Two photographs of a black ink handwritten lettering tattoo of a quote across a person's upper back, placed between the shoulder blades.

Handwritten quote across upper back

Lettering · Back · Black and grey · Photo

Two side-by-side photographs show the back of a person with a long block of handwritten lettering in black ink across the upper back. The text runs over several lines, with fine, slightly uneven strokes and some lines set closer together than others. The skin tone and lighting are natural, and the head and face are not shown.

Lettering Back Quote Text Handwriting

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Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The train is already sliding out when you find the note, folded small inside the pocket of the coat you lent her in March. Her handwriting leans forward as if it is in a hurry to reach the margin. You read it standing on platform four at Crewe, with the wind pushing crisp packets along the tracks and a tannoy announcing a delay to nobody in particular.

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It is not a love letter, not exactly. It is a list of instructions written in the careful, slightly uneven pen she uses when she is trying not to cry: that you are braver than you think, that the kettle always takes longer on the second go, that if the days ever stop feeling like yours, you should go and stand somewhere with a view of water. Each line sits a little closer to the one above it, as if she ran out of paper and refused to waste the space.

You fold it back along its creases and feel foolish for the lump in your throat. The Leeds train pulls in on the far side, doors sighing open, and a man with a bike asks if this is the one for Carlisle. You tell him you have no idea, which is the truest thing you have said all week.

The note goes into your inside pocket, against your ribs, where you can feel the paper with every breath. You walk to the end of the platform, where the lamps stop and the sky goes the colour of wet slate, and you read it once more, out loud, to nobody, because she asked you to and because the sentences still hold.