Close photo of a hand resting on a stone ledge, with a small metallic gold chevron tattoo on the side of the index finger, beside rings and a beaded bracelet.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Metallic chevron tattoo on a finger

Hand · Colour · Photo

A hand rests on a pale stone ledge in warm, sunlit light with soft bokeh in the background. A small metallic gold chevron design with stripe-like bands sits on the side of the index finger, with simple, crisp edges. Several silver rings, one with a turquoise stone, a dark beaded bracelet and dark nail polish complete the composition.

Hand Chevron Stripe Metallic Gold Finger tattoo Ring Nail polish

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The gold leaf never sits still in a draught, and Mrs Pyle's front door was the draughtiest in Scarrow Bay. I had my gilder's cushion, the squirrel-hair brush and a sheet of leaf so thin it lifted if I breathed on it, and the whole of my morning hung on getting three bright stripes onto the chevron above her door before the tide turned up the slipway.

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The chevron was older than the house. Her late husband had painted it on the board in red when he was a harbour boy, a sign for the lifeboat men that the water had reached the high mark on the steps. Mrs Pyle wanted it gilded for the summer lettings, so the guests would think the place was grander than its damp back bedrooms. Every lodger who came down for breakfast stopped at the step to look at the shine, and then looked at the sea, as if to check it was still behaving itself.

A woman from room four leaned on the doorframe while I worked and asked why anyone bothered gilding something the weather would only take back by Christmas. I told her the gold was for people coming up from the station with their cases, and the stripes were for the boats. She didn't answer. She just watched the leaf settle, the last stripe catching a flicker of light off the water.

When I finally stood back, my own knuckle had a smear of gold where the leaf had stuck to me, a small crooked chevron I couldn't wash off. By evening the sun came low across the bay and the sign burned above the door, and I thought the whole row of guesthouses looked like it was waiting for the tide to tell it what to do.