'Skin Flicks, Voted Best Tattoo Parlor in Town' by Debra A. Daniel

Coy sits behind the reception desk. “You sure you want a tattoo?” he says. 

“Hell, yeah,” the woman says. She juts her chin forward and narrows her eyes. “I want a whole sleeve, but I’ll start with something simple like a chameleon or a woodpecker.”

Coy looks at her. Gray hair, wrinkles, knotty blue veins. “Neither of those is simple,” he says, “not if they’re done right. You don’t know much about tattoos.”

“As long as you do, we’ll be fine. I do know I like yours, especially the anaconda  winding around your neck,” the woman says. “Ironic. Wry. In your face.”

Coy scratches his head. This woman could be his grandmother. Maybe great-grandmother. She’s ancient. Skin like hers would be paper thin. Probably a bleeder. He imagines tying a tourniquet about her arm to stop some god-awful hemorrhage.

“Does anyone know you’re here or that you’re wanting to permanently inject ink into your body?” Coy can’t help but notice that she smells like cake. “Can I call someone to take you home?”

“I don’t answer to anyone, young man. I’m the boss of me,” she says, “an if I want to tattoo one hell of an anaconda on my neck, then that’s my prerogative. If you won’t do it, I’ll go to Inkblots.” She turns to leave.

Coy flinches. Barb over at Inkblots would grab the old woman’s money, slap some god-awful smudge of a broken heart on her shoulder and sleeve her up with clichéd designs and bleed her of hundreds of dollars. 

“Wait,” Coy says. He walks around the desk to stand with the woman who smells like someone he wishes he remembered. 

“We’ll start with cornflowers,” he says, “Then around your arm, we’ll twine a vine with heart-shaped leaves as green as early spring.”