The Final Appointment

Nicole had an appointment at 7 p.m.

He did not particularly like working on Nicole. She was wonderfully attractive, with long auburn hair, fair skin, fine features and a tight little body. That was not his problem with her. It was her attitude. She oozed self-believed superiority. It is almost certain that she was captain of the varsity cheerleading team; salutatorian of her high school; and, vice-president of her college sorority.

Nicole was a junior customer service executive in the regional office of a large national bank. She made sure he, and everyone else who could hear her voice, knew that she was the youngest person in the bank to rise to such a lofty perch. She took aerobics and drank two-dollar-a-bottle water.

Since it seemed to be trendy, Nicole opted to get a tattoo, and since she was not terribly daring or unconventional, she chose to get a tribal design on her lower back.

This was her third appointment for a tattoo that could have been finished in one sitting. Working on Nicole was difficult. She did not have the greatest patience or tolerance for pain, and whined and complained incessantly. In fact, she could only be tattooed when heavily doped up on GHB and painkillers. For all of her achievements, mainstream appearances and pretenses; Nicole was a bit of a secret pill-junkie.

She stumbled through the front door of the shop slightly before seven, the cab she took pulled away from the curb as she entered. She was wearing a short skirt and a white, fuzzy cashmere sweater. The idea of wearing something casual and practical probably never occurred to her.

Her eyes already looked glassy.

He motioned her to the chair, but she waved him off.

“Not yet,” she slurred, popping another pill, “-have to let this stuff really kick in.”

She stood there, swaying a moment and half-closed her eyes.

He finally talked her into the chair. He directed her to sit backwards in the seat, with her elbows resting against the top of the backrest which was covered with a clean towel.

He started to raise up her sweater, “You want me to just tuck this up, or-“

She suddenly pulled it off over her head and tossed it on the table. She was not wearing a bra, and her ample breasts jiggled with the motion.

“Hell no, don’ wanno ink onnit..” she barely managed, as she turned to face the back of the chair and pressed herself against it. She would probably be shocked if she could have heard herself just then.

He readied the shading iron and sprayed down the work-in-progress. As high as she was this evening, he figured he cold finish it. It only needed about forty-five minutes of solid black coloring and he could finally have the nightmare that was Nicole out of his studio, and out of his life.

He triggered the machine.

She jumped before he even touched her and turned around.

“Fuck!” she slurred, “-not ready!”

He rolled his eyes as she made a show of settling herself back into position.

“Ok, now I am...” she murmured, her head resting on her forearms.

He began coloring in the large, v-shaped tribal design. It was fairly rote work, filling in solid black, with no conversation and little to artistically engage his mind. The time passed as he put the black into her lower back.

It was then that he noticed that her breathing had slowed, and became more regular. He shaded some more, feeling her lower back beneath his hands, listening for her breathing. She did not move at the touch of the machine, and her breathing remained unchanged.

“Nicole?” he said.

She did not answer.

He took the shading machine and shaded a spot further out on her flank. From experience with her and other customers, he knew that this was a very painful location, and was sure to get some kind of reaction out of her.

She did not do so much as make a whimper. Her breathing continued; slow, deep, and regular. He forcibly picked her up and turned her around in the chair, the towel across her chest falling to the floor. She moved in his arms like a one hundred and ten pound rag doll. The combination of GHB, Hydrocodone, and who knows what else, had placed her in a state of complete disassociative unawareness.

He stared at her eyes, now closed, and gently opened one eyelid with a thumb and forefinger. Her eyes were nearly rolled back into her head, and she remained unresponsive.

The pale forbidden fruit of her breasts rose and fell with each regular breath. They were around a size D-cup, the work of an extremely expensive, extremely well known plastic surgeon in Boston. She had had them less than a year, and was extremely proud of them, constantly wearing tight fitting, or cleavage revealing tops. She was barely an A-cup before the surgery.

He again watched the rising and falling breasts; so firm, so pale, so lovely.

He took up his lining machine and firmly stretched the already taut skin of her right breast. He paused a moment, took a deep breath, and depressed the foot switch, starting the clattering buzz of the machine.

His hand was shaking slightly and he stopped, and took another deeper breath.

He swallowed hard, and depressed the footswitch again. With a steady hand he brought the machine to her skin. Ink and a small amount of blood welled at the surface as he engraved a black line, the beginning of an intricate outline, into the firm, white flesh of her right breast.

He worked quickly but precisely, his heart racing as the chemicals percolating through her system slowly continued to do their work, but as they just as slowly wore off. He finished the outline and switched to his heavy iron shading machine. Black, greens, gold, purple; a virtual rainbow of colors was forced into her skin by the relentless needle as she lay there passively, unaware, and unable to stop it.

Sweat poured from him as he worked in a trance, eyes half-closed, pausing only to rub the sweat from his brow and to dip the needle-tube into a cap of ink.

After nearly three hours he finished.

He sat back with a start, the hot machine still dangling from his hands. He was barely aware of what he had done, or even that he was doing it. The machine dropped from his numb fingers and clattered to the floor as he beheld his work, fully-conscious of what he had done for the first time.

Her right nipple was transformed into a flaming pearl, the tendrils of fire licking up and around the tender pink flesh of her areola. The pearl was grasped in the four-fingered claw of a Chinese dragon, its scales purple and gold. The long colorful tail looped around her breast, the head and body rising up her chest, even above her collar bone, and out to her shoulder. A nimbus of bright fire shaded with orange and yellow surrounded the dragon, filling the space between its twisting body and limbs. Several long tendrils of brightly colored flame emerged from the dragon’s back and crept several inches above the collar line along the entire right side of her neck and throat; one sinewy lick of flame stopping just below her ear.

He took her unconscious body in his arms, and her head just rolled back, the breathing still deep and regular. He was only now beginning to grasp what he had done to her, how irrevocable and final it was.

There was really no turning back now, he had to finish what he started.

He took some Vaseline he used for tattooing on his finger, and moved aside her silken panties beneath her skirt.

Her muscles were slack, and her pussy was loose and relaxed, not gripping him at all as he thrust into her. Her chin was raised, her head back, and he rocked her up and down upon himself, her breasts, one completely tattooed, the other still pale and unadorned, bounced in an ancient rhythm. Her throat fluttered with each heartbeat, the bright ink on her neck trembling slightly with each beat.

He came into her with a long, shuddering gasp; an orgasm which seemed to last an eternity. When done, his balls ached from the effort.

It was the next morning that the police came and took him away. As he was led to a patrol car, hands cuffed behind his back, he saw her the front seat of a nearby squad car. Her eyes were red and hollow from crying. She wore sweater with a scarf around her neck, and as his eyes locked on hers she looked away. But before she could fully turn, he caught a glimpse of the hot colors that now graced her neck, visible despite her efforts to conceal it; and it always would be.

It was more than worth it.