Hallelujah

Chapter 8

When I stand up to face him my heart drops and start beating in over time.  I can also feel my respiratory rate increase. 
"Hello, My name is Niki" I say grabbing his hand. He gladly takes it, and stares at me for about a minute, like he is confused. Does he not recognize me?! He shakes his head then drops my hand.
"So...um...I hear you want to have a portrait of Frank Sinatra?" I manage to mumble out.  He gives me his collate smile and I feel my insides turn to mush.
"Yeah! If you wouldn't mind. He's one of my biggest inspirations." He enthuses, and with that said I see the boy I loved come out. I reciprocate his smile. 
"Well I have a few ideas sketched out if you want to take a look" I say reaching for my sketch book, but he stops me.
"Honestly I've seen your work, it's...unbelievable. I want you to surprise me!" I give him  a confused look.
"You wan't me to surprise you with an unknown tattoo on your arm? That doesn't seem very smart..." I state. He shrugs his shoulders and sits down on my tattoo chair. 
"You gotta take some risks sometimes."  I bite my bottom lip and decide to just go for it. I sit down on my rollie stool, he pulls up his sleeve and exposes his bare left fore arm. A blank canvas. My inner artist gets excited, he has a couple tattoos on this same arm, but nothing interfering with my work space. 
"If you're sure about this...." I snap on my  black rubber gloves. He nods. 
I place the stencil on his arm and peel it back. I stare at Sinatra's face for a while, and that's when I get the idea. I'm going to tattoo the drawing I gave to him the night he left me, maybe that will make him remember. 
My hands start shaking and I have to take a deep breath before I start, but once I do I start tracing my outline, and purposely dig my needle into his arm a little harder than I normally would, I can tell by the pained look on his face that it hurts. I smile a little evil grin and continue.

An hour into the tattoo and the outline and some miner shading is completed. 
"Mind if I go have a smoke?" he asks. I roll my eyes and stop my tattoo gun. He's still smoking, great. 
But I politely say.  "Yeah. Sure" I place the gun down and take my gloves off. Brendon looks down at his arm and smiles. 
"So far it looks great!" he reaches into his pocket and grabs out a pack of cigarettes and heads to the door.  I place my  head into my hands and try to hold back tears.
How does he not recognize me?!?!  I start to get really mad. Do I look that different? Then I remember that I have my senior year book buried in my office. 
I shoot up off my stool and race in there. After 5 minutes of digging around I find it. I flip to my picture. 
My blonde hair was straight as an arrow and I had a half smile on my face, my face was so skinny. My eyes look bright with happiness. And I flash back.  Picture day was the day Brendon got me a really pretty flower necklace, which is that I am seen wearing in the picture. He gave it to for our 3 month anniversary.  I smile now thinking about how happy that made me. I shake my head and flash back to the present. 
"Hey Dylan!" I shout from my office.  A couple of seconds later Dylan stands in my doorway.
"yes?" he sings.
"Do me a favor and look at this picture and tell me what you think..." I say pointing to my picture in the yearbook.  He gives me a confused look but comes over and looks. 
"Eh...kind of a plain girl, screams Jesus freak if you ask me." He states. I laugh. 
"Why?" he asks.
"Just wondering, she was this girl  I went to high school with she just tried to add me on facebook" I lie. Dylan nods and looks at me.
"Ok...." he gives a me a funny look and walks out of the room. He didn't even recognize me! No wonder Brendon doesn't either, I have changed so much.  I've gained about 50lbs (gone to good areas) my hair is fire truck red and my arms are covered in tattoos. I feel a little bit of relief. I am going to make him remember me, remember leaving me and never coming back. I walk back out of my office and see Brendon sitting back in the chair on his phone.
"Sorry had a phone call" I plainly say. I put on another pair of gloves and start tattooing again.

2 hours into the tattoo and I am just about done. Brendon hasn't really looked down at it and we haven't really talked, although I can tell he is very tense. 
"So tell me how your band got it's start" I say breaking the silence finally. Brendon snaps out of his daze and lets our a cough.
"We all met in high school, we all wanted to be in a band so we started practicing together. I worked at a smoothie making store to help pay rent for our practice space. The Spring before I graduated high school we got noticed and got asked to go on tour opening for some bands, and the rest is history" he says like he has said it a million times, which he probably has, but I decide to pry further.
"Oh, have you been back to your home town since?"  Brendon gets a little tense at that question.
"Uh..yeah a few times. Mainly to visit family for a short while then we are back on the road." I dig my needle in a little deeper. So he had gone back! He went back and never came for me! 
"So I imagine you left a lot at home, being so young and all.. friends, family, girlfriends." I pry.
" Yeah...lost a few people" he says sadly. Is he remembering? 
"So are you married?" I question. Brendon laughs and responds
"Recently single thanks" 
I bite my lip. Then he asks.
"and yourself?"
"I've been single for about a year now" I respond truthfully. 
"Why so long?" he prys. I get irritated, what does he care?
"Because I had some one in my past break my heart beyond repair and I've had trust issues ever since" I say honestly. Brendon looks sad.
"Sorry I asked"  
"Well We're about done here, just doing some quick spot checks" I say turning his arm and inspecting my work. That's when I look and see that in one of the tropical flowers he has tattooed on him he has a date hidden in it, it reads 5/28/2005.
"What's this date mean?"  I blurt. Brendon gives me a shocked look.
"you can make that out?" 
"Yeah, I've done plenty of hidden stuff like this in tattoos before, so it easy for me to spot"  I boast.
"Oh I guess that makes sense.  It was the day I left a piece of me at home and could never get back. When I'm having an troubles with songs or anything I look at it and it takes me back to that day, all the happiness, anger and sadness and it inspires me." 
I become speechless. I feel tears trying to fall. I just nod and wipe the ink off his arm. 
"You ok?" he asks seeing something is wrong. I shake my head no.
"You can look now" I say with a shakey voice. Brendon gets up from the chair and goes over to the mirror. 
He looks at it and his smiles fades and I can see a mix of emotions go across his face.
"It's....I....It looks just like....." he stutters. He walks up to me and gets within inches of my face, and stares deep into my eyes. 
I can feel the fire burning between us. It takes all I have not to wrap my arms around him to make this feeling go away. After several intense moments he finally whispers.
"Abbi?"