

He relaxes back on the chair. “She told me she was going to make an appointment today. Did she?”

A non-committal sound escapes my throat. “She backed out at the last second.”

“Called it.” He sighs and throws his head back. “I knew she wouldn’t go through with it. I love her to death, man, but she’s got this annoying habit of overthinking everything way too hard.”

I remove the excess ink from Aaron’s skin. “You mean she’s a sensible woman who doesn’t jump into shit like you do?”

He snorts. “Right. That’s because you haven’t known her for twenty-two years.”

So, she’s eight years younger than me. Not that her age is any of my business, but it’s still a piece of information I consciously bury in my head. What for, I’m not sure.

“Is she in college?” I ask, because for some reason it intrigues me. Probably because she looked so freaked out when she walked in and hurried out like that.

“English major.” He smiles sheepishly. “She’s so badass. Moved here four years ago all on her own for college. I thought you knew her?”

I shake my head. “I don’t even know her name, man.”

“Right. It’s Grace.”

Grace. She looks like a Grace, all right.

“You coming to Paulson’s party Friday night?” If I didn’t know him, I would be surprised by Aaron’s sudden change of topics. But because I do, I don’t even bat an eyelid.

“Don’t know.” I haven’t given it much thought. “I might have to stay home with my sister.”

If my mother is drunk out of her ass, I want to add, but I don’t.

“Shit. Can’t you bring her with you?”

I stop the needle and give him a funny look. “She’s four.”

Aaron’s torso shakes with laughter. “Fuck, dude. I can’t believe I forgot. I’ve met her! Definitely don’t bring her over or she’ll be scarred for life.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” I mutter.

As if I’d ever let my princess get within two feet of Paulson and his friends. I have nothing against the guys except that they can’t keep the words ‘fuck’, ‘shit’, ‘cock’ and ‘pussy’ out of their mouths for more than five seconds. Which are the last words I want Maddie to incorporate into her ever-growing vocabulary.

And yeah, all right, I’m a foul-mouthed bastard too (sometimes), but at least I can control myself around innocent ears.

I finish Aaron’s tattoo in silence—at least on my part. He keeps chatting about god-knows-what, but my mind is too distracted to pay any more attention.

It’s not that I’m dying to go to Paulson’s on Friday, but I hope for the life of me I don’t have to stay at home for the wrong reasons. My mother’s last sobriety record lasted a total of eight days, and it’s only getting worse as the anniversary of her brother’s death rolls around.

It’s been fifteen years.

To be fair, my mother already had a few issues with alcohol way before Uncle Rob passed away, but it’s gotten worse ever since Maddie was born.

Even though I was living on my own and in another city, I had to move back here when my sister was born because my mother was ‘too exhausted’ to take proper care of her (not like she would ever admit that out loud), and my poor excuse of a stepfather didn’t seem to realize he had a kid to provide for. So it was either I moved back, or I let social services take Maddie away. And that was not going to fucking happen.

Since then, my mom has gotten slightly better at parenting. I still visit my sister every day, drive her to and from school, and sometimes she sleeps over at my apartment, but it’s nothing like the hell I went through when she was born.

Despite living alone, I made sure to rent a place that was big enough for two, with two rooms and two bathrooms, because I knew it would come to this. I knew the time would come when my sister needed a safe haven away from our mother and Pete.

I really don’t want to take my sister away from her home, but if I don’t someone else will, eventually. And then everything will go to hell.

Maddie isn’t unsafe with our mother by any means, or else I would’ve taken her out of that house years ago. My mom isn’t abusive, and Maddie isn’t unhappy with her. No, she’s just… neglected.

I was once a neglected kid without an older sibling to look after me, and I turned out fine. Mostly. But I don’t want that life for her. The moment my mother crosses the line, which I suspect will be soon, I’m taking my baby sister with me for good.

Hell will freeze over before I let my princess have the same miserable childhood I did.