Ink

Chapter Three

And I died every night, in your honour, while you were gone ...

Breakfast was pretty much what I always remember my family meals to be. Loud. Like feeding time at the zoo.

Jack and Scott argue like cat and dog – they're just too similar, that it's like the only thing that can really wind either of them up is a mirror image of themselves. They've always been that way, and Tommy, being the eldest, has always been the one to reign them back in when they get out of hand. Jack and Scott even look alike – there's like a year between them so everyone thinks that they're twins, but they're not – they're just like recycled clones of each other. Both blonde and brutish, and immature – all they care about is fucking and fighting ... and engines of any description – on a bike, a car, a boat, anything. All of my brothers inherited that from our father. I never had, I'd just always felt like I had to at least try, and that's why I'd started to spray the designs onto my brothers' bikes when I was barely a teenager, because I'd needed a reason to stay in my own family's shop. Spraying was something that only I could do – it was a reason for them to come to me – and I love to watch a design come to life no matter how it manifests, so bodywork designs were just a happy medium.

How pathetic that you'd need to go out of your way and find a purpose to fit into your own family.

"I need that last piece of bacon," Jack was shouting over to Scott, "I'm fucking hungrier than you are, you fat bastard! You've done nothing but eat since we got here!"

I had noticed that my pitiful food supply had dwindled since I'd left them all in the lounge the night before – I'd had to drive out to the store for eggs and bacon, because they must have started breakfast at like five am.

Scott swallowed the greasy meat anyway, smacking his lips with relish as Jack went to dive across the table at him, but Tommy had him by the scruff of his neck before his ass left the bench. Tommy had barely moved, he just had quick reflexes like that.

They'd definitely made themselves at home, alright. Everything was exactly the same as I remembered; all the dynamics were just as they'd ever been – two fighting, Tommy in the middle, Stix a silent authority watching over them, hopping in whenever he was needed. It was exactly the same, but I didn't have a clue where I fit into this. Because I was fifteen when they left, I'd have maybe sulked that nobody thought to pass me more breakfast, or kicked up a fuss because Tommy used the last dregs of milk for his coffee, and they'd roll their eyes at me, and ruffle my hair to carry on their wind up – maybe bitch a bit that I was too skinny anyway. But I couldn't fit in in the same way after three years – too much had changed.

Because, for three years, my breakfasts were silent, limited to what I had in the fridge or cupboards, or what I could afford, and I used the time to catch up on my bills, work out my budgets, do a few designs that I had to catch up on. I'd maybe get a text from Lee, or Genna, my boss at the studio where I worked on freelance tattoo pieces, but my breakfasts didn't look like this anymore.

I felt like a visitor from the future. Like I was the intruder. Like this wasn't the same kitchen I sat in every morning.

So I quietly finished my corn flakes, pulling out my phone to text Lee and see what he was doing later, and then sent another to my boss at Angels, to see if I could try to at least sort some of this shit that Stix caused by dragging me out of the club in the middle of a performance like he did. Without another word I just started clearing the table around them, leaving them to their friendly breakfast. They had no need for me, so I might as well make myself useful. I'd deliberately avoided Stix throughout the morning, I'd felt his eyes on me, but I never looked up to meet them. I couldn't, there was something different and yet exactly the same about the way he was looking at me, and I couldn't work out what he wanted. I wasn't even sure I wanted to try. I had to bury it, especially if they were staying.