Black and grey sugar skull tattoo with a mandala on the crown and a small anchor on the forehead, placed on the side of the ribs.

Sugar skull with mandala on the ribs

Neo-trad · Ribs · Mixed · Photo

A shaded black and grey sugar skull fills the centre of the image, with a detailed mandala across the crown, swirling ornament at the temples and cheeks, and a small anchor between the eyes. The skull has dotted eye rims and a sharp toothed grin, with bold outlines and soft grey shading. A partly visible floral tattoo in teal and green sits at the lower right edge of the frame.

Neo-trad Ribs Sugar skull Skull Mandala Anchor Swirl Floral Teeth

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The band at the Lantern Ballroom has been playing the same waltz since eleven, and Mrs Okafor at the cloakroom has stopped pretending she isn't watching you. You came in off the Bristol tide with salt still stiff in your collar, and the lad from the chandlery swears you owe him a dance. Keep your hat on. Tonight the floor belongs to the painted skulls, and nobody here wants to see a sailor's face under the powder.

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Nell drew the skull the winter before you shipped out, a bone-white thing with a mandala for a crown and a small anchor pinned between its eyes so you would always find your way back to port. She said it would keep you honest. It has kept you alive, which is more than the anchor managed for the Marigold's second mate off the Azores. You have nothing to show her now but a crumpled letter and a ticket for the eight o'clock ferry, and you are not sure which of them you are more afraid of losing.

The band stops mid-bar. Across the floor, the girl at the upright piano lifts her head, and the scrolled hem of her dress swings like a compass needle settling north. She has Nell's way of holding a cigarette between two fingers, and her laugh carries over the crowd before you can decide whether it is hers or only the sea playing tricks.

She crosses the parquet without hurry, takes the ferry ticket from your fingers, and tears it neatly along the perforation. The stub goes into the anchor-shaped brooch at her throat. "Dance first," she says, already reaching for your hand. "Then you can tell me where the others went."