Tyler (Inked Brotherhood 2)

He steps inside, and I follow as the clouds release an icy downpour that blurs the outlines of the street and buildings. Dripping, I enter the quiet of the tattoo shop. There’s a tall desk manned by a pretty girl, her long dark hair pulled back in a ponytail. Her skin is like coffee and cream.

Booths line the back of the shop, which is more spacious than I thought from its small street façade. The whirring of tat guns and soft music fills the air. A table stacked with magazines sits against one wall, flanked by a couple of bright orange sixties armchairs.

“Here.” Zane tosses me a blue towel, and I grab it reflexively. He gestures at my dripping hair. “Dry up.”

A puddle is forming around my scuffed black boots. I hesitate one more second before I rub the towel over my head. There was a time I wouldn’t have touched a towel I didn’t know was washed and bleached—but I’m better now.

I just have to keep telling myself that, even though lately I seem to be slipping again. Something I can’t afford. I’m supposed to be fine now, dammit. Have to be.

“Have a look at the catalogs.” Zane waves a hand at some thick folders on the counter. “Meg can show you specific designs if you have something in mind.”

The pretty girl, who must be Megan, shoots me a smile—a cautious tilt of her lips—and her dark eyes are curious.

Towel in hand, I walk over to her and open the first folder randomly. I should be going. It’s not like I have money for a tat right now, or that I’m even sure I want one. Sure, I’ve thought about it—lots I want to hide under patterns and colors, but now is not the time.

But before I can make my escape, Zane blocks my way and leans his hip against the counter, peering into the catalog.

“Got any ink on you already?” he asks, and although his gaze is on the designs, I have a feeling he’s studying me from the corner of his eye.

“Some.” Tats and scars. A name, a word, a picture. I rub my stomach, and then my chest.

When it becomes obvious I’m not gonna say anything more, Zane shrugs. “Many guys go for comic figures lately. Of course, most people who come here have something specific in mind, something that has a special meaning to them. A person or a symbol.”

I take a step back. There’s a smell in the stuffy air of the shop that rubs on the edge of my nerves. Sweet. Metallic.

Blood.

Of course. It’s a tattoo shop. Lately all smells feel stronger, though, and suddenly I’m dizzy. I have to get out of here.

“I have to go.”

“Sure, no problem,” Zane is saying, and his voice seems to come from a distance.

Fuck. Not now. I haven’t had an attack in more than a year. But my skin is itchy, my lungs labor and white noise fills my ears.

Maybe I’m due for one. Time to get out, like, right now.

But my luck has always been shitty. Through the din in my ears, I dimly hear a woman’s voice, vaguely familiar, calling Zane’s name.

I turn as if through water.

The woman must have just come in, because she’s holding an umbrella that’s dripping water all over the floor. That’s the only thing that registers apart from the heart-shaped face and large, dark eyes with flecks of green and gold. Eyes that are widening, and a small mouth that is now hanging open.

“Oh my God,” she breathes, taking a step forward and stopping. The umbrella falls from her hand and thuds to the floor. “Tyler?”

“Erin.” A face I used to know better than my own, a body I’d mapped with my hands and lips what feels like a thousand years ago. She hasn’t changed much—though I see her curves are fuller. Of course they are. She was fifteen in my memory. Now she’s nineteen, three years younger than me. Strangely, she also looks smaller, but I realize it’s me. I’ve grown taller over the years.

All blood drains from her face, but she doesn’t ask me anything—why I vanished from her life and where I went. I’m dying to know how she’s been, but the question freezes on my tongue when she claps a hand over her mouth and pushes past me, vanishing between the booths.

Leaving me breathless with the assault of memories. Her scent is all around me, sweet, just like so long ago. Has it really been four years? Holding her, kissing her, making love to her.

And then leaving, being without her, feeling hollow and empty and barely alive. I did try to find her online over the years, just to make sure she’s all right, but couldn’t. Either she doesn’t hang out on the social networks like most, or uses an alias I don’t know. Any email I sent her bounced back, and calling her was out of the question, for many reasons. Not least because she wouldn’t want me to.

“Hey, fucker, you okay?” Zane waves a hand in front of my face, and I blink.

“Yeah. I’d better go.”

Without waiting for his reply, I toss the wet towel on the counter and head out, letting the door of the shop slam shut behind me.