Side ribs tattoo of realistic hands forming a peace sign, a heart and clasped hands in grey linework with soft pastel washes, with the words Peace, Love, Unity and Respect.

Peace, love and unity hands on ribs

Realism · Ribs · Mixed · Photo

A side-body photograph showing three hand designs stacked down the ribs: a peace sign at the top, two hands forming a heart in the middle, and two hands clasped together below. The words Peace, Love, Unity and Respect sit beside the hands in small script. The hands are drawn in grey shaded linework with soft pastel washes of pink, teal, orange and purple behind them.

Realism Ribs Hand Peace sign Heart Love Script Clasped hands

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The ferry horn sounded twice across Holm Bay, which meant the tide had turned and Nell still hadn't come up from the slipway. Maud wiped her palms on her apron and stood at the bakery window, where she had been painting a word in cream enamel since breakfast. She had the P and the E done. Peace was a difficult word to keep small.

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Nell had taught them the hands when they were girls, the winter their father's boat went out and didn't come back for three days. Two fingers lifted meant I'm fine, don't fuss. Two hands folded into a heart meant come home before the lamps are lit. Two palms pressed together, one over the other, meant I have hold of you, so wait. Their mother used to tap a flat hand on the kitchen table when a conversation had gone far enough, and Nell had insisted that was respect, and that it counted too.

At four o'clock Nell came up the slipway with a bucket of mussels slung on one hip. She saw Maud at the glass and stopped, and Maud watched her sister's face crack open into something like laughter. Nell set the bucket down, lifted her hands to her chest and folded them into the heart, slow and deliberate, the way she always had across crowded rooms and noisy quays.

Maud answered with the clasped hands, then finished the last letter of the word in one long stroke. When the paint had dried she pressed her palm flat against the window, leaving a damp print in the condensation, and on the other side Nell pressed hers to it.