Black and grey outline stars above the word RISE in serif script on the inner wrist, with a lower panel showing the same arm with no tattoo.

Three stars and RISE on a wrist

Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

The upper panel shows three small outlined stars stacked above the word RISE in a serif script on the inner wrist and lower forearm. The linework is thin and even, with no shading, and the ink is a dark grey. The lower panel shows the same arm, bare, against a plain grey backdrop, with a blue anchor-print sweater and pale jeans in both shots.

Forearm Star Word Script

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

By half past three the bakery on Cross Street smells of scorched sugar and wet flour, and you have stopped trusting the clock on the wall. Ruth wants the tins loaded before the first van, and the dough in the back proving room has already pushed its cloths up like sleeping shoulders. You press a knuckle into the nearest batch. It springs back slowly, which is the answer you were hoping for.

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Out the back door the city is still wearing its night colours. A bin lorry grinds past on the ring road, and above the chimney of the mill conversion three stars hang in a gap between clouds, the same three you drew on the back of a delivery docket in March when Ruth asked what you wanted from the shop once the loan was paid off. You had written RISE underneath them, half joking, and she had laughed and then pinned the docket above the proving room sink, where it still is, grease-spotted and curling at the corners.

The oven door drops open with a sound like a held breath let go. You slide the first trays in, count to the number you always count to, and feel the heat rise into your face. Nothing about the work is glamorous. It is the same patient shove every night, until something swells and holds its shape.

At ten to five the van horn sounds from the yard. You wipe your hands, pull the tea towel off the rack, and step outside long enough to see the stars go pale and thin. The loaves leave warm in their crates. You lift the last one onto the tailgate and think, not for the first time, that morning comes back for whatever was promised to it, even when the promise was yours to keep.