Why do children have to be so small?

A pretty thought

Getting a tattoo hurts like hell. It's far away from having the skin on my elbow slowly decay, or being crushed under a building, but it's pretty close. I've been sitting here with my arm stretched out for a couple of hours. Everyone else is finished, their tattoos wrapped in plastic. Eri has been holding my hand for the past hour or so.
"It's so pretty, daddy!"
"You think so?"
I haven't actually seen it yet, I just saw the stencil. I've been actively avoiding looking at it since we started. 
"I'm almost done, it's just the numbers left."
The tattoo artist refills the needle with black ink and tattoos the numbers under the cats. 
"What do the numbers mean?"
Eri is looking at the tattoo with big eyes.
"It's your birthdays, princess. July first, July seventh and December twenty-first."
She gasps dramatically.
"Really!?"
Eri's seventh birthday is getting close. My birthday just passed. And I know exactly what to get her. She's been eyeing a big teddy bear whenever we go to the store. I've seen her hugging it a couple of times as well. 
“Really. I wanted the tattoo to have meaning, so I let that meaning be you. My family.”
“Okay, all done. I’ll just clean it and wrap it up and we’re finished.”
“Thanks.”
She wraps it in plastic wrap and I finally get to stand up. My neck is sore from laying still for so long. 
“Let me see let me see!”
“Calm down, I want to see it, too!”
I walk over to the full body mirror that’s leaned against the wall and look at the tattoo. I had shown the artist my very ugly sketch and she drew the cats exactly how I wanted them to look. 
“Wow… I have a tattoo now.”
“So do I.”
“You already had the poke thing!”
“Stick ‘n’ poke.”
“Poke thing.”
Hizashi pulls my arm without a warning.
“That hurts! Stop!”
“No it doesn’t, you’ll get used to it.”
He looks at the now wrapped up tattoo in awe.
“It’s so pretty…”
“I know right? Can I have my arm back now? That really hurts.”
He lets go of my arm.
“Let me see what you got.”
I pull up his shirt and look at the tattoo right above his hip. The tattoo is fairly small compared to some of his others, but to be fair, he didn’t have much room left. It’s a tattoo of a little bird, packed with detail and color. 
“Did you draw that?”
“You really think I can draw? After over 15 years? No, I did not draw that.”
“That’s a shame.”
I drop the shirt and kiss his cheek.
“I want to see yours, too, young man.”
Hitoshi got his tattoo in the same spot as me. It’s a cluster of dark, yellow and white flowers, filled to the brim with tiny details. Every white flower has a little thorn, and every dark flower has an imperfection somewhere, like a little rip in one of the petals.
“Wow, are you saying I’m old?”
His face goes deep red and he pulls his arm back.
“N-no, it was just a play on your sc-”
“I know, I’m just teasing you. It’s pretty.”
I ruffle his hair before turning to Kaminari. he got his tattoo on his ankle. It looked like it hurt a lot, but it won’t be visible most of the time. 
“Now none of us are getting more tattoos in at least another yea-”
“Wait!”
Hizashi grabs my arm.
“We have to do one more thing!”
“What is it?”
“A tattoo.”
“Well, yes, that much I figured, but what tattoo?”
“Ngh- you won’t want to do it if I tell you what it is but I know you’ll like it-”
“Why would you suggest a tattoo you know I won’t want.”
“Just trust me on this one, okay? It’s tiny, only take a minute. Pretty please?”
I hesitate. I don’t like the idea of getting a tattoo without knowing what it is before it’s on my body.
“...Fine. But it has to be tiny.”
“It will be, I promise.”
He walks over to the counter and starts talking to the tattoo artist that tattooed him. 
“How does he keep dragging me into stuff like this?”
“You dragged yourself into this, dad, you can’t blame him for this one.”
“Well, I agreed to one tattoo, not two. This is all him.”
“Okay, let’s do this!”
He grabs my arm without a warning and pulls me towards the chair.
“Wait you want me to go first?”
“Yes! You won’t do it if I do it first!”
I sit down in the chair again and sigh. 
“Why do you keep doing this? Are we getting matching tattoos?”
“Yes.”
“You are so stupid, so many people get matching tattoos and then break up and then they have something to remind them of their ex forever.”
“We’re not going to divorce. We’ve been together for over fifteen years, love.”
“You never know. What if you go insane and kill someone? Then I’ll have to divorce you.”
“I’m not going to go insa-”
The tattoo artist interrupts him.
“Ready?”
He has red ink in the needle.
“I have no idea what’s gonna go on my body but sure, I’m ready.”
He grabs my left hand and starts to clean my pinky finger.
“Wait, my finger?”
“Yes.”
“But that’s gonna be visible, especially if it’s red!”
“No it’s not. Just trust me, okay? It’ll be fine.”
I hesitate once more before finally giving in and letting him clean my pinky. Then he turns the tattoo machine on, and the needle starts going up and down. Hizashi told me to specifically not get a tattoo on any of my fingers because it’ll hurt the most, and now he’s the one making me get one. Unbelievable. I let put a small gasp as the needle hits my skin. It feels like it’s scraping against the bone underneath, much worse than the tattoo on my forearm. 
“Yup, that sucks, that really sucks…”
He slowly turns my finger around, tattooing around it. It doesn’t take more than a minute before he’s done.
“There, easy peasy, wasn’t it?”
His pierced lips smiles up at me.
“Yeah, easy…”
I look at the tattoo. It’s a simple, red line around the base of my pinky finger. 
“Well… what is it?”
I look at Hizashi as we switch places.
“Have you ever heard of the Red String of Fate? It’s a myth where all soulmates are tied together at their pinky fingers with a red string. No matter how long or tangled the string gets, it can never be cut or broken. And we can’t wear our rings when we’re on duty, so this is an alternative to that.”
I look at the tattoo again. The Red String of Fate, huh? It’s a pretty thought. I kiss his forehead when he sits down in the chair.
“Thanks. But you’re paying for these.”