Photograph of a blue-inked butterfly tattoo group of five on the outer thigh, with the skirt being lifted beside it.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Five butterflies down a thigh

Thigh · Colour · Photo

A cascade of five butterflies with outlined wings and shaded detail descends diagonally from the upper thigh towards the knee. The ink is navy blue with grey shading, and the largest butterfly sits at the top with the smaller ones trailing below. A pink skirt is gathered in one hand, and a grey knit cardigan sits above, against a plain indoor background.

Thigh Butterfly

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Nan counted them the way other people counted change, under her breath with one finger lifted off the handle of the watering can. Five, she said, that's the lot. I didn't believe her until I looked along the buddleia by the shed and saw them hanging there with their wings shut, dark as slate, and only the navy edges showing. The biggest sat at the top of the bush and the others crept down the stalks behind it, each one a little smaller, like a family coming down the stairs in the wrong order.

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They came every September from somewhere beyond the allotments, and Nan said the first one was the leader and the rest only followed her. You didn't cut the line, she told me, and you certainly didn't put a net over the leader to show Mr Okafor at school on Monday. I did it anyway, the summer I was nine. I crept up the path with the jam jar and the old butterfly net from the cupboard under the stairs, and the net caught on the gate hinge and tore right across the mesh.

The leader lifted before I could reach her. The others went up after her one by one, wings catching the light, and they drifted over the fence in a crooked line towards the allotments. I stood there holding the torn net and the empty jar. Nan didn't say a word. She just turned the tap back on and let the can fill up until it spilled over the edge.

These days I have a garden of my own with a buddleia that is far too big for it. Last week I came out with the kettle and found five of them on the fence post, wings closed, sorting themselves out in the order they had always kept. I didn't reach for anything. I lifted one finger off my mug and counted them out loud, the way she taught me, so they would know someone was keeping track.