Black and grey realism tattoo of a smiling man with swept-back hair and the words The King in script, on the upper thigh.

Black and grey portrait with script on thigh

Realism · Thigh · Black and grey · Photo

A large portrait of a smiling man with swept-back hair fills most of the upper thigh, his hand raised near his face and a wristwatch visible on the wrist. The face and hair are rendered in fine, smooth shading with strong contrast, and a small round emblem sits beside the arm. Script lettering reading The King runs along the bottom edge, and the image is entirely black and grey.

Realism Lettering Thigh Portrait Man Hair Hand Wristwatch Script Lettering Emblem

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Sit yourself down by the fire, our Dot, and mind the kettle, because this is a long one and my throat's not what it was. Ask anyone in Hollin Pit what happened to the Pritchard whippet and they'll tell you the dog was cursed. I'll tell you it was only ever a dog with a stubborn streak and a fine coat.

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Every Saturday that summer the lads gathered behind the Miners' Welfare with their pocket watches out, timing the straights on the cinder track. The dog was called King, after nothing grander than the card in Bert Pritchard's pocket, and he ran like the wind had been let off its chain. Bert kept him sleek with goose grease and wore his good ring out of pride on a hand that smelled of coal and liniment. Every man in the village combed his hair back that year, because Bert said a winner should look like one even standing still.

Then came the night of the big race, when the lamp at the far bend guttered out halfway round and the whole field went blind. King didn't stop. He ran on the sound of the others, nose to the rail, and he came in first by a whisker that nobody could measure, not even Bert's watch, which had stopped dead at the start and never went again.

Bert wore that watch to his grave. The brass disc he pinned to my coat that night still sits in my tin of buttons, stamped with the colliery crest and a date you can barely read. Hold it to the light, love, and you'll see the dog's name scratched under the crest by a boy who was too proud to ask anyone to spell it. Right, pass me those biscuits, and don't go telling your mam I got to the good bit first.