Peace symbol tattoo on an ankle

Mhairi from the pier office drew on the back of my hand before we cast off, same as she does every Tuesday, a circle in blue biro with three lines inside it. She tapped the centre with her thumb to show me where the lines should meet. She said it was the sign for the fish who can't read the shipping forecast. I told her it was the sign for something else entirely, and she laughed and said that was the trouble with signs. Her string bracelet, the one she plaits from baler twine and dyes in the tea urn, slid down over her knuckles while she talked. I've been trying to get my own lines even all afternoon, and they keep leaning.

Halfway over, the swell came in from the Sound and the deck went out from under the pallets. Iain Dhu put out a hand to the rail without looking, the way you'd steady a door. Then he took the biro from my pocket and drew a dotted line from the bow cleat, up along the gunwale where the salt had dried white, and round the corner of the wheelhouse as far as the paint allowed. He didn't say what it was for. He gave the pen back and said one word, which was the first word I'd heard from him all winter, and it was only the Gaelic for 'there'.

At Arinagour he went ashore first with his cap in his fist. I checked the manifest twice. The eggs were whole, the mail was dry, and the line on the rail was still there when we tied up, the ink holding in the spray.