Back view of a woman with a hair bun and pink knit jumper, showing a small fine-line black cross tattoo on her upper back near the shoulder.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Small cross tattoo on the upper back

Fine line · Back · Black and grey · Photo

A woman is photographed from behind, with her hair in a loose bun and a bright pink knitted jumper worn off the shoulders. A small, thin black cross is drawn in a single fine line on the upper back, close to the shoulder blade. The ink is solid black against pale skin, and the plain grey-green wall behind keeps the focus on the tattoo.

Fine line Back Cross Hair bun

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Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell,

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The dodgems are down at Thornbury for the winter and I am writing this on the back of a spare ticket roll, so forgive the crumpled look. Mr Pascoe has finally let me run the cable car on my own, and I have only dropped the brake once. Do not tell Mother.

Last Tuesday a boy came to the waltzer with a dog-eared photograph of a girl in a blue coat. He asked each of us whether we had seen her. Mr Pascoe said no and gave him free rides, which is not like him at all. I think he was sweet on her, or she on him, or somebody had paid him to look. I could not tell which, and the boy did not say.

That same evening Mrs Hale, who reads palms in the tent beside the candyfloss, pressed a little tin cross into my hand and told me to keep it in my pocket on the big wheel. I said I was not chapel. She said the wheel does not care what chapel you are. I laughed, but I have kept it there ever since, and I touch it every time the car swings out over the marsh.

On Sunday the rain came sideways off the water and we packed up early. We were loading the pony rides onto the lorry when the boy came back, soaked through, and asked me to hold the photograph while he wiped his face. I looked at it properly for the first time. The girl in the blue coat was standing in front of our very own wagon, with the same chipped green paint on the door.

I suppose that is the trouble with travelling. Everyone you lose is only ever a county away.

Your loving sister, Jean