Old Ink (Get Ink'd #3) - Ali Lyda Page 0,4

help others had been a dream come true. With the show, though? It seemed like more and more of my time was spent doing the bullshit I hated, and the art had fallen to the backburner.

A knock on my door broke me out of my thoughts, and Javi poked his head in. “Good t-time?”

“Sure,” I said. He stepped in and sat down across my desk. “What’s up, Javi?”

Javi smiled, and his whole face lit up with it. It’d been that way since he and Gordo had found each other. I’d always known Javi would be an amazing family man, but it had taken him a long time to accept that he was allowed to have a family at all. Now he had a husband who adored him and a daughter who was a delight. Giuliana was getting ready to start kindergarten after the summer, and Javi and Gordo were a mess of emotions about it.

“I just thought you might need an ear to b-bend.” He leaned back. “Every t-time you have a meeting with a producer, you g-get all s-surly after.”

The shock stunned me for a brief second before I chuckled and shrugged. “I don’t mind them. Aside from that first creep, they aren’t so bad.”

“Then why d-do you look s-so d-down?”

Sighing, I looked at my desk. Stacks of contracts up for renewal that I needed to go over with my lawyer. All of the bills that come with a business in another pile. Sticky notes with reminders that were multiplying like rabbits. My days were so long, with very little me in them anymore, and when they were over…

I went home alone.

“Do you ever feel like you’re supposed to be doing more?” I asked. “Like you’re successful on the surface, but deep down, you aren’t sure it’s enough?”

Javi stared at me, but it was fine. He was like that—taking his time to say the right thing rather than jumping the gun with the wrong advice.

“I think,” he said slowly, working hard to get the words just so, “that you let yourself b-be everything for everybody and leave little for yourself.” His brow knitted. “You d-do everything t-to make us happy, and we are. And we’re thankful for it. B-but it is okay to think about yourself, t-too.”

He wasn’t wrong. There was a peace that was found in helping others, but I also knew I often used it as an excuse to avoid digging deeper into my own needs, for fear of what I’d find there.

“I hear you, Javi. Thank you. And I’ll think about it, too. Until then,” I glanced at the clock and winced. “It looks like it’s time for filming.”

“Last shoot of the s-season.”

“Damned straight.”

I clapped his shoulder in thanks on our way out to the parlor. The cameras had improved over the years, becoming smaller and less intrusive and located in better spots. The film crew, too, while not feeling like family to us, didn’t feel like strangers anymore, either. Having familiar faces around made all the difference for me. It helped me relax and feel more in control of my world.

My client was waiting for me at my tattooing station. “Mike,” I said, giving him a hug.

“Dude, I’m so stoked to have this finished,” he said while returning my embrace. “It’s going to look so sick.”

It already did, honestly. An incredibly intricate mandala that morphed as it expanded into a planetary system. An ode to the Big Bang and the connectivity of us all. Mike’s father had passed away a year before and he’d wanted a tribute that helped him honor the fact that we were all made of stardust. It had been a pleasure to create and work on and I was just as pumped as he was to see it finished.

While I’d been filmed a few times working on it, we’d kept the full image and meaning a secret. Today would be the big reveal. I felt a flutter of excitement as we got into our places.

Sitting at my station felt as close to home as anything currently did in my life. In my heart, I loved art. Creation, color, making an idea come to visual fruition… it stimulated my mind and thrilled my soul. It felt like the past few years had forced me to take more and more time away from creating. There was so much bullshit I needed to wade through to run a business and navigate being on a show. It wore me down, shaving pieces of me away.

Mike