Neo-traditional colour tattoo of a glowing lantern surrounded by pink and teal clouds and stars, on the forearm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Pastel lantern with clouds and stars on a forearm

Neo-trad · Forearm · Colour · Photo

A lantern with a pink glass body, gold fittings and a pink handle sits at the centre, wrapped in teal and pink cloud shapes. Speckled stars, small sparkles and dotted trails run down beside it, with two pink teardrops and a purple teardrop below. Bold dark outlines and smooth colour fills give a bright, pastel palette against the skin, and a partial second tattoo is visible at the lower edge.

Neo-trad Forearm Lantern Cloud Star Sparkle Teardrop Dot

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The lanterns at the Gull Pier Ballroom were lit only on Thursdays, when Mrs Abernethy climbed the step ladder with her tin of paraffin and her brass key. For three summers you had watched her from the cloakroom door. This year she handed you the spare wick and said, "Don't scorch the clouds, they took me a week to paint." The pink glass was warm when you lifted it down, and the gold collar caught the last of the sun coming off the water.

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By nine the floor was crowded with sailors on leave and girls in borrowed shoes. A band from Ramsgate played a slow foxtrot, and paper stars cut from old sugar sacks swung from the rafters on fishing line. Teddy Vance crossed the room with two lemonades and no nerve, and you pretended not to notice him stop twice. Each time the door opened, the lantern above the bar shivered, and small drops of wax ran down its handle and hardened on the wood like sweets left out in the rain.

When the last waltz ended, Teddy finally asked, and you said yes before he had finished the sentence. You danced until the lantern guttered, and then you were both out on the pier, counting the dark spots of wax that had dropped through the gaps in the boards to the tide below. "Your lantern's going out," he said. You laughed and told him it was only tired, and the teal and pink clouds glowed once more before the wick gave up, leaving the black water scattered with the sparks it had shed.