Black line drawing of a stylised sitting cat with a curled tail and swirling linework, with a script quote running down its back, shown as a tattoo design on white.

Stylised sitting cat with script quote

Black and grey · Flash

A bold, stylised outline of a cat seated in profile, with its head raised and its tail curled around its base. The thick black linework uses curling flourishes on the ears, shoulder, haunch and tail, and the design is flat black on a white background with no shading. A line of cursive script follows the curve of the back as part of the design.

Cat Sitting cat Swirl Tail Script Quote

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Tuesday, off Lundy, Force 6 and freshening. The cat has taken her usual place on top of the warm bread oven and will not be shifted, not for love nor the good sardines. Mrs Pargeter says she came aboard at Falmouth in a coal sack and has been running the galley ever since. I am writing this at the end of the mess table with my boots wedged under the bench, because the lamp is swinging and the pencil keeps rolling off the page.

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Young Tom from the purser's office has been sneaking his guitar down to the stores after his watch. Last night he played two chords over and over with his tongue between his teeth, and the cat sat bolt upright on the spice rack, ears turned like a pair of weathervanes, tail wound tight around her paws. Mrs Pargeter swore she had never seen a cat listen to anything but the tin opener. "She's keeping time," Tom said, pleased as a boy with a medal.

Then the sea came over the bow at three bells and the whole galley went sideways. The guitar slid off the crate, the saucepans rang like a belfry, and Tom went white and reached for the strings. The cat leapt the length of the galley, landed squarely on the case, and sat there with her spine straight, staring at him until he laughed.

This morning the grease pencil on the bulkhead reads, in a careful hand, So tear down the stars now, and take up your guitars. Mrs Pargeter says it is nonsense. The cat, asleep again on the oven, has not objected.