Friday night, and it was raining quite heavily. Yet the four of them decided to go bar hopping around LA and got halfway drunk, but drunk enough to arrive here.

“What are we doing here, Chris?” Erika glared at them. Chris and Drew looked at each other and grinned evilly at her. They were drunk as hell of course.

“So, since Jenna already had her first tattoo, on her ass -”

“I was pretty wasted then. But I didn’t regret it!” Jenna slurred and hiccupped happily at Chris.

“Oh no no. I’m not a fan of needle, Chris.”

“Erika. Trust me. You’ll get addicted later.” Drew stood in front of her and towering over. She had so much respect and care for him that she just brought herself to believe him.

“Okay. But only a small tats though. Nothing to obvious.”

“Whatever you say.”They practically and drunkenly pushed her into the tattoo parlor called Think Ink and as soon as they were in, a shirtless skinny guy with tattoos all over his body greeted them warmly.

“Hey y’all. I’ll be with you guys in just a minute okay? Got a client inside.”

They nodded and took a seat on the couch nearby, waiting for their turns. But shortly after, a girl came over to them. She was breathtakingly beautiful. Her hair was brunette, her eyes were light gray in color, and just like the skinny guy earlier she had tattoos all over her arms and neck.

“Hey. I’m free. You guys wanna ink?”

Drew stared at her, dumbstruck. While all the other guys pushed Erika to upfront, he was stunned and just stared at her. She was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.

“You wanna see the designs first?” she smiled as she spoke and it made her almond eyes squinted into a smaller shape.

“Oh, I just wanna make a small tattoo. Not too obvious. Under here.” Erika showed her right forearm to the girl. “Just a ‘faith’ word under here and that’s it.”

The girl smiled again and drew something on a piece of paper really quick. “All black?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, follow me.”

Erika followed her into a small room, separated with the other room by a wall and she can already hear the buzzing noise of needles drilling through somebody’s skin. She swallowed at the thought.

************************************************************************************************************************

“So…is this okay for you?” that skinny guy held up a piece of paper which contained his design of a dead tree with a real heart beneath it. Zacky shrugged and nodded. Arin too, was impressed with his drawing skills.

“I love it.”

“Okay then, we’ll start right away. Zacky, hold his hand.”

Zacky laughed at his request. “Come on, Chester. Don’t underestimate this kid.”

“But this is his first ink, right?”

“Pretty much.”

“Well I hope you’re prepared.”

Arin had no idea why he agreed to Zacky’s persuasion for him to start having tattoos. Probably to fit in with the guys and he will look good shirtless. At least that was according to Matthew. Zacky did many of his tattoos here as he and Chester were friends from way back. So Arin decided to just trust his instinct.

Chester drew a rough line sketch on his shoulder using a faint line of pen first and he already felt shudder at the touch of its cold point.

“Okay done.”

“That was fast.”

“Only a rough sketch, dude. Now the real shit is coming.”

Chester turned on his needle and it made a loud buzzing sound. Arin closed his eyes and without knowing, he gripped tight on Zacky’s palm.

***********************************************************************************************************************

Erika went out of the room feeling weird. She felt a little bit of sharp pain on her forearm but other than that she felt great.

“So, how was it?” Jenna went over towards her happily. She bent her arms and showed the underneath of it to her. A cursive black handwriting of ‘faith’ splayed across her skin and the red marks were still visible around it.

“That is beautiful.”

“Here, let me patch them up for you.” The tattoo artist girl then patched a small bandage covering her newly made tattoo and smiled at her.

Drew on the other hand, just pierced his eyes into that girl and his heart was beating faster than ever as he watched all her moves intently.

“Dude, you’re okay? You look like you’re about to eat her alive.” Chris said in a low voice and Drew snapped back to earth.

“Uh, I’ll wait for you guys outside.” His face went red as he moved to let himself out of the parlor.

“Hold on,” Chris gripped his arm, making him stopped. “You like her don’t you?”

Drew startled and pulled his arm away but Chris can read him like a book.

“You want me to ask for her number?”

“Chris, don’t. I’ll kill you if you do. Now let me the fuck go.”

Chris let his arms go and smirked as Drew really went out of the door, pulling out a cigarette from his pocket. After that, Chris turned back to Jenna and Erika who stood in front of the counter, talking to the tattoo artist – Drew’s newfound crush.

“That’d be 75 dollars.”

Erika was about to reach for her purse when Jenna suddenly slammed on the counter with a 100 bucks in her palms.

“My treat!” Jenna claimed.

“Aww Jen! You’re the best!”

“Yeah you always say that whenever I’m paying.”

“Hey, excuse me ladies.” Chris barged in between the girls suddenly. “My friend back there wants to know if you’re still single.” He addressed to the girl behind the counter.

Erika, Jenna and the tattoo artist girl blinked at him, speechless.

“You mean the one who stared at me like he was gonna drill a hole into my head?”

“Yes ma’am.”

She smiled. “Yea, I’m single.”

The girl then told Chris that her name is Megan and she gave him her phone number for him to pass it to Drew. After he got what he wanted, Chris just went out of the parlor and looked for his childhood best friend outside.

“Wow, I never thought Drew could like someone!”

“Yeah, he was always a bit cold to us. To Erik, mostly. But he’s nice. Don’t you worry Megan.”

Megan chuckled slightly and gave Jenna her change back. “Here you go. Oh and don’t worry about the rain. It won’t ruin the tats.”

“Thanks, Megan! I hope Drew will call you soon.”

Megan blushed into a pink shade and beamed at her as she went out of the door.

“Fuck where are they? Did they leave us already?”

Chris and Drew were nowhere to be seen as soon as Jenna and Erika went out of the shop. The rain was still pouring heavily and they didn’t have any umbrella with them.

“Jenna, could you be a honey and fetch my car for me? My arm still huurts….”

Jenna rolled her eyes at Erika. “You’re so fucking lucky that I love you.”

“I know you do Jen. Thank you. I‘ll treat you to some Krispy Kreme later okay?”

Jenna’s face immediately lit up and she quickly ran across to the other side of the street, drenching in rain to look for Erika’s car. She parked quite far earlier on the intention of going bar hopping.

Erika raised her left palm to reach into the dripping rain and just felt the cold water knocking on her skin. She used to do this small thing with Emily, just drenched in the rain and danced, not caring about the world at all. Smiling at the thought, Erika mindlessly walked into the pouring rain and let herself soaked underneath it.

“Thanks Meg! Yeah, I’ll tell them you said hi.” Zacky hailed to the inside of the shop as both him and Arin went out of the door. Arin’s shoulder was patched with an arm-length bandage and he flinched everytime it touched something. He quickly put on his leather jacket to cover them.

“I’ll get the car. You wait here.” Zacky ordered, and then off he went disappearing into the rain.

Arin tightened the grip on his jacket and he suddenly saw a glimpse of a person standing beneath the rain, with both her palms up and her back was facing him.

“Hey! You’ll get a cold! Don’t stand in the rain!”

She turned around. Her red hair drenched on her face but Arin can clearly recognized who she was.

“Erika.” He whispered.

“Arin?!” she yelled.

Notes