Colour tattoo of a blue butterfly with orange markings and black outlines on a woman's shoulder.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Blue butterfly on a shoulder

Shoulder · Colour · Photo

A butterfly with blue wings, orange markings and dark outlines is shown in flight on a bare shoulder. The linework is bold and the wings have soft shading that gives them a slightly dimensional look, with a faint shadow beneath. The tattoo sits in the centre of a softly lit close crop, with a hand resting on the upper arm at the right edge.

Shoulder Butterfly Wing Insect

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Marjorie,

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I nearly didn't come to the reunion. Then the envelope arrived with your handwriting on it, all those looping capitals, and I remembered you were the only one who ever believed Mr Pryce's cabinet had a specimen missing on purpose. So I'm writing instead, since the hall will be full of people asking about our mortgages.

You'll remember the summer of the Lepidoptera project. We were twelve, and I was sure the blue one from the field behind the bins was a Purple Emperor, though you said it was a common blue with ambitions. We kept it in a shoebox with holes punched in the lid. On the Friday you carried the box down to the river bank and lifted the lid, and the butterfly sat on your wrist for a long time before it decided anything.

I have thought about that butterfly more than is reasonable. It went up over the willows with orange flashing along the edges of its wings, and it did not look back. You said then that a thing that leaves is not the same as a thing that is lost. I told you that sounded like a greetings card, and you told me to stop being so literal, and we both went home for tea.

Anyway. Come and find me by the sandwiches. I'll be the one in the wrong shoes with a pocket full of proper tea bags. Bring the rest of the cabinet story with you. I want to hear whether you ever found out who took the Emperor.

Yours, still literal, Hettie