My finger moves gently, slowly, tracing us underneath my touch. Her body shuffled slightly underneath the blanket. Scared of waking her up, I pulled away to find myself only sighing from the surreal happiness we have been swimming on all these years together. She turned over, parting her half sleepy eyes. She reached out, pulling me over into her breast, and I fell asleep next to the rhythm of her breathing.

Three years ago, her imprint slowly emerged beneath my collarbone. She always laughed at how I could trick people into thinking I was available just by wearing a crew neck tee shirt, and I would laugh back. Judith was my third tattoo. The first one and the second one were still here, visible for the world, and her to see. I could not bring myself to remove them like some of my friends did with their romantic imprints. Similar to how a birth mark indicates my existence, these tattoos mark the existence and life these relationships once had, becoming a part of us. And like a birthmark, they appeared without needing our consent. There are people who would choose to remove these mark. Some said removing them felt like being stung by a thousand of ants, some said it was nothing, it was like scratching off a scalp – I would not know. Despite how many unhappy moments my past relationships had, I did not have the courage to face the possible emptiness and confusion I might encounter if I was to have them remove.

We passed by him once. I saw him with my sister all the time when they were still dating. They were what everyone called high school sweethearts. To me he was not as bad as how my friend has been treated or mocked at by their sister’s boyfriend. He treated me like a friend, and I grew to like him and got used to him around our family. And one day I walked home, seeing my sister with a bandage wrapped around her neck. I looked for a sign or an explanation from my mother, she looked at me and shrugged. Aggie, was sitting on one of the wooden chairs. Her head leaning backward, in an angle where she could rest her neck. I remember how the ink was slowly chewing its way through the cotton bandage, some managing to tickle slowly down her neck. Aggie was humming a song underneath her breath, her eyes met mine and she smiled. I could not make out whether her eyes were teary, or were mine. When the last drip of ink was no longer visible on where the imprint originally was, all memories related to the relationship would have been erased with it.

I recognised the despiteful attitude Aggie holds against people who wore their tattoos like badges we got during girls’ scouts. Our neighbour, Diana was one of them. Under one coincidence when I left my key and had to wait for my mother to come around to pick me up, I picked up my courage and decided to ask Diana about her tattoo filled arm. She gave a heartfelt laugh, breaking the uneasiness I felt. The sleeve is not worn as a display of victories or the number of heartbreaks she went through or made. It was just a record of her life and she just happened to never have settled. “Perhaps, when the right one comes along, I could start removing some that I do not recall any longer. It would make no difference if I removed them.” My mom always said people like Diana would end up being covered by tattoos before there was any space left for the right one to enter. But I liked Diana, at least she is honest.

Judith was like Diana. I was among the crowd of tattoo on her right arm, standing tall and proud, I was the Statue of Liberty. We were on a boat with the tour guide yelling in his microphone behind our back, informing us about the history of this magnificent lady. I remember the history clearly Statue of Liberty was a present from the French to the American, and I fell for Judith for her subtle romance, her sun kissed skin and the french accent of her tongue. We were gazing at this lady from below, the sun shining into our now squinting eyes. Her facial expression wasn’t one full of bubbling happiness, her eyes were gazing out. She wasn’t intimidating, her face showed her to be a woman of experience, one that has gone through hardship and was still standing on her two feet. Judith’s green eyes looked intensely trying to capture vividly everything in her sketchbook before we were interrupted by the tour guide again. I leaned in and I was now standing on my two feet as Statue of Liberty in the middle of her right forearm, quiet, but bold.

We sink into the coach. Our regular routine had transformed from moving back and forth to each other’s home for sleepovers into making a home out of the 680 feet studio in the laid back area of Sai Ying Pun. Often, or always her nights were my mornings, my breakfast was her dinner, my coffee in the morning was her milk to her sleep. We both yawned. Her clothes were stained with mulberry, with lemon, with sea green blue, colours of her sleepless nights. From the side of her palm down to her elbow, the colours grew a new skin of embodied acrylic. The love marks and paint became one- I could not tell them apart. I grew obsessed to peeling those dried coloured plastics off her—her neck, her fingers, her elbows each time she curled up into my lap after the long night of painting. One hand would be rubbing her back, the other one would be busy removing the delicate aftermath of the second starry night masterpiece of the century. She would hold her hand up high for this routine, and my fingers would move around her, pulling a piece of paint away from her skin at a time, letting her skin reborn one breath at a time.

The last customer put on his jacket. “Thank you,” and the door closed with the bell echoing throughout the shop. The cafe was empty, rather hollow, in the cold weather, people came in and slowly faded into the wallpaper with their book and coffee. I put away the last coffee mug on the rack, switched off the light and left the bell echoing behind me. It was winter, close to Christmas. The cold crisp air was eager to bite off my nose. I steadied my pace back to the studio, looking forward for Judith’s touch to end my winter blues. Her back was turned towards me, her hair tied up in a ponytail as it snaked down her back. Her head had probably flown away to an entirely different space, one that is only off murky ocean blue and the dreamy voice of The 1975’s. I took off my boots and dusted the snowflakes off my coat. I poured myself a hot chocolate, and added marshmallows into hers. I made my way softly into her corner with the two cups in my hand, and put one lightly on the rare spot of unpainted surface. She glanced up at me, pulled me down for a quick kiss and slipped back into her galaxy. I sat down next to her, my fingers itching to peel the semi dried crimson red on her neck. I watched her brush slowly caressing the canvas, leaving behind trails of evergreen. I followed the path the brush left, the subtle stop in the long straight line of coral pink, the repeated and packed strokes of sky blue, the interruption of small pine green brushes in the midst of vast baby blue. I couldn’t stand it, and my fingers found their way around her neck. I pulled the edge of the crimson red slowly, watching the rest of the paint clinging onto Judith’s pale white skin. Underneath the red was not the expected snow glowed white, there was a dot of a new colour— a grassy green colour that only the right amount of lemon yellow and the sky blue of a sunny day could make out.

Judith sighed. I quickly held on to the itching desire, and her shoulder fell back to their place. Leaving her to be, I slipped away from her corner, making my way softly to the bed just as the grassy green quietly tiptoed its’ way into my head. The dot of new colour followed me into my sleep, and slowly my nights became her nights, my breakfast was her breakfast, my coffee, now white, was our milk to sleep.

I scavenged for a second  glance at the foreign intruder on her skin. And it came out of its’ hiding one night— the night when we came back from the opening party of Judith’s exhibition. The red wine swam in my blood, up to my head and stole away my sleep. My finger moved gently, slowly, tracing the significant French present underneath my touch. Her body shuffled slightly underneath the blanket, and her neck was under the pale moonlight. I saw the crimson red again, a red now calling to me, yearning to be touched, to be pulled and to be destroyed in my fingers. The itch grew thirsty and hungry, and all turned violent. My nails were bloodthirsty, they screeched against the now white glowing skin underneath the moonlight, digging out the edge of the crimson red. I scavenge for the hidden gold below my prey. I peeled slowly, colours began to drip effortlessly around my finger tips to my elbow. Each scratch deepen the ink into my finger nails, each claw left stippling strokes glazed around my fingers. Flakes of crimson red scattered beneath her, down her back, across the bed sheets. My breath became short and quick. Each dig excavated an unfamiliar hollowness within my chest. And the tunnel of emptiness spread— a love tunnel with only a one passenger seated boat. 

The grassy green has now turned pine green, it was no longer a dot. It was the leave of an evergreen tree, and it smelled like a Christmas party I was not invited to. Judith opened her eyes. And in her eyes, I became a painted canvas of my insecurity, my jealousy, and my doubt. The Statue of Liberty stood undisturbed on her spot, but peeling and silenced.

I never knew whether it was regret that Aggie felt after removing the mark or relief that she would not be bothered by remembering this relationship ever happened. Along with the last ink of her blue jay bird, along went the reason of her true intention to this now unsolvable mystery that would penetrate me. Aggie was not a self absorbed type of person, but she did place much attention into her image. She worries often on how people viewed her, but it did not stop her from discovering her true self. Beside her friends and her family, she was slow at opening herself up beyond her laughters and easy going personality. Each time a guy approached her, she would dance around the fire with caution, but she never let the flame touched her. Not until Joseph came into the picture, and unlocked all the chambers she has locked when the jay bird flew away. She brought nothing from the past relationship with her and Joseph was her second first love.

There was a time when we passed by the candy store where we – Matt, Aggie and I would hang out after school. Aggie would stare at it for a while as if she could recall something. She brushed it off quickly, saying she should stop eating candies so often, her weight was getting out of control. But we walked by him once, I could make out that he kept their imprint. The blue jay bird was peaking out underneath his sleeves. He hesitated when he saw us, and with a faint nod of politeness, he walked passed us in a hurry. My sister did not notice him.

The bell rang, and a breeze of January’s crisp entered the store. The coffee beans were roasting, and the steam from hot milk was fogging my glasses. “Can I have a cup of white coffee? And oh, if possible with marshmallow?” That voice dig out a buried tunnel in me. I turned around, it was her— the familiar copper skin from the sunny days, the french accent rolling lazily off her tongue. She caught me staring, and repeated her question, “Is it possible with marshmallow?” with a tint of embarrassment. Her inner child remained me of a home, a scent of oakwood and paint. “Sure.” She took off her trench coat. I searched for me, for us. The present from the French to the American had vanished—it was brushed off as easily a pencil erasing a single line among the long paragraph. Perhaps I was the right one that she left a space between her painted collage, but the pine tree is now the evergreen and not me.

She took the white coffee off the counter- and I realised, now it is my skin that needed to breathe, and I paddled away in the love tunnel as it turns around the corner into kisses the sunny blue.