Close photo of a fine black script lettering tattoo running diagonally along the inner forearm of a person in a black top.

Thin script lettering on a forearm

Lettering · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A close photograph of a thin, black script word tattooed diagonally along the inner forearm, with the arm raised across the torso. The fine, even linework is solid black with no shading, and the lettering is set against plain skin. The background shows a dark graphic t-shirt and a black strappy top, with the image taken in warm, slightly saturated indoor light.

Lettering Fine line Forearm Script Letter Word

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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

The rain has been coming in sideways under the market awnings since seven, and you are still kneeling on the wet flags with a fine sable brush, trying to keep the black enamel from bleeding. Mrs Pell's fish board is propped against an upturned crate, and the last word is the one she made you practise three times on the back of a bread wrapper before she let you touch the board.

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The word isn't in any dictionary you own. She gave it to you from memory, a word her father used to shout across the harbour wall when the boats came in late. She spelled it out slowly, tapping each letter onto your palm with a finger that smelled of brine and lemon. Now you draw it in one thin, unbroken line, every loop leaning the way a rope leans when the wind gets under a hull, and the rain keeps trying to take the tail off the final stroke.

Pell sits on her stool beneath the tarp, hands folded over a flask of tea, watching you the way she watches the weather. "You've got the slant wrong," she says. "He never wrote it neat. He wrote it like he was running for the quay."

You tell her the hairline is the only way to make the word sit small on the wood. She doesn't argue. She reaches over and shifts the crate a little closer, so the board stays dry under the awning, and says nothing about the word forming silently on her lips.

When you finish, the grey light is already going, but the thin black strokes are holding. You stand up with wet knees and wonder who, besides her, will ever read it.