Upper arm of a woman wearing a black bikini top, with metallic gold and silver temporary tattoos of chevron bands, a crescent moon, chains and feather and heart charms.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Metallic gold and silver temporary tattoos on upper arm

Fine line · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A close photograph of a woman's upper arm with several stacked metallic temporary tattoos in gold and silver. The designs include chevron bands, a crescent moon, chain link bracelets and dangling feather and heart charms, all drawn in fine lines. The shallow focus blurs a pale sea and sky behind the arm, which keeps the metallic designs as the focal point.

Fine line Upper arm Chain Crescent moon Chevron Feather Heart Bracelet Metallic

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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 foil only holds for three tides, so I cut the bands fresh every time we dock at Halden Reach. Gold for the outbound run, silver for coming home, the chevrons pointing the way the ship is meant to go. Mother said the sea reads metal the way gulls read bread, and a girl who forgets to dress for the water gets taken by it.

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Tonight the crescent goes on last, the one the old moonstation printed on every ration slip before the lights failed. I press it down with my thumb while the tug's hull ticks and groans against the mooring. Through the deck plates I can feel the drive heat rising, and somewhere forward Ilse is calling the drift numbers in the same flat voice she used when we were kids counting shells on the breakwater.

The feather and heart charms are hers. She gave them to me the morning she signed onto the survey barge, dangling from a loop of wire, and said if the sea took her I was to wear them until they peeled. Nobody has told me yet which way the current is running. I only know that silver is the colour the water turns when the light is poor.

At the dock's edge I unclip the last chain, the one with the heart, and fasten it to the bollard where the tide will find it first. The crescent is already lifting at its edges in the wind. By morning the sea will have what it wants of us, and I will be walking the causeway with my arms bare, reading the water for her.