Black and grey pencil-style flash design of two roses, leaves, a filigree Roman numeral clock and hanging pearls, with the script words 'You know my name, not my Story...'.

Roses, clock and pearls with script lettering

Botanical · Black and grey · Flash

A black and grey drawing of a tattoo design showing two large shaded roses with buds and leaves, a clock face with Roman numerals set within ornate scrollwork, and strands of pearls with teardrop pendants. The script lettering reads 'You know my name, not my Story...' and is drawn with fine, even strokes against a plain white background. The rose petals are built with soft graduated shading and fine hatching, while the clock and scrollwork use crisp outlines.

Botanical Lettering Realism Rose Clock Pearl Script Roman numeral Leaves Scrollwork Teardrop Bud Heart

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The clock over the bandstand at the Palace had stopped at ten to twelve the spring I started minding coats there, and Mr Haskell swore he would have it seen to before the season. He never did. So the whole autumn programme ran by the hands of a clock that said the night was nearly done, and nobody who danced under it seemed in any hurry to leave.

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Ronnie Vale came in every Thursday in a grey suit that had been let out twice. He handed me his hat without looking up, and I knew his name only from the ticket stubs and the way the band leader called it across the floor. He danced with a girl in a rose-print frock who wore a string of pearls with little drop pendants, and when the music slowed she touched the clasp at her throat as though checking it was still there.

One night in October I found a folded card tucked inside his hat band. The writing was careful and looping, and it said only that the man who wore the hat had a name I already knew and a story I would never be told. I read it twice with the cloakroom door shut. Then I put it back where I found it, because a name is only a thing people call you, and I had learned that from my own.

When he came for the hat the following Thursday he looked at me properly for the first time, then up at the clock. It still said ten to twelve. Some things keep better stopped, he said, and tipped his head at the card in my hand. I walked home along the sea wall with the waltz fading behind me, and I did not once look back at the clock.