Close-up of a black serif lettering tattoo reading I'm the hero of this story, running along the side of the ribs above grey fabric.

Serif quote tattoo along the side ribs

Lettering · Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

The photograph shows a line of black serif lettering reading "I'm the hero of this story." across the skin of the side torso, sloping gently upward from left to right. The letters are solid black with crisp, even edges and little visible shading. The skin is warm toned, and a grey knitted fabric sits bunched along the lower part of the frame.

Lettering Ribs Quote Text

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The proof reached the shop at half past six, pinned to foolscap that smelled of Mr Vane's pipe. Ada read it standing at the imposing stone, thumb still sore from the morning's sorts. Chapter nine closed as chapter one had opened, with Inspector Fenwick striding out of the fog with the stolen ledger under his arm. Beneath it, in the author's loping hand, was a line he wanted set at the foot of the page: I'm the hero of this story. He had underlined hero twice, as if she might argue.

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She had set three years of his chapters. Her name appeared nowhere in the back matter, though the imprint at the foot of each page carried the house's name, and the house was hers in all but the paperwork. She knew the ledger had not been found by Fenwick. It had been found by Nell from the laundry, in chapter three, who was given one sentence of gratitude and never mentioned again.

Ada took the lead from the case and began on the line, letter by letter, in the plain roman face, not the italic he fancied. She counted as she went, out of habit: twenty-nine characters, the apostrophe, and the full stop he had forgotten to write and she had supplied. When the forme was locked and inked, she pulled a proof and laid it on the bench to dry.

Mr Vane came in at nine, hat already in his hand. He read the page and nodded. "That's the heart of the thing," he said, tapping the sentence. "Clean as a bell."

"Whose story is it, sir?"

He laughed and clapped her shoulder the way he might a good dog. Ada waited until he had gone, then took a spare proof, wrote beneath his line in pencil, and pinned it to the frame where the bindery would find it: Set by A. Penrose, who was also here.