The Tattoo

I walk into a small storefront, in a seedy area of a fair-sized city. Inside, it is brighter and more spacious than seems possible from outside. The counter has curtains, to shield the back area from public view, and a cozy waiting area has bookshelves full of photographs and sketches between very comfortable overstuffed black leather couches. A small table contains two ashtrays, and a crate by one couch is full of old copies of *Maxim.* I know what I want, and I look through the pictures on the walls and in the albums until I find it.

I sign some papers and give them identification--yes, I'm an adult and here of my own free will, thanks for asking--and settle in. The shop is small, and I must wait while strangers, and then a friend who came with me, have their turns. Watching and waiting, anticipation and fear can only grow within me. The hours of waiting steel my resolve; they quicken my breath and my heartbeat.

Finally, my turn comes. I bare my chest and settle into the blue vinyl chair, as suited to a doctor's or dentist's office as to this environment. She shows me her proof that all is well, that all is clean, and safe, and I grip the arms of my chair and swallow hard, full of excitement and fear.

I hear a deep buzzing, then feel a warmth vibrating close to my tender, unmarked flesh. I close my eyes and breathe as the needle burns a searing pain against me. This is it, the point of no return; I am marked now.

The burning continues in tight, precise curves over my chest. I take my mind away from here, and the pain of the needle becomes the pain of your bite. I remember your teeth tearing also at soft, unbroken skin, leaving marks of their own, as colorful and tender then and for weeks after as this mark will be forever.

I remember well the pain of those first bites, your teeth closing on my arms and throat and breasts, my own teeth sinking into my lower lip, holding back the primal screams of pain and ecstasy, then into your flesh as I held on to the pain and pleasure in the moment, the giving and the *feeling,* and let go of the world.

Then and now, it feels like each bite will last forever, like the pain will never stop. I endure it by embracing that part of my core that doesn't want the pain to end. My breathing becomes rapid, and the lightheadedness that follows brings me even closer to the remembered dream of you.

For this, I must be still, and I wish that I had you to hold me still, to tie me against this chair and make it impossible for me to move against you as even lost in this memory, this waking dream, I wish to do. Soft gasps escape my lips, and I grunt against the pain of this burning, as I moaned softly with you then.

The artist's hand continues, unfazed; her words are soft and soothing. I hear your words, instead, tender and masterful even as they are cruel. An eternity later, and all too soon, it is ended. A bird soars over my heart, as high as you took me then, and I am both grateful for this pain ending and looking forward to the next time.

The next day, I wash the skin softly and tenderly with a cool cloth and pat it dry, and wince as I look at the white bottle again. I apply lotion to my fingertips and rub it softly into the parched and cracking layer of raw angry skin. I imagine your hands, gentle enough not to change the image, but hard enough to sting more than simply the lotion, rubbing it there, you enjoying the soft grunts of pain, rubbing lotion lower on my breast, biting at my neck and shoulders, pulling me down over you and being lost again in feeling.

The owl that the mark resembles is a predator--it has caught its prey and is soaring away, carrying it helpless in its craw. As I gaze at the brown and gold image on my pale pink flesh, and the little grey mouse held hopeless, I smile, for although many among my fondest memories are of you holding mastery over me, body and soul, for an hour's pleasure, I know that I am the owl and you are the mouse, to be dominant or subservient only at my whim, to fear and worship me and to live only to be devoured by me, captured body, mind and spirit.