Two forearms in black and white, each with a small black fine line anchor and a flock of birds rising towards the elbow, shown as a matching pair.

Matching anchor and bird flock forearm tattoos

Fine line · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

Two people's forearms are shown side by side, holding hands, each with a small black anchor at the wrist and a flock of simple black bird silhouettes rising up the forearm. The linework is clean and minimal, with solid black fills and no shading. The photograph is black and white, and the matching designs are framed centrally against a neutral background.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The officer at the booth turned Marta's passport over twice, as if the back might have something to say. Behind her the queue for the Calais ferry bent around the car park, and a gull walked the length of a stranded trolley. Her sister stood on the kerb with both hands in her coat pockets, which was how Ruth stood when she was trying not to hold anything.

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They had had the designs done the same week, back when they shared a bedsit above a chip shop in Folkestone. Ruth had drawn the anchor on a paper napkin, and Marta had wanted the birds, a loose cloud of them lifting off the wrist. The artist had made the flocks the same size on both arms, so that when they held hands in a queue the two lines of birds seemed to meet in the middle, like something about to take off. 'Anchor's for the one who stays,' Ruth had said, laughing, and Marta had said somebody had to be the weather.

The officer handed the passport back without looking up. 'Purpose of travel?' 'Work,' Marta said, which was true enough: a contract at a hotel in Lille that started on Monday. She took three steps towards the barrier and felt the pull at her wrist, the small tug you get when a line goes taut under water. Ruth had not moved from the kerb. She was not waving. She was doing what she always did at the end of a visit, counting the birds on her own arm with one finger, as if one might have gone missing in the night.

The starlings came off the wire above the barrier all at once, the way they do when nothing has frightened them, and tilted over the lorries in a dark ribbon. Marta watched them climb, turn and settle again on the far side of the car park, where the sea began. When she looked back, Ruth had taken one hand out of her pocket, and the anchor on her wrist caught the light for a second before she let it drop.

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