Cats in the Cradle-(Jesse Fforde)

[Balthazar]

1986- Balthazar is born in Seattle,Washington to Kita Voss and Christopher Fforde. Kita worked as a parole officer. Christopher was a traveling salesman who peddled his heart as much as he did the infomercial grade office cleaning products that he left behind. The only thing about Christopher that consistently sticks with Balthazar is his patronymic name.

1989- Christopher is beyond bored with the life that Kita has rigidly maintained while he has been free to come and go. Figuring honesty is the best policy with a woman like Kita he calls her while on the road and tells her as much. He consoles her minimal disappointment by suggesting that she go find Balthazar a ‘real’ Dad since he won’t be able to commit to being there. She lost any care for him from that point on. As far as she was concerned he could fall off the face of the earth and not be missed. Or so she thinks.

1995- Christopher returns. Balthazar comes home from school and discovers sounds that tell him his mother must be entertaining in her corner of the small two bedroom rambler. The imitation briefcase with the Fforde name engraved on a small silver bar tells him who is the current guest of honor. Unimpressed and uninterested he passes by the nearly bare cupboards and head out the back kitchen door to the closest thing to what he considered a home.Every soul had a least one small glimmer of hope in the presence of another and for Balthazar that would be the one and only Hugh ‘Lunch Box” Jass. The walking mountain of a kid who made sure no one picked on him and in turn Balthazar treated him like he was as small as he was.

1996- The year that shaped the life of Balthazar Fforde. Lunch Box begins the final fight for his life. This pulls Balthazar into the neighboring rambler not too many yards from his mother’s house. He gradually sinks into the small family unit and becomes a part of the events that unfold from there on.

2000- Up till this point Balthazar has essentially become a member of the Jass household despite his mother residing across the backyard in her own home. He has become a caregiver, along with the boy’s troubled and grief stricken mother, to Lunch Box who is in the advanced stages of the Leukemia that is finally winning the battle.Young Balthazar learns his most valuable lessons about the world around him during this process. Christopher comes and goes as usual and Kita maintains insane hours working to avoid that life is to be lived outside where you are employed. Balthazar slips into the residence only to leave papers that need Kita’s signature. No hello’s or conversation are exchanged when he and his parents do cross physical paths. In a nutshell it is like a different realm in which he can step into but is close to non-existent to those who are within it.

2001- The death of Hugh ‘Lunch Box’ Jass. The passing of Hugh finds Balthazar remaining in the room abandoned by his best friend. The ashes stay on the shelf next to where he sleeps per Hugh’s last wishes. He believed Balthazar would be fine as long as he is there in some form at his side which for the most part in this continuing history proves to be true. Or it could just be plain old fashioned luck.

2002- Balthazar takes a first job at the local movie theater. He escapes into movies and martial arts, which he excels at, when he is not at school. His academic records reveal he is above average intelligence, unusually disciplined and despite his lacking of parental support or contribution he manages to balance out all aspects of his life with remarkable maturity. He graduates ahead of his highschool class without walking in the formal ceremony. Hugh’s mother sells the house and leaves for the east coast and starts a new life. This leaves Balthazar on his own with half of Lunch Box in an urn everywhere he goes. Couch surfing and the random ‘like-you-till-the-next-one-comes-along’ hook-ups happen.

2010- Eight years flows by with nothing monumental marking the time. No lasting relationships are developed romantically by his own choice during this period. His employment shifts from the management position of the movie theater where he had his first and only job to working as a seasonal golf ball diver at Seattle’s finest golf clubs. The first year he made more than he had all the years prior added together at the theater. Twelve hour days diving and averaging around 6,000 ball retrievals each shift is the stress free employment he can appreciate. This is the beginning of his whim in permanent ink. “Got balls?” needled into his lower abdomen while drunk was the first dabble in the world of eternal color for Balthazar. A whim that slowly blossoms across the majority of his body over the next several years.

2014- Balthazar hooks up with a golf pro and trades in the diving fins for the role of carrying their bag. Two and a half years are spent continent hopping and chasing balls on land and handing out the right clubs.

2016- The golf pro marries its manager and retires to teach. Balthazar is once again back in Seattle slipping into his scuba gear and taking to it like a fish tossed back in it’s preferred water. During this time Kita and he oddly reconnect. Christopher reappears becoming a far more solid and interested presence. Both parents seemingly found their way out of the extensive emotional fog that denied Balthazar the normalcy a healthy childhood should have. It only serves to finally confuse Balthazar and shake up his world.

______________________I N T R O_________________________

“Say that again?”

Balthazar couldn’t believe what he just heard. He pulled his focus off of Christopher and pulled his fingertips downward from his cheek until they reached his jaw. Each pressed firmly as if there was a hook to be found if he pushed a little more. His artic blues locked on Kita trying to get a visual of her expression while making heads or tails of what Christopher said.

“He…” Kita cleared her throat and swallowed slowly avoiding eye contact with Balthazar. For once she seemed to lack the courage to say anything at all.

It was just like old times. The tightness in the corners of his jaw and the drop of his hand caught the attention of both sitting at the kitchen table. His mother was taking everything that had been said far too calmly to be finding out then and there. Christopher, his father, obviously knew all along. Of course Balthazar was the last to know. It had nothing to do with him until now when they needed something from him. Which was more than likelyChristopher hoping to die in peace and his mother was hoping to have whatever time he had left to offer so she could hold on to to the end until her own arrived. What about Balthazar? It didn’t probably matter any more than it did the day he was born. He was just the one who never asked to come into the world to begin with but was tugged along for the ride anyways.

“I know what he said. I just wanted to see if he was man enough to say it twice.” His eyes drilled deep into those looking back at him. The woman’s face went pale and her eyes cast back to the one carrying the weight of the world and failing mortality on his shoulders. “I guess it takes dying for some to grow a set of balls.”

Balthazar stood up and took the steps needed to get around the table and closer to the door he planned on using sooner than later. It was then that he realized death of all things had been building a presence in his life while he was living his. The loss of Hugh was as much as he thought he would get alloted. Not because he was some exception to the odds in general at getting the short end of the stick. It was just that much of a event that he figured that was the big ordeal in his life. Until Christopher went and told him the story of how he had another family-which really is an odd term coming from the guy to begin with. He went and knocked up a woman, lived with her and their twins for a while. One died in some accident he didn’t expand on and the other lived somewhere in Harper Rock.

“I told you because I figured given the circumstances you should know.” A hand that bore the signs of being on death’s door stretched out and curled each frail meatless digit around the much healtheir hand beside him. “Both of you.”
“Are you ******* kidding me, Chris?” He had nothing else to call him since asshole was a little late to take up now that he had an expiration date climbing up his back. “You couldn’t handle what you created here so you went and repeated it elsewhere. Like doing it in Canada would make things any different?” He shook his head while the flow of his colorful hands went over his forehead and gripped onto the hair beneath his palms. “One drops dead and the other has some problems. No surprise you bailed. Wonder WHY he has a few problems?” He could feel his temples throbbing. “Where do I find him?”
“You don’t, Balthazar.” Kita even looked at Christopher surprised at the statement. “There is a lot more to it, okay. A lot more.” The nearly dead guy at the table stood up, be it slowly. “My brother had it coming but hell if I really know what all happened. I do know this…” He braced his unstable weight with the bony grip of his right hand on the chair in front of him. “You don’t want to get into that mess. I am surprised I made it out of there alive.”
“Yeah, so am I.”

Those were his last words as he pulled the back door open and stepped outside effectively closing it behind him. The warm glow of lights in the short distance reminded him that to feel at home required him to step into the backyard and look to the neighboring house. That was the house that once was as much of home as he ever come close to claiming. Hugh Jass was the brother he never had or so he thought. Now he is supposed to forget one that is actually walking around? Two were gone too soon. He wasn’t going to ignore the fact one was still out there. He wasn’t his father. There was no way in hell he was anything close to what Christopher Fforde was.

[Jesse Fforde]

There was a picture, for a while, on the mantel piece. A picture of his mother and his father; his mother’s skin had a healthy glow, and her hair was robust, thick, a vibrant auburn curtain that fell neatly over her pearlescent shoulders. There was a pink tinge to her cheeks which was only testament to the smile she wore, so brilliant and genuine. Her eyes, blue as the noonday sky, were glittering with love and admiration as they gazed up at the man beside her. His eyes were equally blue, yet they had a shard of ice to them. The blue wasn’t as warm. It was sharp. He, too, wore a smile.

Jesse couldn’t see his father in this picture anymore. He last saw the picture when he was five years old, and even after ransacking the house once when he was nine, he couldn’t find it again. He could find no pictures of his father. He realised that the bonfire his mother had started in the middle of the lounge room had been what had erased them all. The police had been called that night. The neighbours had called the fire department. Maybe that was the night Jesse had grown addicted to the acrid stench of burning things.

Uncle Tommy could not be asked. Uncle Tommy was the devil wearing a human face. Jesse always tried to remember his mother the way she was, but after his father’s death his mother had disintegrated. It was like both his parents had died, except his mother’s body had been left behind – a remnant of what she once was. Her skin grew pallid beneath the bruises that Uncle Tommy created. There was no longer a gleam to her warm blue eyes. They grew dull, all the light left them. If either of the boys ever asked about their father, Uncle Tommy would come after them with a belt, or a hockey stick. He’d come after them with his steel-capped boots or his thick, sausage-like fingers.

These were the memories Jesse now had access to. After that night on the roof, the night that Jordan had died, it wasn’t only Jesse’s voice that had been robbed from him. All memories of his brother slipped away, like he’d never existed. There was always something missing in Jesse’s life, and it was only after he was turned and the nightmares began to plague him that he started to realise it wasn’t only a lack of a mother and father, or a parental figure of any kind. It was a lack of a brother, a lost part of his own soul. A box in his mind had been unlocked and the memories that had been kept inside now slowly crept back out again, one by one; they took Jesse off guard a lot of the time. He’d find himself staring into thin air as they rummaged around his brain.

But there they were. Two small boys running from an Uncle who should love them, an Uncle they should have been able to rely on. They created their own refuge; the two boys had each other. That’s how they survived. They vowed to keep each other safe. Their mother was lost to them. Even then, even at six years old, they assumed the angels had taken their mother. Their mother had gone to live with their father.

All too often Jesse felt a yearning for something he’d never had. No, the yearning was for something he had once had, something he had forgotten about, something he’d thought he’d have forever. It was a lump in his throat he couldn’t dislodge, a rage that remained even though Uncle Tommy was dead, dead, dead. He wanted to bring him back, just to murder him all over again.

But he had to let it go. The rage was a weight he couldn’t handle. There were other responsibilities, there were other obligations. There were people to fill that void. They were more than that. He was no longer alone.

And so he did his best. That picture from the mantel piece was forgotten, pushed from his memory. Somewhere out there his mother still lived – as far as he knew, she still lived. Every now and again he had missed calls from her on his phone, calls that he did not answer. He did not call her back. Would he care if she died? Would he care if he wasn’t there for her in her last hours? He should. But he couldn’t bring himself around to it. She deserved to be alone in her last hours, just as she had condemned him to aloneness in his first.

________________

Even when Jesse was happy, even when he was content, there was always a heaviness to his step. A smile so easily gave way to a grimace. The gleam in his eyes – so like that of his mother’s when she was young and vibrant – could so easily give way to sparks. Fury was a constant boon buddy, a temper unleashed at the slightest provocation. The threat of the ticking time bomb constantly leaked from his pores, an aura spreading from his persona which caused the mortals around him to spread out, to avoid and evade. Jesse was morbidly fascinated by it, morbidly proud of his ability to terrify.

It wasn’t always good for business, of course. He’d all but been banished from behind the bar unless the clientele was mostly vampire, immortal. The tattoo parlour was his baby, however; it had become a destination. It was a parlour visited by those not faint of heart; those who could withstand the aura that Jesse emitted were worthy enough of the art he etched into their skin.

Tonight was no different. Jesse had a few clients booked in, and a few hours to kill should there be any walk-ins. In those hours he’d remain in the parlour bent over his sketch pad with his pens and pencils, his ink and his brushes. The leather jacket was peeled from his shoulders and hung from the vintage stand by the front door. The neon sign that graced the front window was flicked on, now flashing ‘open’. Beyond the circle of couches was the counter, behind which was the glass floor that looked down on the busy parkour/paint skirmish gym below. And beyond that were the chairs and the booths, where the pain was given and received, the art created. Upon the front counter were stacked folders of Jesse’s work – past projects and flash projects he was willing to do on the spot. He had a card, too, with his name and the shop’s number and email address.

There Jesse stood, leaning over the counter as he stared at the computer and the timeline of his night ahead; the eerie glow of the screen reflected in his eyes making them bluer than usual, shards of blue ice infused with light. Music started to play overhead – a mix of punk and southern gothic.

For now, it was a regular work night. Jesse’s world was normal, balanced on its axis. He could never have been prepared for what this night might bring.

WEARING

[Balthazar]

C a r :l: A p p e a r a n c e

“It’s on it’s last leg.” The oil stained shop cloth in the mechanic’s hand momentarily hid the decades conditioned hands that were responsible for bringing another life to the car that should have given up long ago. “Sure you don’t want to take a look at a few possibilities I have out in the back lot? I can hook you up with something far more dependable. What you got is on it’s last leg. I don’t know how the hell you made it this far,man.”

A sigh left hanging at the end of the statement almost made the sales pitch believable. Pulling the wallet from his backpocket brought forward more than the folded worn leather beneath Balthazar’s tired gaze. A rush of what was found the Seattle native’s sleep deprived brain. While his hands opened up what he really never looked at until that moment he could hear the words as clearly as if they were being said for the first time.

“And when you get the keys you gotta drive it so far that they never catch us.”

The struggling breath of someone you love who is held prisoner by something you cannot rescue them from imprints upon a person. Understandably Balthazar would never forget the sound of Lunch Box fighting for air. It would haunt him forever. While the thick pad of his thumb pulled at numerous credit card. It didn’t matter how many years had passed, how many miles he had covered in doing what he said he would. His word was golden and Hugh Jass knew it. There was no sound as Balthazar’s lips mouthed two words. The same ones he repeated when it was too hard to watch.

‘Breathe buddy.’

“We are going to get outta here.” The far away look in the failing eyes held their promise and it was Balthazar’s responsibility to make it happen. “Just like we always said we would.”

“Fforde, eh?”

A hiss of plastic moving through the credit card scanner reminded him he needed to come back to the business at hand. He looked down as the raised letters at the bottom of the card cued him to say something. Christopher Fforde never left anyone hanging that was talking to him. Especially when money was involved. He nodded and slid the card that belonged to the man back home into the wallet he had no real rights to. In a matter of seconds Balthazar would find out how upset he was that it wasn’t on the dresser where he had left it.

“Alright Chris. It looks like you are good to go.” The receipt was presented across the counter for the required signature. “My number is on that if you change your mind and you need a more reliable set of wheels.”
“Thanks.” The carbon copy was folded up and sank down into his front denim pocket.
“Any relation to the one who owns Serpentine?” The oil stained fingers scratched at the stubble peppering a square jaw.
“Probably not.” The swipe of his inked up hand claimed the keys on the service counter in front of him. “I heard about it though. Which direction would I head to find it?”

Fifteen minutes later Balthazar sat and stared at the outside of the business. He blinked slowly as if it could be any building at all like the thousands he likely passed by on the way to Canada. The gatorade bottle in his hand lifted again and found the stiff line of facial hair that formed two eye catching sharp curls at each end. He pulled the bottle down and tipped back the last of the Fierce Grape. Two swallows emptied it. A stretch of his arms was followed with the retrieval of what rarely was absent from his side. The wood dug out that would be taken for carrying anything but kid’s ashes slid into his pocket. With a creak of a driver’s door hesitating to open the taller than average form of Balthazar finally unfolded and stood at full height. The only thing left to do was to take that first step inside. Two more minutes passed and that is exactly what he did.

[Jesse Fforde]

Ever since the revelation of vampires, business had picked up. Oddly enough. Jesse had assumed that the humans would run scared; they’d set up curfews, they’d stay indoors in the later hours. The night would belong to the undead, who would then fight over their meals like scraps in a drought. With such popular films and TV shows like Twilight and Vampire Diaries, however, the opposite seemed to occur.

Sure, there were the purists who preferred their Dracula over the more modern renditions of the horror genre, but there were more curious humans than there were wary ones. Business picked up as Harper Rock became something of a tourist destination without any of the foreigners. The rest of the world was slow to pick up on it, but the locals were out and about hoping to catch a glimpse of their nearest ghoul. It meant that Jesse’s clients did indeed increase. Word of mouth, maybe – he’d become a popular dare. It didn’t matter. It should have mattered that there was an undergound movement of people who knew what he was and where he worked, but Jesse’s give-a-**** had waltzed off the set.

Whatever the case, he’d had one cancellation and his next appointment wasn’t until later in the evening. Until then, he’d welcome walk-ins and work on the commissions he had backed up. There was always work to do.

When the bell sounded alerting Jesse of a new customer, he’d relocated to the back of the parlour to his usual desk. Sketches were spread out around him, charcoal in hand. The tattoo artist jumped between mediums; where many of his contemporaries liked to use tablets, where they sketched their commissions digitally, Jesse preferred the old-school mediums. He liked the sound of pens and pencils on rough paper. It’s where he started, anyway, before transferring the design to the digital space so it could be easily resized. He finished off a couple of prominent lines before he finally looked up; the space between his desk and the front counter was vast, given the glass ‘window’ he’d had installed into the floor.

Even fully clothed, Jesse could tell the guy was serious about his tattoos. He was covered in them. Jesse wondered what real estate he could have left on the canvas that was his body, but he was morbidly curious. And anyway, these were the kinds of customers he liked best. Those who were covered in tattoos were more lenient, they gave the artist more freedom. They often gave ideas that were legitimately fun and interesting to work on, rather than the usual cliché ******** the needle virgins wanted.

Jesse stood and brushed off his hands, smears of charcoal unseen on his black denim jeans. He scuffed down the hallway to the front counter where he offered a vague smile – Jesse wasn’t generally the smiling type. And, given his aura, it wouldn’t have made a lick of difference anyway.

”Hey, man. What can I do you for?” he asked, voice its usual husk and gruff. His gaze lingered momentarily upon the curled moustache, brow twitching as he resisted the incredulous arch of a brow. It was not his place to question the man’s choice in facial hair and style. It was Jesse’s place to create and give tattoos. And so he remained silent.

[Balthazar]

Fourteen gauge surgical steel tapped at the inside upper row of his teeth while he glanced around. While his tongue curled back and pressed the combination of warm iron of alloy and carbonates downward he felt uneasy. It hit him as soon as he stepped inside. Something was totally off and it was enough to have him glance back over his shoulder to see if he was missing something behind him. Nothing was found but empty space and the door he used.The tattooed palm of his right hand curled at the back of his neck and massaged the muscle beneath. If that was supposed to do any good it failed when he heard the sound of a voice coming from the body appearing from wherever it was that they were before making their presence known.

Balthazar stood frozen right where his shoes locked on the floor beneath him. It was like the room temperature dropped instantly. A visible shiver of his upper body sent his hand down from his neck and diving for his front pocket of his jeans. The opposite hand followed suit which left both hooked at the thumb in case for some reason they were suddenly needed. His tongue corrected and his lips parted just enough he could pull in his bottom lip and run the piercing over the bottom teeth closest to where it was permanently fixed.

He was in a bit of a predicament. The words were welcoming enough but some really off putting energy was finding it’s way around him. It reminded him of the time Hugh talked him into sticking his tongue to one of the poles connecting the metal fencing around the school. It wouldn’t have been such a bad idea if it wasn’t nearly 40 below at the time. His gut was twisting as he looked the guy over that waiting for an answer. All those warning signs were jumping up just like they did back then. He knew it was a bad idea before he did it and now deja vu was coming into play. he was getting the heebee jeebee’s all over again. A twitch of his upper lip sent the well tended to facial hair over his top lip dancing briefly. He was going to ride it out. He didn’t come all the way from Seattle to leave without something. Answers in the very least.

“Ink.” Balthazar knew what he was standing in was no ordinary dive with a hung over artist answering the bells and whistles he must have set off coming in. “Looks like I came to the right place.” He stepped forward just enough to confirm that was actually a glass floor behind the one greeting customers. His attention found it’s way back to the guy while his nerves tried getting the best of him. “I am looking for someone named Fforde. Supposed to be one of the best.” Balthazar may have been increasingly uneasy while he was standing there while the skin on his chest was developing two hard knots where the hoops were fastened, but he was committed. “No offense but not just anyone gets at my skin.” He nodded at the inked up canvas staring back at him. Was it him? another shiver found his spine. “Damn, It’s cold in here.” His hands sank back into his front pockets. “Know if he is available or where I can find him?

[Jesse Fforde]

”It’s no colder in here than it is outside,” he said, gesturing to the thermostat by the door. Jesse was, of course, aware of what was happening. He was aware of his own affect on other people, specifically human people. Living people. Some came in here looking for it. Others were strangers to it, and to the rumours. This man appeared to be one such stranger. To a degree, anyway. Apparently he’d heard the name Fforde coupled with good reviews. How could he have heard that and not the consequences of seeking said tattoo artist out? Jesse shrugged it off.

Most of the time he took joy in watching how people reacted to him. Sometimes it got irksome, especially if he had work to do and he just wanted to get back to it. Tonight he was calm, and he was in a good mood. But not so good that he chose to **** with his customers. He could really push the boundaries, sometimes. The truth, however, was that he had no clients for a few hours, and more clients were better than none. If this guy wanted to walk in off the street and get some ink, than Jesse would do his best not to scare him off.

”I am one of the best. It’s your lucky night. I’m free for a few hours,” he said, hands settling on the countertop as he leaned, trying to gauge the other man. He didn’t exactly look weak. Anyone covered in that many tattoos had to have a special kind of stamina, had to be able to withstand pain. But it was amazing what a little bit of a bad aura can do to the strongest of men. There was nothing more satisfying than sending leather clad bikers running for their lives. This one was holding his ground, though.

”You got an idea in mind or are we staring from scratch? You want ink tonight, or you just want to discuss it first?” Jesse asked. He usually set up meetings with his clients beforehand – consultations before the real work began. It gave them time to think about it, to be sure of what they were going to have permanently etched into their skin. To Jesse’s credit, they generally came back. Which was saying something about his artistry.

[Balthazar]

Balthazar pulled his hands out of his front pockets. The right moved slow but firm over the front of his chest. The material of the shirt and the camo jacket overlay gravitated back and forth as he did. So either this was the Fforde he was looking for or some ink artist who was feeling particularly confident as if he owned the place. That in itself was never a bad quality. Especially when there was the prospect of allowing the one he was observing to take a needle attached to a gun with permanent ink and have at his skin. His hand froze on his chest and a slow tap of each fingertip at the surface drummed out the seconds it took for him to weigh his options.

“Sounds good.”

His hand moved to join his other and made easy work of shrugging out of the jacket and bunching it up in a firm grip for easy carrying. His left arm from the elbow down was a sleeve of black and a curiously intricate design starting on the inside of his wrist and trailing upward. Much of the same covered the right and any exposed skin, outside the hard to miss bare cap of his left shoulder, was already filled. Japan had it’s time on his body as well as a few shops in the U.K. Spain and Paris left it’s mark as well. He was a walking map of what the world had to offer in terms of permanent ink and the the artisans who specialized in working on a flesh canvas. If he was to drop his pants there was even less work space left to offer. Waist down he was covered to his toes with images of what told his story piece by piece. What it cost to achieve was insignificant. He was going to take it with him everywhere he went including to hell when he finally died. He had no doubts where he was going to one up sooner or later.

“I was thinking of something for my shoulder.” He stepped forward and leaned just enough to roll the space into view while lifting the joint. “ I think that would be enough to fill your couple hours.” the drop of his boot on the floor to step back echoed as he did. A contemplating brush of his fingers at his chin to pull lightly on the beard beneath had him wondering if it really was that cold in the place or it was just him. “How are you with a side profile of a skull with heavy shadowing in black and gray?” His hand cupped the spot his wanted it. “Right here?”

Balthazar couldn’t help himself. Something just was giving him a case of ‘get-the-****-out-of-here’. It hit him whenever he was about to do something he would regret. He scratched his head trying to sum up it’s source. The guy he was chatting at seemed a bit pale and perhaps he was one of those types that required more transfusions than the average living. So far he was acting cool. Balthazar wasn’t doing anything stupid like handing over his wallet and the gold fillings in his teeth. That had to be some sort of sign. Casually he pulled a plastic sleeve saltine cracker from his pocket he took extra of back at the convenience store he last fueled up at.

“Sorry,man, got a mild gut ache rolling through. Likely was the toxic chili I had when I got into town.” The crinkling of the cellophane was brief when he tore it apart and claimed the dry prize inside. He bit the cracker in half and started chewing. “Ready when you are.”

[Jesse Fforde]

Gut ache. That was new. But then Jesse wasn’t in the habit of discussing a human’s woes with them. He didn’t ask them how he made them feel, down to the specifics. He could only work with what they gave him, and most often they said nothing. They chose to ignore the creeps he gave them, gloss over them, blame on something else. Like bad chilli they had on their way into town. Jesse arched a brow.

”You make it sound like you rolled into town to come here and get a tattoo,” he said. Food didn’t last long in the body. A couple of hours, maybe less, for that toxic chilli to only now be causing a gut ache. Food that couldn’t have been consumed too long ago. It was curious, but maybe the guy had settled at a nearby motel and had a few hours to kill, not wanting to hang around in some dingy room and preferring to see the sights. And, given that Harper Rock had very little in the way of tourist attractions, why not get a tattoo? Still, Jesse had to wonder.

”I suppose I should be flattered. I didn’t know rumours of my work had gotten out of town,” he said, a tilt of an invisible hat in the direction of his own curiosity and dubiousness. Trust was a foreign concept to the Necromancer and if anyone’s stories didn’t add up he had to assume they were up to no good. Not that he’d reached that point yet. To blow a bad chilli on the way into town out of proportion would be insane. He was not so paranoid as to become a crazy person.

”To do those rumours justice… yes, I can manage that. I could even say it’s my forte,” he said as he reached for one of the many folders he had spread out over the front counter. He had them sorted according to style, and he handed the customer the folder containing all his black and white pieces, his portraits and sketches – which did, indeed, include quite a few skulls. Most of them with snakes writhing through them, but the snakes could easily be taken out.

”Find something in there that suits the style you’re after and I can knock something together,” he said.

[Balthazar]

“Does that surprise you? Being the one considered competent enough to hold a needle and sink it into someone’s flesh with permission is pretty huge in my book. Even more so when you are the one who leaves the results there permanently for them to walk around with. I have went all the way to Japan to have work done by one artist.” Balthazar took up the folder that was offered and flipped it open. “Getting paid a pocket’s worth of nice change is a bonus.” Balthazar was six pages in when something finally caught his eye. He looked up instead of pointing it out. “But that isn’t why you do it.” Finally his finger tapped out the side view of a skull with a snake peeking out of an eye socket. “You are an artist. The fact I am going to be paying you to set this in my skin says it.” He traced out the snake with the tip of his inked up finger. “The rumors are true.” He slide the folder back to him. “And you have a thing for snakes.”

A shiver slithered down his spine as he gave the shop a slow assessing look. His blood was going to surface within the walls and it was becoming a lot closer to it happening. Balthazar didn’t take things lightly. Despite what history had thrown his way he actually gave almost everything serious thought. Even if it had him pulling golf balls out of water for a living, or carrying some pro golfer’s bags in Japan. Hell, he even gave that swallow of two shots worth of moonshine back in 2015 a lot of thought before he tipped it back and let it all slide down his throat. The results after the fact left no question it was hardly one of his brighter moments. Hopefully this situation had better results.

“So where we going to do this?” He was back to focusing on the one who was going to make things happen. The very one who still had his skin feeling unusually uncomfortable and inspiring a memorable case of the creeps. He stepped back from the counter and gave his shoulders a brief roll to relax the rest of his body which proved to be ineffective. “Jesse Fforde, eh?” He caught sight of the business cards held nice and neat in the holder on the counter. He leaned forward just enough to pluck one out. “Always been local or is this a new spot for you?”

Balthazar figured coming right out with “Who’s your Daddy?” was not the route to take. Finding out what he could while he got some work done would buy him a few hours worth of information to decide if he was who he was looking for. Something already said he was. The eyes perhaps. It was like looking at Chris.Time would tell.

“I am good to go, man.” He nodded to the hall that he assumed would lead to the guy’s work spaces. “Lead the way.”

[Jesse Fforde]

With the way the words rolled from this guy’s tongue, Jesse had a feeling he wouldn’t have to keep up the conversation tonight. The other guy could do all the talking. All Jesse needed to do was grunt and give single worded answers. These were his favourite kinds of people. The ones who didn’t constantly expect him to keep up conversation, as if silences could be awkward. Jesse preferred silences. Sometimes he wished he were still mute. Sometimes he was tempted to cut out his voice box so many times that it refused to grow back. All that would be left was one huge scar. And though people would ask why he had it or what had caused it, he could just smile knowingly, and never have to give them the answer. There was a freedom in being exempt from speech.

But here he was, a business owner, with a customer trying to make conversation. So many of them did it. They were given such a violent case of the creeps that their nervousness caused them to talk, to ask questions, to spill their guts. Jesse merely nodded and gestured down the hallway, this guy desperate to get his ink done. Normally Jesse made them wait on the couches out front while he did the drawing but for this one, he’d sketch it straight onto the skin. That’s the kind of impatience this guy seemed to have, his confidence in Jesse’s work paramount.

”The place is called Serpentine, man,” he said, a statement delivered in a flat tone. He may as well have said well done, Sherlock. Everything else was dismissed, for now, the compliments and statements filed away. Anyone who didn’t know Jesse soon learned that he wasn’t a chatty guy. He liked to get his work done, leave his art on others. The guy was right. He didn’t do it for the money, though the money was a bonus.

Following along behind the customer, Jesse grabbed a clipboard with forms on it from the counter. Once in the back room he gestured to the chair, which looked a lot like a dentist’s chair but more retro-modern, suggesting that the guy should sit.

”Fill this out while I get ready,” he said. It was the usual guff – **** that probably didn’t need to be asked, given how many tattoos the guy had. At the top it asked for a name. Underneath, it asked for a phone number and email address, though those were optional. Underneath that, it asked things like allergies, whether or not he’d drunk any alcohol in the last twenty-four hours, whether he was prone to anaemia. There was a paragraph of terms and conditions down the bottom, and a space for a signature.

Serpentine was not just any old back alley tattoo joint. Jesse did things properly, and above board. These forms were his insurance.

He did not answer the question about where he was from – he was less in the habit of giving away personal information about himself now than he had been before. It was a harmless question but still. Whose business was it?