Sweat sheens on the forehead of the girl they called Lark, and she says something to Friday. Has she changed her mind about a tattoo? She looks like she’s thinking of leaving.
For some reason, I want to keep her here. “What does she want?” I ask Friday.
“How the fuck am I supposed to know?” she asks me. She points at Lark. “Ask her!” Friday shoots me a death glare. I’d be quivering in my boots if I had never been the victim of her temper before. I have been here for two weeks already, and she let me know who’s in charge on Day One. I had made a mental note to myself right then and there: Never piss off Friday Reed.
I throw up my hands, though. How the fuck am I supposed to talk to Lark? I don’t speak. And she probably doesn’t sign.
Friday grabs my hands and holds them at a ready position in front of me. Then she points to Lark. “Talk to her. She might even talk back.”
“You can sign?” I ask her in sign language.
“Yes, she can sign, dumbass,” Friday tosses in. I have a sudden urge to give her a noogie, but she’d go for my balls if I did.
“You can sign?” I ask Lark again.
She holds her finger and thumb an inch apart and nods hesitantly.
Great. She can probably fingerspell. Finding out what she wants will be like pulling water from a rock. But I motion for her to follow me toward the back of the shop and I pull the dark curtain around us. I motion for her to sit down in a chair. She perches her bottom on the edge of the seat and folds her fingers in her lap. That’s when I realize that she’s wearing elbow-length gloves with the fingers cut out. What does she have to hide?
“You’re here for a tattoo?” I ask her. I make sure to move my mouth with my words, so she has a chance of understanding me.
She nods. “I have some scars I’d like to cover up.”
“What kind of scars?”
She runs her hands up and down her gloved arms, like she’s soothing herself. “On my arms. I have scars from grease burns.”
I reach for the top edge of her glove, but she pulls back. Her pulse starts to beat solidly in her neck. I can see it jumping. “May I see?” I ask. I wait for her to give me permission to look. I look at bodies all day, and I touch every single one, but I’ve never touched anyone who first didn’t want me to touch her.
She shakes her head. “Just tell me if you can cover scars, first, okay?” she signs. Her signs are a little slow, but accurate, and I can tell she’s translating in her head.
“I won’t know until I see them.” Some scars can be covered. It depends on the extent of the damage. “Scars that are puckered and bumpy are more difficult, and require more sittings for the tattoos so the ink can be applied heavily.”
“The ones on my arms aren’t too bad. Just spatters from the grease, really.”
I reach for her glove again and she closes her eyes, but she doesn’t pull away. I roll the glove down ever so slightly, taking care to go slow.
She sits stiff as a board and she takes in a breath as I roll the glove past her elbow. When I get halfway down her forearm, her eyes fly open and she stops me, grabbing frantically for my hand, and I know immediately that I have gone too far. I sit back and raise my hands like I’m surrendering to the cops. She forces her body to relax.
The scars she has on her arms aren’t too bad. “What happened?” I ask her.
She looks down at her arms and traces a finger around one of the circular patches of skin. “It was my parents’ anniversary and I wanted to make them a funnel cake, so I heated up some oil in a big pot on the stove. They were still asleep, and I had it all set up. But suddenly the grease started popping. It burned my arms and made these marks.”
I nod.
Her burns are more like discolored spots. They’re not puckered or terribly scarred, and they should be easy to cover over. “I can do it.”