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“I am,” Blaze asserted. He added to Giselle, “That way, you can get a taste of what it looks like before it’s your turn.”
“I’m not going to chicken out,” she maintained defiantly. “I got this.”
Blaze settled in for his appointment, his left arm stretched out. Maritza hunched over his wrist, meticulously tattooing the name Giselle in ornate lettering.
“If you could go back in time and tell yourself six months ago that you’d be getting my name tattooed on your wrist, what would you say?” Giselle asked him, bemused.
Blaze chuckled, not flinching at all as the needle repeatedly punctured his wrist.
“I probably would have laughed in my own face,” he confessed. “You have to admit, we didn’t exactly get off on the right foot.”
“Look at us now,” Asher said, smiling fondly at Giselle. She smiled back and gave his hand a squeeze. They chatted while Maritza finished up the final touches on Blaze’s wrist tattoo. They admired the bloody, swollen art when she was done.
“Wow. It’s beautiful,” Giselle said.
“Good. It matches you, then,” Blaze remarked. “The most beautiful girl with the most beautiful name. Now, when I look down at my wrists, I see the mountains of home on the right, and the girl I love on the left.”
“How mushy-gushy,” she replied, leaning over to kiss him.
“Aww. You guys are cute,” Maritza commented as she prepared the station for Asher.
He settled into the chair and took off his shirt to reveal his bare chest. The words ‘con brio’ and ‘con fuoco’ were already tattooed on either side of his rib cage, but this third tattoo was for his chest, right over where his heart thumped slow and steady. Maritza took her time carefully penning the words ‘con amore’ in handwriting reminiscent of sheet music as the first two tattoos. Giselle held his hand and admired his muscular body while the artist worked.
After some time, she lifted the needle and said, “Done!”
“Oh, it looks so good,” Giselle said.
“Killer placement, bro,” Blaze added.
“I already have these reminders to live life ‘with spirit’ and ‘with fire’, but now I have a forever reminder to live my life with love, too. Although, with you around, I hardly need to be reminded. Just looking at you fills my heart with love,” he told Giselle.
Even though she was trying to look cool, he could tell Giselle was melting inside. She kissed him on the lips, careful not to accidentally brush against his sore chest.
“Wow, you three are so affectionate,” Maritza said. “Kind of refreshing, actually. I get a lot of last-ditch romantic gestures in here, but I totally don’t get that vibe.”
“We’re the real deal,” Asher said proudly, putting his arm around Giselle and kissing her on the forehead. Then to her, he said, “It’s your turn, kiddo. You ready?”
“I was born ready,” she announced.
Giselle looked so cute in that giant tattooist’s chair, lying on her stomach with her legs up in the air behind her. Maritza gently brushed her hair off the back of her neck and began sanitizing the area. Asher and Blaze each took one of her hands so she could squeeze them. Giselle bit her lip in anticipation of the coming pain. When the needle first punctured her skin, she jumped a little and yelped, but she quickly recovered.
“Are you okay to continue?” Maritza asked, worried.
Giselle nodded. “Hell yeah. I can do this.”
“That’s my girl,” Blaze said.
Even though they knew she was in no real danger, the boys were laser-focused on getting Giselle through the pain of her first tattoo. They held her hands, caressed her, chatted about anything that came to mind, whatever it took to distract her. Maritza was focused too, making sure that the singer’s first tat was a well-executed one. Asher was so proud; Giselle hardly trembled at all, and didn’t shed a single tear. When Maritza was finished, the boys leaned over to check out her masterpiece.
“How does it look?” Giselle asked impatiently.
Asher grinned. “It looks amazing, Giselle.”
“Three black hearts interconnecting,” Blaze described.
“Meant to represent the band, of course, and my dedication to my career,” Giselle revealed. “There are three of us in Tortured Hearts, and there always will be the three of us. We’ve been best friends since we were kids. They’re practically family. And then, of course… it also represents the three of us. Asher, Blaze, Giselle. Three hearts connected.”
“That’s beautiful,” Maritza sighed.
“Hangin’ around these two really brings out the hopeless romantic in me,” Giselle admitted as she sat up and turned around in the tattooist chair. The three of them paid for the session, along with a whopping massive tip for the artist. By the time they walked out of the studio, the sky was melting into a gorgeous, colorful sunset. They strolled down the street together, all of them feeling like they walked on cloud nine.
As they reached the restaurant where they had a reservation for dinner, they were still admiring each other’s brand-new tattoos.
“Wait until the tabloids get a load of this,” Blaze said, holding out his wrist with Giselle’s name clearly tattooed across it.
“I’m sure they’ll have a lot to say about that,” Asher chuckled.
“I don’t care what they say. In fact, I don’t really care what anyone has to say anymore. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been in my whole life. I never even thought I could feel this good. And it’s all thanks to you two,” Giselle said. “It’s amazing what true love can do.”
Asher agreed with her. Love was transformative. It was life-changing. It was eye-opening. The client of their nightmares had turned into the woman of their dreams, and now, they had the freedom to love her out loud. And they didn’t care who saw.
