Colour tattoo of a grey maneki-neko cat with a red collar and bell, surrounded by pink cherry blossoms, on the calf.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Maneki-neko cat and cherry blossoms on a calf

Japanese · Calf · Colour · Photo

A grey maneki-neko cat with a green eye, red collar, gold bell and a patterned gold coin sits at the centre of the design, with one paw raised. Pink cherry blossoms with yellow centres and falling petals surround the cat against a blue background wash. The bold outlines and smooth shading on the cat contrast with the flatter colour of the flowers, and the design fills a vertical area of the lower leg.

Japanese Neo-trad Calf Maneki-neko Cat Cherry blossom Bell Coin Petal Flower

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The cat had been waving at Marlow Street since before the Coronation, and Dad said it was the only honest thing in the shop. It sat on the windowsill between a cracked gramophone and a tin of furniture polish, one paw lifted, painted eyes half shut as if it knew something about the rain. Its bell had gone quiet years ago. Mum said the clapper had rusted, but I liked to think it was saving the noise for something.

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When the bank man came in the March of 1956, Dad was out on the Kingsway delivering a wireless and I was minding the counter with my homework spread across the oilcloth. He wanted to see the books. I handed him the ledger and watched him tap his pencil against a column of figures that refused to add up. I thought about the gold coin the cat held, stamped with a pattern like running water. Dad had told me it was for luck, for whoever came through the door.

I lifted the cat down, wiped the dust from its whiskers with my cardigan sleeve and set it on the counter facing the bank man. Then I tapped its raised paw with one finger, the way Dad did when he wanted a customer to think about buying. The bank man laughed, a short surprised sound, and closed the ledger. He said he would come back on Thursday. Outside, petals from the cherry tree by the chapel were blowing along the pavement, pink as boiled sweets, and for once the street looked as though it had been waiting for us.