Black and grey realism tattoo of orchids with flowing script lettering across the shoulder and upper arm.

Orchids and script on an upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

Large orchid blooms are shaded in soft greys with fine highlights, and their petals overlap across the shoulder and upper arm. Cursive script runs between the flowers, with the word Love the most prominent. The image is a close crop with a blurred background, and the shading is smooth and detailed.

Realism Lettering Botanical Upper arm Shoulder Orchid Flower Script Quote Love

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Ada,

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The orchids came aboard at Singapore wrapped in wet moss and sacking, and the purser swore they would not last the Cape. Forty-one days later, nine of them are still alive in the glass case bolted to the lee rail, and I have stopped pretending I am not proud of them. The grey-white blooms look carved from soap in the lamplight, each lip speckled like a thumbprint. Mr Pell calls them ghosts. I call them stubborn, which is the better word for anyone who survives a voyage.

Your last letter said I should write plainly, so here it is plainly. I have not slept well since Madras. The line you wrote in the corner of your Christmas card, about knowing where I stand in your heart, I read every night by the stove, and I never answered it properly. I am answering now. When the swell lifts the case, the petals lean toward the porthole as if they want the land, and I find I do too.

Mostly I wanted to tell you that the ninth one flowered yesterday, on the morning we passed the Azores. I will take it to the men at Kew myself. Keep the envelope; the pressed bloom inside is for you. Tell Father I have not fallen overboard.

Your brother, Tom