Black and white photo of a fine three-dot dotwork tattoo in a row on the inner forearm near the wrist, against a striped fabric background.

Three small dots on the inner forearm

Dotwork · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A black and white photograph of an inner forearm close to the wrist, showing three small, evenly spaced solid black dots in a horizontal line. The dots are very small and crisp, created with dotwork technique, and sit on smooth skin with no surrounding shading or linework. The striped fabric behind the arm is out of focus and provides a plain, high-contrast backdrop.

Dotwork Forearm Dot

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

14th March. Hollin Lock, half past six, and the water still skinned with ice at the edges. Dad says I am to stop writing up the weather and start writing up the work, but the weather is the work on a morning like this. The lower gate groaned like timber in a swell and the paddles came up stiff as old teeth.

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Before we went through, Dad took the stub of carpenter's pencil from his waistcoat and put three dots on the beam of the gate. He does it at every lock on the Thrale cut, three dots in a row, a little apart, the way his own father taught him. I asked once what they meant. He said they meant we were here, which is the sort of answer you get from a man who would rather be steering.

When he was looking at the sluice I put my own three on the beam, a little crooked. He saw anyway. He said nothing, only tapped the tiller twice with his fingers, which is his way of saying a thing will do.

Tonight we tie up above the weir. The Ruth creaks at her mooring like she is counting under her breath. I will sit on the cabin roof until the frost comes down, and I think I will count the dots I have made this week, three steady ones for every lock, then go below and sleep with the lamp out.