Watercolour-style lavender sprig tattoo on the forearm, with a black Celtic knot band near the wrist.

Lavender sprig on forearm

Botanical · Forearm · Colour · Photo

A bunch of lavender stems with purple flower spikes and fine dark stems rises up the forearm from near the wrist. Soft purple, blue and pink washes sit behind the flowers, and the stem lines fade out towards the bottom. A solid black Celtic knot with partial lettering sits above the lavender near the wrist, on a plain background.

Botanical Forearm Lavender Sprig Flower Celtic knot Watercolour wash

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mrs Okonedo on the eleventh floor had been growing lavender in old paint tins since before the lift was fixed for the first time, and every June she sent her grandson down to the car park with a bunch tied in string for whoever had been kind to her that year. I was the one who had carried her shopping up the stairs when the lift broke in March, so I got the first bunch, in a jam jar, with a note that said only "for the wash-water, not for drinking."

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I kept it on the sill of the stairwell window, where the light came in grey and then blue, and I learned that lavender goes on looking purple long after it has stopped smelling of much. Tom from flat fourteen said it was the same with men and their promises. He was joking, mostly. He had a drawer full of lavender sachets from a market in Brighton and kept swapping them for the ones I made, because mine were cheaper and not as neat.

Mrs Okonedo died in the autumn. Her grandson came up with a cardboard box and asked if anyone wanted the tins. I took three. I scrubbed the rust off the biggest, filled it with compost from the bin behind the garages, and pushed in the last cuttings I could find, stems bent and grey at the base. Most of them sulked through the winter, and I told myself they were just tired.

In the second June, one spike opened, a purple going blue at the top and fading to nothing where the stem ran thin. I stood on the balcony with the wind pulling at my cardigan and thought, that's her, the stubborn old thing, still making a fuss on the eleventh floor.