Black and grey tattoo of ornate scissors with a beetle on one blade, shown on the inner forearm, in a dotwork and realism style.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Scissors and beetle on a forearm

Dotwork · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

An ornate pair of open scissors with a dashed cut line runs down the inner forearm, with a detailed beetle with spread wings resting on one blade. The linework is fine and the shading is built from stippled dots, giving the metal and the insect's shell texture and depth. The tattoo is rendered only in black and grey on a light skin tone, centred on the forearm against a dark background.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell,

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The beetle came out of the ticket box on Tuesday, sitting on the good scissors as if it had paid for the seat. Mr Halloran swears it rode in with the rope-walker's trunk from Skegness, but I reckon it smelled the sugar in the candy floss cart. Either way, I was halfway through trimming Dolly Pickersgill's fringe when it lifted its great horned head and walked straight across my cutting table.

Nobody at the fair would hold still for it. The strongman shrieked, the twins from the ghost train climbed onto the tombola, and Halloran wanted it squashed before the vicar came round for Sunday's show. I wouldn't let him. Those scissors were Father's, the pair he used on the ringmaster's coat for thirty years, and I'd sooner lose a finger than let anyone crush a thing that had settled so neatly on the blade.

So I left the scissors open and the beetle where it was. I chalked a dashed line down the awning cloth, the way Father always did, to show where the cut should go. It was a long night, Nell. By morning the beetle had wandered off towards the bins behind the big top, and I'd stitched Halloran's canvas back together with a seam he didn't deserve.

Tell Mum I'm eating properly. The gingerbread on the pier is awful, but the man who sells it is kind, and he says the autumn fair goes to Hunstanton. I'll write again from there.

Love, Ruth

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