He had always wanted a tattoo.
He went to work every day ashamed of the blank canvas beneath his shirt, the pale undefined skin that wanted substance and meaning. He coveted the bold images that others wore emblazoned across their flesh like statements of intent.
But he did not know what to choose. He leafed through books and web pages, haunted the shop windows of high-street tattooists, snatched covert, lustful glances at the limbs of others in the swimming pool or the gym. Nothing seemed right.
It wasn’t until he had the dream that he knew at last. He woke in confusion on the train as it was pulling into the station. Gathering up his coat and bags in haste, he got off just before the doors closed and sat down heavily on one of the platform benches. Departing passengers eyed him warily as he took pen and paper from his bag and began to sketch. He couldn’t forget. It had to be right. He had no idea where it had come from, but he got it down on paper in the end, snapping his bag closed just as it began to rain. It was beautiful; perfectly balanced, every aspect of the design symmetrical along every plane.
On his next day off, he went back to the tattooist. As the girl etched the ink into his back, his heart beat fast. He had no choice but to trust her as the image soaked into his skin, outlined in pain. Its black heart would steady him, lead him, define him. He would have a real identity at last. The red hunk of muscle that beat inside his body could not be trusted. It was susceptible, unreliable.
The skin of his back itched and burned as the tattoo healed, but his will was strong and he did not scratch. Not a detail of the design could be altered or spoiled by the premature flaking of a scab. He stood between two mirrors to marvel at what he had set upon his skin, and his whole body thrilled in response. He loved the ritual of its placement, its smooth warm canvas away from body hair and casual glances. He put on his shirt, and at work he stood tall and proud in his secret, knowing that he had caught perfection.
The image slept on the surface of his body as summer turned to autumn, and autumn to winter. And then, one cold morning, it stirred itself, and he woke early. His back was sore; it felt like sunburn. He remembered the torment as the tattoo was forming itself under the scabs and hurried into the bathroom. Perhaps the central heating had made his skin dry out; he should put on some moisturiser after his shower. He felt his body flinch under the water’s touch, then caught the scent of iron just as the first blood dripped into the shower tray and swirled into the drain.
He tried to see over his shoulder but whatever he felt was out of sight. The drops of blood became a stream, and as he struggled, he heard the first soft, wet impact of torn, burned flesh as pieces of his body fell to the tiles at his feet. The pain built to a crescendo and he looked down in horror as his perfect design burned through his chest in all three dimensions, monstrous, white-hot and radiant.
The thing he had carried shrugged off the irrelevance of his burned and bloody flesh, and he was dead before it clattered to the floor, bright, flesh-forged, and perfect.
Originally published by The London Reader, October 2019
Clare O’Brien grew up in London, but moved to a house by a sea-loch in the Scottish Highlands, which suits her much better. She has been a schoolteacher, a journalist, a politician’s PR and a rock star’s PA, and was 2025’s Poet In Residence at the National Trust for Scotland’s Inverewe Garden. Her 2025 poetry pamphlet ‘Breathing Out Becomes White And Snowfall’ (Intergraphia Books), followed her 2022 ekphrastic collection ‘Who Am I Supposed To Be Driving?” (Hedgehog Poetry Press). Her work has appeared in various journals and anthologies around the world, and she’s working on a novel and a full poetry collection.
