Page 44 of One Small Spark
“And you’re opposed to making out in fresh air?”
Her gaze locks on mine, her thoughts performing a vivid dance behind her eyes. “No…notopposed, I guess. It’s never been an option.”
“And if it was an option?” Do I sound eager? Hell, yes, I do.
“I mentioned the bug issue.”
“We can slather you with eucalyptus oil.”
She goes on staring at me until her gaze drops to my mouth. She quickly refocuses on her plate. “I’m giving it a solid maybe.”
I can handle a maybe when it comes with that tiny smirk attached.
My thoughts stray to a hike with Wren that’s mostly making out. I have to pull off my hoodie and cool down. I drape the sweatshirt over one of the empty chairs and take my seat again. Her attention snaps to my tattoos, her gaze moving up one arm and then the other.
“You can ask whatever you want,” I tell her. This is true about everything.
Her gaze eats up the images inked on my skin. “Does it hurt to get them?”
“Yes.” I rub the elbow closest to her. “Going over the bone is probably the worst. The inner biceps come in second.”
She cringes but doesn’t look away. “How long did these take?”
“I started five years ago. My artist and I had a vision for the entire piece, and I added to it whenever I had time and money.” It was slow going at first, when extra money was scarce. Now that Get in Gear is doing well, time is the harder factor to come by, since it requires a trip up to Portland and back.
“Do they have meaning, or do they just look cool?”
I can’t help my smirk. “You think they look cool?”
She doesn’t meet my eyes. She’s too busy cataloguing my tattoos. “Shut up. You know they do.”
“They all have meaning. Some more than others. But they’re not random.”
Just like she was drawn to my rolling ladder and the books, she slowly reaches out a hand as if she’s under a spell. Her fingertips lightly trace over the pine trees on my forearm, moving up over the mountain peaks that stretch along my biceps. I breathe slowly, her gentle touches as difficult to sit through as the original tattoos.
“What do they mean?” she asks softly. “Or is that private?”
“It’s not private.” Not from her. “The trees are for the time I spend outdoors. Bugs and all. The mountains are for my grandfather Callahan, who was my rock.”
I turn my hand over to reveal my inner arm.
“Lupines?” she asks.
It squeezes something in my chest that she recognizes them. “For my grandma.”
I stretch out my other arm. “Another forest scene over here. The river running along my inner arm is for my parents. The little cabin in the woods there is for Charlie.”
Wren meets my eyes. “Because of the lodge?”
“We spent a lot of our childhood playing out here. And she loves it so much, it seemed to fit.”
“These are beautiful. I’ve never really looked at them before.”
She’s certainly never touched them before. She slides her palms over my skin, admiring the tattoo artist’s work as if it’s somehow separate from my body. As if she’s not lighting up my nerve endings one by one. Her fingertips graze beneath my short shirt sleeve like she wants to sweep it out of the way to see the uppermost reaches of my shoulder.
“You have bugs in here.” She taps a finger on my outer biceps. “A beetle?”
“My other grandma. She never killed insects if she couldavoid it. Always trapped them in a glass and set them free.” She would have loved the shiny beetle on my arm in her honor.
