Two Sides of the Same Tattoo Needle. By Leah Scarpati

Well I can certainly say I've learned my lesson! Mummy had always warned me about expressing myself through body art, tattoos, piercings and such like; but the more she told me not to, the more determined I became to disobey her. "It's just not what people like us do dahhling," she purred in-between a long drag of a cigarette and a sip of her dry martini.

"Just because you're mixing with all sorts at that University of yours, it doesn't mean you forget who you are and where you came from. Don't forget there is royal blood in our heritage." But my mind was made up, a tattoo across my lower back it was going to be, a sarcastic swipe at Mummy's values and beliefs. I'd even designed it myself. I'd have a fancy crown with my name, Amelia, emblazoned above it.

So I coerced my friend Lottie into coming with me and withdrew the necessary eighty pounds from my bank account. Lottie was nervous about even the sight of needles and needed a swift Bloody Mary before we could even step foot in the tattoo parlour. It was a bit dingy and run down I noticed as we stepped inside, loud heavy metal music blared out of somewhere. Lottie was horrified at the thought of sitting down in the waiting area, in case we caught something and tried to persuade me to leave - but I was far too excited to worry. This felt so wrong, it felt fabulous!

When the tattooist poked his multicoloured head around the curtain and beckoned us inside, I thought Lottie would die with fright. This room was even dingier and I lay down on an already prepared seat. I pushed my Victoria Beckham jeans down to expose my virgin skin and told him to copy the pattern of the crown from the pocket on my tush and to tattoo my name, Amelia, across the top of it. The Bloody Mary must have gone to Lottie's head because I saw her giggling nervously in the corner of the room, then I steeled myself for the pain.

***

God! I was so 'ungover this morning I nearly rang in sick. Tommo would 'av killed me though 'cos we were busy today. So I managed to drag my arse out o' bed and drove to work. I was still half pissed, good job I dint get stopped by the coppers or I would 'av been well nicked! As usual, Tommo had his Marilyn Manson compilation CD blaring out, it did nowt for me banging head! I felt so sick, I could still taste last night's cocktails from 'Spiders' and I think I still had some of the kebab stuck between me teeth.

My first job of the day was this fit bird who wanted a tattoo across her back. She was well posh though, a bit up her own arse really - but her mate was quite fit and I kept giving her the eye. She kept giggling, the way they always do when I turn on the Chopper charm, get a bit of that old magic going! She was quite hard though, I'll give her that, dint even flinch once throughout the whole thing. I 'ad to copy a crown off her arse cheek, as if concentrating want gunna be hard enough today!

***

It was over and done with much quicker than I had anticipated. It didn't really hurt all that much either. Lotty cooed in admiration of how brave I'd been and I felt quite proud of myself really. I got up to have a look at it in the mirror and I must admit, it did look rather impressive. It was slightly bigger than I had imagined it to be but it did look quite cool. I asked Lottie to take a picture of it for me on her mobile phone so I could get a proper look at it, the mirror distorted the image to much. "Ta-dah!" I squealed as I showed it off to Lottie. "Wow! Millie, it's...wait a minute." She paused. "Who's Emilia?"

"What?" "Your tattoo. It doesn't say Amelia, it says Emilia."

***

Oh fuck! My head started to swim even more now as these two birds start squealing like mad and crying. I'd spelt her name wrong apparently. Well? How was I supposed to know? She dint write it down or owt and it sounded like Emilia to me. She started shouting that she was gunna sue me an' all sorts. As if I give a toss! She can't take what I ant got anyway.

Comments System Prototype Version 1.0 by Mo

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