Small colour tattoo of two cardinals perched on a black branch, one red and one orange-yellow, on the ankle in fine line style.

Two cardinals on a branch on an ankle

Fine line · Ankle · Colour · Photo

The tattoo shows two cardinals perched side by side on a thin, leafless black branch. The red bird on the left and the orange-yellow bird on the right are shaded with soft colour, with fine black outlines defining their crests, wings and tails. The small design sits on the lower leg just above the ankle against a plain background of skin.

Fine line Ankle Bird Branch Songbird

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The first one came in through the kitchen window in March, the week after Mrs Pilling's son drove her to Skegness and left her cage door hanging open on the landing. Ray Costello found the bird sitting on the dead rubber plant he had never got round to binning, its crest up like it owned the fourteenth floor of Harcourt House. He stood very still with the kettle in his hand. The bird looked at him as if he were the intruder.

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A second one arrived the next morning, duller and more careful, and perched on the branch of the plant as though it had been reserved. Ray had no seed, so he tore up his bread and left it on the sill. The red one took the crumbs without fuss. The other one watched from the rim of the pot and only came close after Ray had gone back to the telly. He called them nothing at first. Then he called them you two, and then he stopped pretending it was a joke.

The council letter about the lift came on a Tuesday, and so did Mr Pilling's grandson with a cardboard box for the cage. He stood in the corridor and said the birds were the last thing his nan had cared about, and could Ray possibly lure them back. Ray said he'd try. He didn't try. He sat at the table and watched the red bird hop to the window latch and wait.

When the lad had gone, Ray pushed the window wide. The red bird went straight out over the car park towards the plane trees. The other one stayed on the branch a long while, turning its head one way and then the other, before it stepped onto the back of his chair and then, very deliberately, onto the handle of his mug.