Pull Me Closer

Remember you refuse to have sex with me?

Kami

I stared at the big white bandage on his right ribcage suspiciously.

"Jett, please tell me you tripped and fell into a vat of acid, ribs first," I said.

He grinned and shook his head.

"Nope! Got a new tat. Wanna see?"

"I dunno, do I?" I asked.

He nodded.

"Yeah, you do. Do you remember that thing you said to me the other day? About my me?"

I nodded slowly, unsure as to where this was going.

"Well, it reminded me of a line from this book I used to read when I was little."

"Oh, okay, so you got a tattoo of it," I nodded, "that seems reasonable, and not at all impulsive."

Jett rolled his eyes, unperturbed by my attitude and slowly peeled away the bandage.

When he did, despite myself, I moved closer to see.

When I read the quote done in black ink in a font that looked like someone's handwriting, I laughed once incredulously.

Today, you are you.

That is truer than true.

There is no one alive who is youer than you.

~Dr. Seuss

"I can't believe you got a Dr. Seuss tattoo," I breathed.

Jett's face fell.

"You don't like it?"

I was quick to reassure him.

"No, it's not that, but...look."

I lifted up my shirt a little and pulled down my sweats a little, exposing the skin below my hipbone. More specifically, the tiny script on that hipbone.

I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind.

Some come from ahead and some come from behind.

But, I've bought a big bat.

I'm all ready, you see.

Now my troubles are going to have trouble with me.

~Dr. Seuss

Jett chuckled and ran his hand over the tattoo softly.

"How have I never noticed that?" he murmured.

"That, my love, is a place on my body you have never seen. Remember, you refuse to have sex with me?"

Jett ignored me and stood back up to full height.

"We have matching tattoos," he said with a shit-eating grin on his face.

My eyebrows rose.

"Um, no, we have related tattoos, there's a difference.

"Do you have any more?" he asked eagerly.

I shook my head.

"Nope. But I do have my bellybutton pierced," I said, lifting up my shirt and fingering the ring he had gotten me a week earlier. It was a black music note hanging from a silver banana ring, and the music note had sterling silver wings coming from the tail.

"I knew that," he said, with a roll of his eyes. "When did you get the tat?"

"After my dad left," I answered.