Fine line black ink tattoo of three diamond outlines of different sizes on the upper arm.

Three diamond outlines on an upper arm

Fine line · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

Three diamond shapes are drawn in thin black linework on the skin of an upper arm, with the largest in the centre and two smaller ones either side. Each diamond shows a flat top facet and a point below, with inner facet lines drawn in simple outline. The image is in black and grey on a skin-toned background, with a white fabric sleeve visible at the top right and a soft, out-of-focus backdrop at the left.

Fine line Upper arm Diamond Gem

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The woman at lane four put three loose stones on my tray the way other people put down receipts, one large and two small, and asked me what they were worth. I could not tell her. I had a torch, a loupe borrowed from my brother-in-law, and a form with boxes for everything except what she was carrying.

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She had hidden them in the lining of a handbag all the way from Antwerp. Her husband bought the middle one in 1979 on a Tuesday, she said, and the other two came later, one each time the roof leaked or the car gave out. She had not opened the envelope since the funeral. I held the big stone up under the strip light and watched its facets throw a small grey net across the desk, as neat as a drawing done with a very fine pen.

The regulations say I declare everything and let nothing through without a stamp. So I wrote it down: three stones, unset, declared value nil, owner's statement attached. Then I asked whether she wanted them returned to her bag or handed over to be held.

She picked up the smallest one, closed her fist around it, and pushed the other two back across the desk. "Keep those," she said. "He always said the good ones should be looked after by somebody who has time." I stamped the form. I still have the two in an envelope in my top drawer, and I check on them every Friday.