Page 46 of Nash
The shop is warm but quiet. Frankie's station is dark, her apron still on the hook. She told me at the clubhouse she was meeting Arden before coming in. Something about picking up supplies for a stray she'd been feeding.
I glance at the basement door on my way past. The padlock is in place.
Nash takes the wall by the door. I tie on my apron and start my prep.
My first consult is a college kid with a nose ring and a binder full of reference images. She wants a compass rose on her wrist.
"I've been researching for like six months," she says, flipping through printed pages. "I want something that feels like it belongs on old nautical charts but also has a modern edge? Like vintage but not costumey?"
"You want it to look like it was carved into a ship's wheel by a drunk sailor with excellent taste."
She lights up. "Yes. Exactly that."
I walk her through placement, sizing, how the lines will age on the inner wrist versus the outer. She asks smart questions. Clearly, she really did do her homework. I pull out my sketchpad and flip to the compass rose I've been working on, the shattered one with wisteria growing through the cracks.
Her eyes go wide. "Can I get THAT?"
"That one's not ready yet. But we can work toward something in that family."
We schedule a follow-up. She leaves practically vibrating. I watch her go and feel the warm hum I always get when someone trusts me with the thing they've been carrying in their head for months.
I glance at Nash. He's watching me. I catch his eyes and he holds my gaze. My stomach tightens and I turn back to my station because if I hold that gaze any longer I'm going to say something I can't take back.
My second consult is a couple getting matching mountain ranges. His-and-hers. A trip to Colorado that changed everything, they tell me, finishing each other's sentences the way couples do when they've been telling a story so long it's become one voice.
"We want the same range," she says, "but from different angles. Like we're standing next to each other looking at the same thing."
"Same mountain, different perspectives," I say. "I love that."
"Is that doable?" he asks.
"Honey, I once tattooed a man's fantasy football lineup on his ribcage in a font that matched his wedding invitation. A mountain range from two angles is a vacation."
They laugh. He squeezes her hand. I measure his forearm and hers, noting the difference in circumference, calculating the scale adjustment so the ranges will line up when they stand side by side.
They're holding hands the entire time. His thumb traces circles on her knuckles. I watch the gesture and my brain, uninvited, supplies the memory of Nash's thumb stroking my pulse point over a stolen fry. My hand cramps on the measuring tape.
Focus, Ruby. Professional. You are a professional.
I catch Nash in the mirror behind my station. He's watching my hands. The way he watches my hands when I work, as if my fingers are doing something worth studying. The thought of what else these fingers could be doing to him arrives fully formed and settles between my thighs.
Jesus Christ, Ruby. There are clients present. There are MATCHING MOUNTAIN RANGES present. Get it together.
The couple leaves. I sit at my station and press my palms flat on the surface.
"You okay?" Nash asks from the wall.
"Fine. Great. Just had a very professional thought about mountain ranges."
He doesn't respond. I don't explain.
Frankie arrives after one, bag over her shoulder, coffee in hand, looking like a woman who has done something complicated before breakfast and intends to say nothing about it. She sets up her station, puts on a record, and the shop fills with the low, familiar sound of it.
"How's the stray?" I ask.
"Fed." She doesn't elaborate. I don't push.
The afternoon is a sleeve session for a woman named Hargrove. Three hours of precise linework, thorny vines wrapping across the client's shoulder blade, the negative space holding the composition together. I lose myself in it. The buzz of the machine, the rhythm of wipe-and-ink, the way the design transfers from paper to skin. This is where everything goes quiet. Just hands and ink.
