Boardwalk

Chapter Seven- Tattoos..sorta

Once she said that she looked at me, or more correctly she stared into my eyes like someone would stare into your soul,"Sweetheart what's wrong with your eyes? They're all plum-colored..." Even as she said it she realized what had happened, what the day was and connected it to why I was soaked, soon her features turned to a look of horror. Probably because I was doomed to be haunted by ghosts and being possessed and all that cheesy crap from the myths.

"Ellie, don't freak out, but I fell into the water today," I said as she shook her small head.

"No no no no no! You cannot have fallen into that stuff! I was supposed to protect you! What is wrong with me?!" She said her head shaking faster, the scene would be quite funny if the topic wasn't so serious.

"Ellie it's fine okay? Everything will b-" I was cut off by my own scream as a hot fire began to spread over shoulder. Little tiny pin pricks of lava about the size of a 50 cent coin imprinted in my skin on the hollow of my throat, but as soon as that was done another larger area was suddenly on fire too, consistent pricks of pain danced down my shoulder and the side of my back. The pain was so intense I nearly passed out, laying on the floor of the shack I moaned in my slow torture.

And just when I thought it was over a searing pain went across my forehead in a strip, but finally it was done, everything faded out again and I think I heard Jessica's voice, but I didn't care. It was time to sleep.

~~~

When I woke up hours later Ellie, Jess, and Rykki were all hovering over me in awe.

"What are you guys staring at?" I asked putting a hand to my aching forehead.

Rykki grabbed my hands and yanked me up."I'll show you what were looking at,"she said her face still showed she was in awe of something.

She pulled me outside and told me to look into the water as she had before with my eyes, so I looked and boy was I amazed.

There was an eagle about as wide as my forehead and about half an inch tall. It's wings curved up and ended at the edge of my hair line leaving half an inch of space between its head and my hair line.

"Wow,"I breathed in astonishment."It's so pretty,"I said, putting a hand to my forehead, ignoring the throbbing pain.

"That's not all JC. Look at your shoulder and the base of your neck,"Jess said, wide eyed.

So I did. I stretched my neck to see my shoulder to see a massive dragonfly extending from my shoulder blade to my waist.I leaned over the pier further to see my neck and saw a small butterfly kind of looking as if it was made of knots on the hollow of my throat. My jaw dropped,"What are these?"

"Well I believe they are symbols,"Ellie replied.

"Symbols of what?"I asked.

"I'm not so sure about the dragonfly or the eagle, but I know that the butterfly is a symbol of spirit."

Rykki held up her finger,"An eagle stands for strength, and because it's on your forehead I'm going to guess it has something to do with strength of mind."

Well this was a 'huh?' moment for sure.

"So what's the dragonfly mean?"I inquired, extremely confused my brows furrowed and I frowned. Mom and dad sure aren't going to like these...tattoos, if that's what they even are.

"Um so where's Tank, Ellie?"I asked, changing the subject before anyone could answer my dragonfly question.

"Exactly where you were. He left to go find you. Disappeared the morning after you did."

Oh, that's not good at all.