Colour tattoo of a fisherman silhouetted on a boat at sunset above a leaping bass, on the upper arm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Angler and leaping bass on an upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A silhouetted angler stands on a small boat under a sky of orange, yellow and grey clouds, casting a rod towards the water. Below, a large bass leaps from teal water with a lure in its mouth, with green reeds rising at the lower edge. The fish is shaded with soft greys and highlights, while the sky and water use bright, blended colour across the composition.

Realism Upper arm Boat Fish Sunset Cloud Water

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dad never let me cast until the sky had gone the colour of marmalade over Hollin Mere, because he swore the bass only came up to feed once the light lay down flat on the water. We pushed out from the boathouse at the edge of Ashby Wood, where the pines stopped and the village began with its one lamp, and we rowed past the reeds with the oars dripping gold.

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The lure was a wooden plug he had painted himself, red over white, with a split tail he'd glued back on after a pike took the first one. He tied it on with a fisherman's knot and handed me the rod without a word, which was his way of saying he trusted me with the cast. I flicked it low, the way he'd taught me, and it landed with a small clean sound like a coin dropping into a tin.

Something big came out of the water as though it had been thrown. I saw the silver flank, the open mouth, the lure gone bright in its jaw, and then the line was singing off the reel and the rod was bucking against my palms. The bass shook its head, dived under the boat, came up again, and for a long minute neither of us spoke. Then the plug flew free and the fish slid back into the teal water as if it had only been showing off.

Dad laughed until he had to sit down. He didn't reel the lure in, just passed it across the seat and said the fish had been paid its due and was welcome to keep the rest. I still carry that plug in my coat pocket. Some evenings I take it out at the kitchen table and turn it over, and the red paint has worn to pink where my thumb keeps finding it.