Black tally marks in simple strokes on a forearm, with another person's hand holding the wrist.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Tally marks on a forearm

Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A close photograph of a forearm with a group of black tally marks, made of four vertical strokes crossed by a diagonal, beside a smaller set of three strokes. The lines are crisp, solid black ink with no shading, set against pale skin. The arm runs diagonally across the frame, with a rolled white sleeve at the top and another person's fingers gripping the wrist at the lower left.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nan, the strike is in its fourth week now and I have stopped counting the soup pans, so I have started counting something else. Every evening at the kitchen table I make a mark on the back of the rent book, four upright strokes with one slashed across, the way Dad used to tally coal on the ledger. Three days ago Mr Hollis from the Co-op knocked and said there would be credit until Friday, and I cried on his doorstep like a fool.

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Tom has been down at the picket line at Coldharbour every morning since Monday, stamping his boots by the brazier with the other men. He says the lads sing when the wind drops. I told him the wind has never dropped in this valley in living memory, and he laughed, the first proper laugh I've had out of him since the notice went up on the baths door.

Last night he showed me a drawing on the pad he keeps in his coat, a small tidy row of marks with a date beside them, the one he means to have inked once it's all over. I asked why he'd want a count carried on his skin. He said so nobody could ever say we didn't keep track of who stood where, and who stood firm.

I'm writing this with the lamp turned low so the gas lasts. Tonight's mark is a short one, three strokes, because the Co-op has said yes to Friday and the pit owners have said nothing at all. I'll post this in the morning. Tell me what they're saying in Sunderland, and tell Mam I'm eating properly. Your loving daughter, Margaret.

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