13 of 100 - More of Toni's Tattoo

As Markie followed the artist and his subject through the opening at the back of the room, she was struck by the stark contrast from the gloom she’d just left. The room was bright with artificial light. Not a window in the place, the walls were bright white with slick industry posters of tattooed women and men placed around the room. Between those hung many photographs of tattoos Markie assumed had been done in the shop. In addition to men with tattoos covering their whole backs and others with intricate designs running up legs from ankle to thigh, there were many many photos of tattooed body parts tacked up like this place was some kind of chop shop for legs and arms and asses and breasts.

There was something disturbing about these floating body parts that Markie couldn’t quite put her finger on. She kept looking, trying to figure what seemed wrong about those photographs. She was pulled back to the complete human forms in the room by Toni’s voice.

“So do I just take everything off or what?” The tattoo artist had finally released Toni’s neck as he directed her to the dentist’s chair in the middle of the room, and she had turned to face him before hoisting herself into the raised chair.

“Sure honey. Just strip down so I don’t get any ink on those pretty panties of yours. You can leave your top on – if you want that is.” He reached forward and, laying his hands on her shoulders for a moment, moved them lazily down to her waist, brushing the sides of both breasts lightly on the way down. He kept his hands on her waist as she pushed her shorts and thong to the floor, and then tightened his grip and lifted her effortlessly into the waiting chair.

Markie winced at the thought of Toni’s bare ass against the vinyl of the chair, and wondered what else could have been there and happened there before Toni’s ass settled in it. Markie knew Toni would never even consider the idea to have reservations about her exposure there.

Working with so many different women for short periods of time, Markie had realized she had become somewhat of an amateur behavior analyst. She had no interest in really knowing any of the women she encountered on the circuit, but she wasn’t interested in alienating them either. She walked a tight line of compassionate disinterest with most of them, and paradoxically, they were drawn to her detachment. And she was fascinated, looking from the outside as she always was, in trying to figure what made them tick, as her father used to say.

Markie knew Toni feared little but intimacy. She’d worked with her at a number of gigs, and had watched the woman squat squarely, naked, on bar stools and stained sofas, never minding what her bare pussy came in contact with. Many of the girls shared Toni’s nonchalance about their pussies. It’s as if, Markie thought, they no longer cared for that part of themselves and had embraced all the connotations of the word cunt. These same women kept manicured finger and toenails, spent hours on their hair and hair products, shaved, waxed, and lasered body hair, pampered and cared for their physique obsessively, but abused and neglected the wet opening between their legs. It, of all the parts on their bodies, seemed to become simply an object, a tool of the trade. Even the breasts were more revered and pampered than the pussy. It’s as if that one part of their body was disconnected from the rest.

Markie suddenly realized what bothered her about the photographs tacked to the walls. She looked again, walking from photo to photo to check her hypothesis. None of the photos were of men’s body parts, and none of the full body photographs were of women. It’s as if the women had all been dissected and displayed exclusively as the artist’s canvass – there were no faces of women anywhere. Sure, Markie noticed as she walked among the photos, there was a neck here, or a cheekbone there, but the tattoo was the focus of the image, not the woman on whose body the ink was embedded. Markie felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up, and she turned from the pictures to the scene unfolding in the middle of the room, shocked to meet the steady gaze of the tattoo artist. She wondered how long he had been watching her.

“Nice pictures here,” she lied and kept her voice light. “I’m Markie, by the way,” she added, realizing no introductions had been made.

The big man raised the corners of his mouth slightly and raised his eyebrows a little more. “I’m Mike,” he said. Then after another few seconds of holding her eyes, he turned back to Toni. “And you are . . . ?” As he asked her name, he reached his large hand – one covered with a spider web design with the image of about half a spider appearing to crawl up from his palm over the web of skin between his thumb and first finger – down to cup the mound of flesh rising from between her legs.

Toni jumped, then settled in against the pressure of his hand, breathed audibly, and said, “Toni. I’m Toni.”

“Okay Toni. Let’s do this.” He squeezed gently and then slid his hand up to her belly, keeping it there while reaching with the other hand to grab the spray bottle of alcohol needed to prepare for the needle and ink.