Close photo of a small, thin black fine line cross tattooed on the inner wrist of a hand held up against a beige carpet.

Small cross on the inner wrist

Fine line · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A small Latin-style cross is drawn in thin black linework on the inner wrist, shown with the hand raised and the fingers curled over. The cross is simple and open, with no shading or fill, and sits centrally on the wrist just below the crease. The plain beige carpet behind the hand keeps the focus on the tattoo and the pale skin.

Fine line Forearm Cross

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Maggie,

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The ward went quiet around three, the way it does when the drip alarms have been silenced and everyone who can sleep is sleeping. I sat at the end of the corridor with a trolley of clean linen and a flask of tea gone lukewarm, and I thought about you telling me I'd never last a night shift without going soft. You were right about the coffee and wrong about the rest.

Mr Adeyemi in bay four watched me tick the observation chart this evening and asked what the small crosses were for. I told him they meant I'd been, that I'd looked and everything was as it should be. He said his mother used to draw one on the bread before she cut the loaf, so the knife would be kind to it. I didn't know what to say to that, so I said I'd remember, and I suppose I will.

Something happens at this hour. A man in bed nine wakes up and asks what day it is, and you tell him, and he settles. Nobody writes that down. I keep thinking about the thin black marks I make on the board each hour, small and plain, saying I came, I checked, I was here. Tomorrow I'll tell the day sister I finally understand why the old ones never trusted a clean page.

Anyway. Dawn is coming up grey over the car park and the first porters are clattering in. I'll post this on my break. Come and visit when the baby's born, and bring the good biscuits, not the ones from the machine.

Love, Jen