Four black-outlined arrows with feather fletching hang over blue, purple, pink and orange watercolour splashes in a fine line style on the upper arm.

Watercolour arrows on upper arm

Fine line · Upper arm · Mixed · Photo

The design shows four arrows with feathered fletching hanging downwards on thin black lines, each ending in a small arrowhead. Behind them, loose watercolour washes in blue, purple, pink and orange fade out at the edges, while the arrows themselves are drawn in fine black linework with minimal shading. The tattoo sits centred on the inner upper arm against plain skin, with a dark leather chair and wooden floor in the background.

Fine line Upper arm Arrow Feather Watercolour Splash Line

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mara had counted the pigeons on the ledge of the Victoria Street flats three times before the rain started, which meant the fourth feather was late again. Uncle Teo's workshop above the chip shop smelled of wood glue and cedar shavings, and on the hook by the window hung the mobile he had made the winter before she moved in: four arrows on black thread, each one dropping a little lower than the last, so that the bottom one nearly brushed the sill.

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By nine the canal had turned to a river of sodium light. She walked the towpath with a canvas bag of fletchings for the archery club in Armley, due at the hall before Saturday's shoot. Feathers did not like damp. Each one had to be cut, stripped and bound by hand, and each one had to lean the right way, or the arrow would spin wild and the club would blame the wind. Teo had taught her that with his thumb pressed hard against her knuckles. Lean it, he had said. Don't fight it.

At the lock a boy sat on an upturned crate with a sketchbook open across his knees. He was drawing the gates in blue ink, and where he had breathed on the page the wash had bled into a smudge of pink. He tilted the book to show her. Four arrows fell down the margin, their tails trailing like kite strings. "Are they falling or rising?" he asked. Mara thought of the bow, the string snapping forward, and said it depended on who was holding the other end.

The club secretary took the bag at the door of a flat that smelled of wet dog and paraffin, and signed for it without looking up. Mara walked home the long way, past the closed launderette and a bus shelter where someone had painted a sun over the timetable. When she reached the workshop the stairwell door was open, and a draught set the mobile turning. The lowest arrow swung round and pointed up the stairs, towards the light she had left burning, as if it knew which way she would lean.