Living on the Edge

I sat in the middle of my bed, surrounded by what seemed like an endless amount of papers. Some were Julia's tattoo designs, and others for work, some were mine for work, some were James's lyrics and god only knows what else.

"So what color should I do my nails then?"

"That one." Julia told me, while she continued to sketch some script looking letters. You really couldn’t bother her with anything while she was doodling. I picked up on that a while ago, but I just never give up on these things.

"You're not even looking."

"Kristine, I have to get some of this paper work done for work. What are my options?"

"I'll help you finish it later. I'm going to work with you anyway. Okay, there's Lincoln Park After Dark, Russian Navy, or Bastille My Heart."

"Uh, Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln."

"Kay."

"Goes to the park, after dark." she said in a sing-song voice to herself, more than anyone else, still not looking up from her drawing.

"You're sure you're not on drugs?"

"Mmmmhmmmmmmmmm!"

"Can you even like, have a normal conversation?" I asked, looking up from my nails.

"Yeah, but I need to get this done. My client is coming in at one ish. Kill me."

"So are we leaving at 12:30 then?" I looked over at the clock on the nightstand, which now read '12:04' in bright green numbers.

"Yeah, yeah."

________

Julia and I walked into the tattoo shop at around 12:50. Honestly, I was quite astounded with our current achievement. I thought we wouldn't get there until at least 1:15 or so. 

"Well look who decided to show up." Amy greeted us from behind the white, glowing desk. She sat upon one of the desk stools, shuffling some papers around organizing them into folders. The tattooing business isn't always the most orderly one.

"Hey guys" Paige said waving, making herself known from the little sofa towards the corner of the shop she was currently sprawled out on reading a magazine.

"Sorry we're late. Julia thought it was necessary to finish her design at home." I told her, before plopping down in a chair, taking off my sunglasses, and looking around while Julia ran off to the back to get ready for her client. "Did you guys redecorate? Move stuff around?" The couches weren't quite where I remembered them, the curtains looked different, and it smelled like a mix of tattoo ink and and flowers.

"I did yesterday, actually." Amy told me. "I had some free time in the morning, and I was getting tired of looking at how it was before."

"Okay good," I said letting out a sigh "I thought I was hallucinating" 

Something like five minutes later, the door opened causing the bells to jingle, and I'm assuming Amy to look up from her paper work, or whatever she was preoccupying herself with at the desk. I, however, kept my nose in my phone.

"Hi James!" she said, welcoming him in cheerfully.

"Oh no." I said, sliding my phone closed.

"Kristine!" James yelled, a smile plastered on his face as he turned and ran over in my direction. That caused me to at least laugh a little.

"Hey, what are you doing here?"

"I didn't want to sit at home by myself, and I brought this" he announced, pulling a piece of paper out of his back pocket. 

"What is it?"

"Hold on, I can't show you yet"

He turned fully around, making sure the whole thing was unfolded, and wrinkle free, and then turned back around, handing me the piece of paper.

"You didn't" I just looked up at James, in disbelief, who was smiling like an idiot at the moment.

"I like it"

"Of course you do" I said, looking back down at the paper. It was a drawing for a tattoo of Cubbie, his cat who he probably loved more than life itself "James you are such a fruitcake."

"What? Me? How am I a fruitcake?" he asked in a mock surprise voice, taking a seat on my leg.

"James, what are you doing?"

"It's called brotherly love." he said, smiling over at me and batting his eyelashes.

"No, brotherly love would be buying me a car for my birthday," I shot back, matter of factly "And I'd like to point out, batting your eyelashes is a very fruitcakey move."

"Well if I bought you a car for your birthday, I'd have no birthday money left for my birthday."

"Guys, I have to go get some papers in the other room, I'll be back in a few" Amy informed us, hopping off of the stool and grabbing some paper clips.

"Alrighty."

Not three minutes later did someone else open the door, startling James and I from our current argument. It was a thin, yet built man in a leather jacket wearing a pair of dark jeans, boots, and sunglasses to top it all off. He had short brown hair, a nice stride to his step, and from what I could tell, not many tattoos.

"Oh my god!" I whisper shouted at James, who was still sitting on my leg which had gone numb quite some time ago.

"What?"

"Look at that guy" I said, putting my hand over my mouth, directing myself more towards James's ear.

"Are you kidding? You're too tall for him."

"Oh, what do you know?" I asked, sitting back in the chair. At this point, the man was at the front desk and Amy had not yet returned, and he glanced around the shop; at Paige and then at us.

"Uh, do you guys work here?"

"Um, Paige?" I questioned, looking over at her past James's shoulder.

"It's fine, you can take care of it" she uttered, batting her hand my way, still engrossed in reading her magazine.

"James get off of me," I instructed, pushing James off and attempting to get out of the chair "So your appointment was for one right?" I asked, hobbling my way over to the desk with my leg half asleep.

"I believe so" he said smiling and pulling off his sunglasses.

“Okay”, I told him once I reached the desk, frantically looking around for the client forms. Luckily Amy left some handy from when she was doing her organizing. “I just have to ask you to fill these out, and I’ll go tell Julia her client’s here” I said smiling, handing him the papers.

“Oh, so you’re not tattooing me then?”

“Ah, fortunately no. Honestly, I bet a three year old can draw better than me.”

“Hahaha. I’ll take your word for it, I guess. You’ll keep me company though, right?”

“I might. I wouldn’t worry about it though, Julia’s quite the party”

He flashed a toothy grin at me before I practically skipped back to Julia’s station, making sure I didn’t run into any walls or trip over air. I have a tendency to to make myself look like a dumb ass. I shuffled over to Julia’s chair and table like a little five year old on a sugar rush
.
“Oh my god!” I whispered, scooting around behind her. This made her look up from gathering all her necessary supplies, inks, different sized needles, and a few towels from what I could tell.

“Hm?”

“Do I look okay? Is my hair messed up? Do I have any crap in my teeth?” I asked her all in one breath, presenting her with somewhat of a grin, so she could inspect my incisors, while smoothing out my shirt.

“Uh, no your teeth are fine. Why?”

“Your client, is like, uber gorgeous.”

“Oh really?” She said, going over to the sink to wash her hands, sounding more interested as I continued.

“Yeah, so you should, you know, talk to him and shit. Do that thing you magically do, so by the time you’re done you guys are like best friends” I directed, smirking all the while.

“Okay, okay I’ll see what I can do” Julia looked away, and went back to gathering all her supplies she was before I came in and interrupted.

“You’ll see what you can do? Is that what you said? If you do this, I’ll let you watch all the gay Disney movies you want for a month” That got her attention.

“Really?” she spun around to face me again, asking excitedly.

“Really” I confirmed, nodding my head and folding my hands in my lap.

“Yes! And they’re not gay”

“You’re right, they’re not. But it just makes you gay for watching them since you’re an adult, and you can’t even use the ‘I have kids’ excuse”

“Kristine, just get out before I backhand you”

“Alright alright. Sheesh,” I was more than halfway out of the room, but I turned around again “Violence doesn’t solve anything, you know” I told her laughing. She made a move like she was going to run towards me, but I fortunately ran out of the room fast enough, squealing all the way.

________

It had been almost an hour, and I was just chilling up front with James, Amy and Paige. I would leaf through different magazines and play games on my phone every now and then. Finally I heard a slight chatter coming from the back, and then leaned over in my chair to see Julia and her client walking towards the front room.

“So I’ll just ring you up over here,” I heard Julia telling him as they casually made their way over to the front desk. There was a slight discussion of credit cards, and I couldn’t help but glance up from my current spot in the chair I sat in earlier to watch him pull his wallet out of his back pocket. After Julia gave him his card back, he thanked her along with the rest of us, and made his way out the door. I waited until he was out of sight before I got up from the chair and power-walked over to Julia to start my interrogation.

“Sooo?” I asked in a rather excited tone, prodding her in the side hoping to get an answer faster.

“Go outside” she told me in her most serious tone.

“What?” That was not what I was expecting at all. Hell, it didn’t even make sense. I couldn’t really be mad if I was confused first.

“Just get the fuck outside!” she said again, almost hysterical this time.

“Why?” Why was it so hard to get a straight answer around here? I stood there, patiently waiting for a response, which was very hard for me to do. I’m a rather impatient person. That was never going to happen though, because before I knew it, Julia was attempting to wrap one arm around my neck while pushing me towards the door.

“Just listen to me, and get out!”

Despite the fact that I desperately still wanted an answer I was never going to get, I made my way towards, and eventually out the front door.

________

There was a strong wind blowing in once I put one foot out the door, fortunately for me creating an unpleasant wind tunnel through the door, past me and through the front of the shop.

I actually felt a tad grateful Julia had bombarded me outside, the difference in the fresh, crisp air did me good. I took a breath in through my nose as I took in my surroundings which seemed to contain the usual suspects; the sad excuses for trees outside the front of the shop, cars whizzing by in either direction on the street in front of me, the metal trash cans to the side of the building, just peeking out from the alley. Then I heard something I didn’t usually hear. A cough.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve obviously heard people cough before, but it was the middle of the day on a Thursday. People are at work, not getting tattoos. And there’s the fact that this isn’t the kind of neighborhood people just stroll around in either, if you catch my drift.

Now I was just a little freaked out.

Where the hell did that come from?

I turned around, hoping it was just Julia or James who had followed me out here, but I was only met by leaves rustling down the sidewalk. Then I heard it again. I turned back around, I could tell it came from the direction of the alley this time. Deciding against my first instinct of heading back into the shop, I pondered over towards the alley and around the garbage cans to notice a man, hunched over, sitting on the curb. I leaned my back against the brick and as I studied him closer I deducted it was Julia’s client from just earlier.

Oh damn.

I had just started zoning out when this time, he sneezed. And that’s when I remembered the tiny packet of kleenex I’ve been carrying around in my pocket since my nose decided it was actually Niagra Falls.

Damn allergies.

“Need a tissue?