Chapter Text
AT McCOY'S TATTOO PARLOR
Leo looked up from his desk as the bell chimed. At three in the afternoon, his shop was almost always empty, which is why he was pleasantly surprised to see a young man poke his head around the corner.
"You open," the young man asked. He voice was soft and his hair was a honeyed blonde and slightly ruffled. It was obvious he had put a lot of effort into making it look like he had just woken up. He was wearing a tight white v-neck, which accentuated his pectorals and biceps, over a pair of bootcut blue jeans which wholly failed in hiding the perkiness of his ass.
"Yeah, we are," Leo replied, "what can I do for you?" The hint of an innuendo spiced his voice.
"I'm looking to get some ink and I heard this was a good place to go."
"You heard right. What are you looking to get done?"
"This," the young man pulled out a sketchbook and flipped to drawing of a bird, all blocks of color and tribal lines, it's neck bent back over its wings in a burst of joy and freedom. Altogether it was quite beautiful. "I want it on my lower ribs."
Leo took the sketch and studied it, looking at the young man from the corner of his eyes. He had leaned up against the counter and was watching Leo look at the drawing with the air of who was accustomed to charming his way into achieving his goals.
"D'you think you can do it?" He asked the question already knowing the answer.
"Most definitely," Leo replied. It wasn't that complicated of a design and Leo knew he would have no problem applying it to skin. "How old are you, anyway?"
The young man pulled out a school ID reading James Kirk, Senior Class of 2008, Oxford High School.
"I'm 18, don't worry."
"I can see that. Shouldn't you be in class, Mr. Kirk?"
"Senioritis is getting pretty bad. Thought I'd go do something interesting. And call me Jim."
Leo smiled. Dang, this kid was cute.
"Right," he said, "I’ll start sketching out, picking colors. Can you come by sometime next week? Sometime when you aren’t supposed to be in school?”
Jim just smiled again, and said, “I’ll see you next Thursday then.”
“Oh, hey!” Leo called after Jim, “Call me Leo.”
Jim smiled and waved, before strolling out into the late afternoon sun. Leo turned, and grabbed the sketchbook off the counter and a couple of pens and dropped them in his office. He then went around the shop, locking up and turning lights off, before grabbing his own thick sketchbook and padding back to his office. Once he had his work space set up, he reached for Jim’s book. What he saw took his breath away.
The first several pages were stunning landscapes of what must have been imagined places, crimson suns in a teal sky over silver fields, sweeping gray-green canyon walls with golden cities built into the sides, an open field of purple plants with a huge night sky complete with several moons, and a series of rings arching across the sky. The colors were vibrant and splashed across the pages, overrunning the lines and blending to create brilliant swirls of color. After came simpler, striking still lifes, in dark swaths of india ink. A bird, launching itself into flight, the soft speckles on it’s down in stark relief with the soft swirling lines of it’s wings. A man, sitting on a bench at a bus stop under an old oak tree with dappled light streaming down from above.
Leo began to draw.
At first it was just the bird, done in different styles, starting with Jim’s bright sweeps of colors and edging more into Leo’s favored techniques of short black strokes with bursts of pigment bleeding through. And then it moved on, page after page filling his sketchbook with bits and pieces of Jim’s work, spinning off into brighter works, detailed pieces of one of his trees, the profile of the old man, the three moons high in an indigo sky.
Leo set his pen down, stretched his fingers, shook out his ink stained hands, and stretched up, cracking his back. His eyes caught his clock - 4:00 am. He hadn’t even realized. Looking around, he took in the chaos that was his desk, the usually pristine space overflowing with paper marked with thick lines of ink swirling and crashing into one another. He couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so inspired. He hadn’t drawn for such a long period of time since his apprenticeship. He smiled softly to himself, and then began packing up the drawings, shuffling them in folders to show Jim next week.
~~~
The next week Jim was right on time. He strolled through the door, a cocky grin on his face, whistling a melodious tune. Leo looked up with a smile on his face, but he felt in his stomach the butterflies of apprehension. He was going to show Jim the finalized version of his bird today and he was kind of nervous. His art was kind of like his soul made physical, the inks and paper manifestations of his internal workings. So he was always a bit anxious to show people his creations. Leo had shuffled away the sketchbook full of his musings on Jim’s art onto a shelf above his desk and hadn’t touched it since. He directed Jim towards his studio while he went back to his office to get the book. When he walked back into the studio Jim was lounging on the bench and staring at the ceiling.
Leo pulled up a chair and flipped the book open to the birds. He had drawn four variants, changing the color schemes and the thickness of the line slightly. Jim's mouth fell open as he picked up the sheets, taking in the flowing lines, the slightly blurred reds and yellows and the dotted wings. He traced the extended feathers of the second version and softly said ‘this one’.
“This is stunning.”
“It’s what you drew. I just copied your design.”
“No, it isn't, not really. It's better. It’s, it’s perfect.”
Leo beamed at the kid. He thrived off people complimenting his work.
“Well, let’s get to it then. You sure you know where you want it?”
“Yeah. Right here," Jim said, pointing to a spot just under his right pec, towards his side.
“Okay, well take off your shirt and go ahead and lie down.”
While Leo went off to assemble all of his needles and inks onto his cart, Jim spread out on the table, luxuriating in the stretch. When Leo returned Jim was lying on his back, arms crossed behind his head with his legs dangling off the edge of the table. His bronze chest was flexed, showing off his defined pecs and biceps.
“Like what you see?” Jim asked salaciously.
Leo just rolled his eyes and instructed Jim to roll onto his left side. He began the process of preparing the skin while Jim just stared straight ahead.
“So," Leo said, eager to break the ice, “where are you from anyway? You don’t sound like a local.”
Jim smiled and responded “Yeah, I’m from Iowa originally. Just moved here a couple years ago.”
“Iowa, huh. Alright, this might sting a little. I’m going to start the outlines now."
The gentle hum of the needle started up, providing a gentle background noise to Jim’s easy chatter. He talked about how much he hated Iowa, about his high school, about how he was working for grades good enough to get out of Mississippi so he could get into a good college. He talked about his art, how drawing was his way of expression when dealing with all the problems at home, like how his mother just checked out when his father died and how he hated his new step dad, Frank. He told Leo about his father who died in Operation Desert Storm and how proud of him he was for giving his life for his country.
Leo in turn told him about his wonderful grandmother, about how she had always encouraged him to pursue whatever made him happy, even when that path took him away from college. He spoke about how she supported his love of tattoos and how her death summer before had been devastating. He talked about being raised in Georgia and the move to Mississippi. But most of all he talked about his art, the power in creating lines swirling over unbroken skin, the beauty of the crisp black ink crossing and accentuating the human body.
Occasionally Jim would suck his teeth as the needle moved over a rib or a particularly sensitive spot. Leo made sure to pause and give him breaks, but the process went quickly as he fell into a rhythm, his needle flying over Jim’s skin and the conversation flowing easily between them. Eventually, he sat up, removed his gloves, and reached for the hand mirror. Jim snatched it from Leo as the artist went to hand the mirror to him, his eagerness to see Leo's work glowing on his face.
Jim smiled, and breathed out, “Oh Leo, it’s perfect.”