Page 40 of Tony

I cringe, thankful for the facemask so Vic can’t pick up on it. But he’s too busy asking me if I’ve ever tattooed any private parts to even notice my internal conflict. “College girls,” he explains in a mocking, serious, listen-to-me-grasshopper tone, “ask for all kinds of weird shit once they see who their artist will be. You know, because I’m hot.” He winks at me and I roll my eyes. “And up until now, it’s only been the girls coming in doing that shit. But you wait, Belinda. Once these college boys hear you’re taking clients, I’m sure they’ll all be lining up for dick art!”

Trev guffaws so hard, my needle slips on his side and my perfectly shaped tendril of smoke goes crooked.

“Funny,” I say, wiping off my working area with more force than I need. “Haha.”

“I’m kidding,” Vic says. “No dude in his right mind wants a needle anywhere near his cock.”

“Yeah,” Trev says. “They’ll go for the butt cheeks first. Then if they like you”—he actually sits up a little so he can see me—“then they’ll want your opinion on the shaft tat. Just so they can whip it out and show it off.”

“They’ll ask for a snake that grows.” Vic laughs.

“Meet my little friend,” Trev says. “Who gets bigger as you watch!”

“Touch him, Belinda. He won’t bite.”

“Hold it tight, Belinda.” Trev snorts. “He might get away!”

They fall into fits of laughter.

“Are you guys fucking thirteen years old in here, or what?”

All three of us look over at the door where Vann is standing. And boy, is he ever scowling at me. “Why are you looking at me?” I say. “I have no part in this!”

“This is like… sexual harassment, Vic. You’re not allowed to say that shit to Belinda.”

Vic looks at me. I look at Trev. And then all three of us guffaw.

“Fuck you guys,” Vann spits. He disappears down the hallway.

“Fuck you, Vic,” Vinn mocks from the studio next door. “You can’t say that shit to Belinda!”

“Yeah, fuck you, Vic!” Vonn joins in from further down the hallway. “It’s sexual harassment!”

I’m pretty sure even the customers in the waiting room are laughing now.

“Fuck all of you!” Vann yells. His door slams closed.

Vic puts up his gloved hand and I high-five him. Then he winks at me.

“Thank you,” I say.

“You should be thanking me, Belinda,” Trev says. “I’m the hottie making your night right now.”

“Any time that brother of mine is an asshole to you, Belinda, you come to me. I’ll handle it.”

I nod, liking him a lot more than I did just a few hours earlier. He really did plan this whole night just to make me feel better. He didn’t have to ask me to stay. He has all kinds of people interested in my shit job, after all. He could probably replace me in a day. And he didn’t have to drag me in to his studio with him to take my mind off things, either. He definitely didn’t have to share his client with me.

But he did all that. And he did it for a reason. Probably not to make Vann feel bad or even teach him a lesson. I think he just did it to be… nice.

Which is nice.

The three of us settle down and Vic and I get back to work. He and Trev are quiet now. Maybe thinking about things the way I am. Or hell, maybe they’re still thinking about Cherry’s pussy.

The point is, I don’t care.

Because inside I’m smiling. Happy. Maybe even OK with the weirdness that has taken over my life for the first time ever.

I’ve felt like an outsider for eight years. I was forced into moving to this town because of the witness protection program. I have a fake name and a fake history. Everything about who I was was cleared away to make room for the new me.