Fine-line outline of a standing deer with the word 'always' written in script across its body, tattooed on the inner forearm near the wrist.

Deer outline with 'always' on a wrist

Fine line · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A single-line outline of a young deer stands with its head turned, and the word 'always' in cursive script runs across its body. The linework is thin and even, with a small amount of soft shading on the legs and hooves. The tattoo is in dark brown or black ink and sits centrally on the inner forearm against a plain light background.

Fine line Forearm Deer Always Script Outline Animal

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The fawn is on the bike shed roof again, and Mrs Okafor in flat 41 has rung the council twice about it. You lean on the fourteenth-floor balcony with a mug of tea going cold and watch it pick across the felt, stepping neatly over the puddles, head swung back over one shoulder as if someone has called its name from the stairwell. Nobody has. The estate is still asleep, and the only sound is the 6.12 train easing out of the cutting beyond the car park.

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Your nan never let a phone call end without it. Ta-ra, love, see you soon, always, scribbled at the bottom of every postcard from Margate in capitals that leaned as if they were running for a bus. Forty-one postcards now sit in a shoebox under your bed, and you have not been able to throw one away. You find yourself thinking the word the way you would think of a light left on in another room.

By the time you get the lift down, the fawn has left the roof and is standing by the wheelie bins, one foreleg lifted, the way it stood on the railway bank last week. Its hooves have left dark prints in the oil stain by the ramp. It does not run when the doors open. It looks at you, then at the gap in the railings that leads down to the allotments, and waits, as if it is the one who has to be sure you are coming too.

You write on the back of a takeaway menu and pin it to the lobby noticeboard for Mrs Okafor: Deer on bike shed, 6am, no harm done. Then, because your hand moves before you tell it to, you sign it the way your nan did, in capitals that lean. Always. The next morning the menu has gone, and so has the fawn, but the bike shed roof has a fresh line of small, careful prints running from one edge to the other.