I want this to be permanent. I want Lila and I to be permanent.
Forever and Always.
I try not to cry. I really do. But I’m an emotional person and this… well, I never ever thought anyone would ever feel this way about me.
As my tears start to stain his beautiful words, I quickly shut the journal so the ink stays intact. I quickly wipe my tears with my hand, look up at him, and before he can speak, I say, “So where are we going to get the tattoos?”
* * *
Ethan
I wasn’t sure how she’d take what I wrote. Yeah, the ending was good, but the beginning… well it was full of my fears. And then she starts to cry and I’m a little worried she’s maybe misunderstood what I was trying to convey in my journal. I’m about to ask her what’s wrong, but then she says she wants to go get the tattoos. I’ll admit I’m a little scared, but in a terrifyingly good way. I want this. I knew it the moment I wrote the word permanent.
After we decide to get the tattoos, I drive us over to a tattoo shop on the main section of town between a row of shops. We go inside and start looking through the examples on the wall, but Lila keeps frowning at them.
“I want something that we come up with,” she says, resting her arms on top of the glass countertop. “Something that’s just yours and mine.”
“A symbol?” I ask. “Or words?”
“Words,” she says, smiling. “I think you should come up with words that connect us.”
I point at myself. “Why does it have to be me?”
“Because.” She walks up to me and hooks her arms around my neck. “You put words together beautifully. I seriously think you should consider the whole writer thing.”
I press back a smile, feeling my heart speed up with panic and fear and excitement. “One future move at a time, please,” I say, and she laughs. I let a slow breath ease past my lips as I try to think of something to put on our fingers. There’s not a lot of room and I know the artist is probably going to tell us that more than one word is too much. I think about the last words I wrote in my journal and how they were so huge because they made me realize that moving forward with Lila was something I wanted.
“How about forever and always?” I say, taking her hand in mine and tracing my finger around her ring finger.
She glances down at her hand, puzzled. “What, you take forever and I take always? But then who would take the word and?”
I shrug. “How about both of us.”
She glances up at me with her brows knit. “You want to split up and? Like you take the a and half the n and then I take the other half and the d?” she asks, and I nod. “Wouldn’t that look a little weird?”
“Does it really matter if it looks weird?” I ask. “It’d mean something to us and that’s all that matters, right?”
She considers what I said and then a smile breaks through. “I really love that idea.” She pulls me in toward her and we kiss until a very bulky dude with tattoos covering his arms comes into the waiting room to see what we want. When I explain it to him, he looks at me like I’m some sort of punk kid who’s stupidly in love. I don’t really give a shit what he thinks, though, and feel perfectly content with his disgusted look as he draws up the designs.
When he’s finished, I decide to go first since Lila seems nervous, like she was when she got her first and only tattoo. I take a seat and the guy puts the drawing on me, making sure it’s where I want it. When we get it in the correct place, he gets the needle ready and I shut my eyes, feeling myself change the moment the ink touches my skin. I can feel myself moving forward with each stroke. Feel myself connecting to Lila. Feel that I’m exactly where I want to be. Right in this moment with her.
* * *
Lila
I get so nervous around needles. It took a lot just to get me in the chair for the first and only tattoo I’ve ever gotten. Then I damn near fainted the first minute into it. But Ethan stood by my side and reminded me why I decided to do it. Because I want to be free and wanted to have something that would forever represent my journey toward freedom.
But watching Ethan mark his finger with something that would always connect him to me is different. It makes me feel even more free and alive. Excited. Overwhelmed. Loved. It’s the perfect moment that ends too quickly because suddenly he’s finished and it’s my turn.
“You sure you want to do this?” he teases, stretching out his fingers as we trade places.
I eagerly and very anxiously nod as I plop down in the leather chair. The large guy with a lot of colorful tattoos on his arms who did Ethan’s tattoo tells me to put my hand up on the armrest. He seems sort of cranky, but I don’t care. Nothing could ever ruin this moment, not even a cranky guy who smells like he’s in dire need of some deodorant.
I stay quiet as he positions the drawing on my finger until he gets it in the right place. Ethan holds my hand the entire time, while staring down at his free hand. The skin around the tattoo is a little red, but other than that it looks perfect.
He’s perfect.
He’s the only person who’s every fully understood me. The only person I’ve ever trusted. The only person who saw who I really am and the potential of what I could become. He loved me in a way that I thought wasn’t possible and that’s what I keep telling myself over and over again as the tattoo artist presses the tip of the needle to my finger.
I’ve gone through a lot over the last eight months or so. I’ve changed for the better. I’ve had a lot of moving, life-changing moments. But this one is different. This one is epic. I can feel it through the blissful pain that makes me hyperaware of what I’m doing. And when I’m finished, I feel genuinely happy even though my finger aches.
“So?” Ethan says as I get up from the chair. He watches me, like he’s waiting for me to say I regret it.
I stare down at my ring finger with a big grin on my face. I’ve always pictured myself with a huge diamond on my ring finger, a carat at least, but now… well, this feels so much better. So much more personal and intimate. Nothing could mark our relationship better than this.
I glance up at him, looking him straight in the eye. “I think it’s perfect.”
He smiles back at me and then slips his fingers through mine. It makes the area of the tattoo sting a little, but there’s no way I’m going to pull back. We pay for the tattoos and walk hand in hand outside to his truck.