Page 116 of The Tattered Gloves
Four Months Later
“ARE YOU SURE?” Sam asked.
“Very sure,” I answered, feeling slightly apprehensive.
His lazy grin saw that hesitation, and he pushed. “Really sure? Because I hear, once you do it, it becomes an addiction, and you just can’t stop.”
“That’s not true!”
“It is,” he argued. “I saw it on TV.”
“You’re just stalling.”
“Am not.” He laughed.
“Are too! And, besides, I thought guys were really into this kind of stuff.”
He looked down at himself, dressed in denim and a graphic tee that screamed the wordBazingaacross the chest. “Do I look like the kind of guy who’s into… that?” His eyes glanced upward.
“What are you crazy kids doing out here in the cold? Come on, let’s get inside! I have a booming business to get back to!” Addy announced, trailing behind us. She’d insisted on finishing her fancy cup of coffee in the car, reminding us that it was only once in a blue moon she got to enjoy the city life.
Looking around, I’d hardly consider Leesburg a city, but it was the closest location for what we had in mind today. And they had a Starbucks, so bonus.
“He’s trying to talk me out of it again,” I complained as Addy stepped forward and pulled the glass door open.
“Now, why would you do that?” she asked.
She turned back to give him a stern look. He shrank beneath its weight.
I snickered.
“It’s just, when I thinkseventeenth birthday present, I think of electronics or a trip to the mountains. Not a painful day in a sketchy tattoo parlor.”
“It’s not sketchy. This is the nicest place in the area. Look, they even have magazines and a coffee machine!” Addy said with delight before introducing herself to the manager.
“Oh, well, since they have a coffee machine,” Sam muttered.
We’d set up an appointment last week, and I’d been waiting in solid anticipation ever since. Sam? Not so much. He liked the idea and the meaning behind it, but seeing his eyes roam around the place like a trapped lion… I thought my nice country boy was a bit out of his element.
“So, this is the design?” the artist asked.
I’d never met a tattoo artist before. I guessed I’d always expected them to be kind of scary. But Evan, the guy who was about to permanently brand me, was nothing but nice.
“Yep,” I answered, looking over the perfect little sketch Addy had drawn out for me.
“And where do you want it?”
I took a deep breath. I’d been practicing this all week.
“Right here,” I said, as I slowly pulled my right glove off with one quick tug.
Just like a Band-Aid, I silently said to myself.
A little trick Addy had told me when I first let her in on my plans.
“I want to get a tattoo…here,” I said, pointing to my wrist… a place still hidden by my glove. “And I want to get it soon… for my birthday,” I added. “But I don’t know how… I mean, I just can’t. I thought, after the trial… after he was in prison, I’d be normal, but I—”
“When I was little,” she finally said, “I used to scrape my knees all the time. It used to drive my mother nuts.
