Prompted Shorties

Unexpected Inking

Prompt: You are showering one morning when you notice a tattoo on your body that you're quite sure you don't remember getting. What is it, how did you get it, and what does it mean?

Story:

My friends kept asking me if I were okay, I mean, I just survived a car crash, why wouldn't I be 'okay' with that?

It's my last day at the hospital, before they discharge me. Yesterday, my mom and dad asked me this weird question. "Do you remember anything before the crash?" It made me ponder on the question for quite a while.

I know I was driving to college because I always drove there from home whenever I stay over for the weekend. That's what I remember, but then they gave me that confused look, like I was delusional or something. Later that day I saw them talking to another couple when I almost passed out from the medicine that the nurse injected in my system, I remember the couple asking my parents "Does he remember our son?"

I never knew what they meant by that. I just shrugged the thought off when I went home to my parents' house.

A lot changed in the house after just a week, which weirded me out a little bit. Everything's in a different place now, the furniture, the appliances, just... everything.

I stayed in my room later that afternoon. Stared at the same old ceiling where my poster of Mumford and Sons still hang. It felt nice that some things hadn't changed around here.

I decided to take a long warm bath before dinner, I felt like I needed the time off after what my body has gone through.

As I prepare my bath with hot water and some liquid soap, I took off my clothes and made my way into the tub. Then, just as I was getting into the tub, I caught a glimpse on my mirror from the corner of my eye a scribble on my upper right butt cheek.

I went closer to the mirror and inspected the scribble.

It was a tattoo of a balloon. I'm quite certain I never got that tattoo and if I did, it surely won't be a balloon.

The more I stared at the unexpected ink on my butt, the more my head began to ache. Until it became unbearable, then lights flashed around me that sent me falling down butt first on the cold bathroom floor.

Then it happened. Tons of memories, images and scents flowing through my mind all at once hitting me hard like a freight train.

I remember everything. The couple that my parents were talking to yesterday were my mother and father in law. A name suddenly surged through my head. James, my husband. Where is he?

I looked at my left ring finger and the tan line where a ring used to be and felt around the emptiness of that ringless finger. I started to sob when I remembered how I got that tattoo. It was our first year anniversary of being married and we wanted to do something crazy that day so we both got a balloon tattoo to commemorate the time that we first met.

A balloon was all it took for our paths to cross and to bond us till death do us part. We were the only two adults that bought one balloon that afternoon on the beach who weren't parents. He was so handsome, so bold, so carefree, so daring and so kind.

I covered my face with my hands and cried as I remember that tragic day. I remember a deer in the middle of the road. I remember seeing a broken windshield, my car crashed onto a tree, my husband bleeding to death as well as I, and... and... wait.

Where's my ring?