A few days had passed by. Jackylen was spending too much time with the young boy. On this particular day, Lucas had an 'agenda' to do. And according to him his mother couldn't know about it. This led to Jackylen taking her fathers car and picking him up.
"Lucas, can you tell me where I'm driving you too?"
"Jackylen can't you just trust me?" He said, frantically rushing through his army backpack.
"Lucas Charles Sinclair!"
"Hey!" He said in defense, looking up in horror. "What did we say? No middle names!"
"Lucas-"
"Pull over here," he demanded, pointing to a small shopping mall.
"Lucas these places are for junkies. What are we doing here?"
"I'm going to the store here. This is the only place that sells the pudding I like and other things." As she looked around the shopping center, she landed her eyes on a specific store with flashing neon lights.
"How long do you think you're going to be?" She asked, not even tearing her eyes aways from the sign.
"How long do you want me to be?" He asked, not following her gaze.
"And hour... maybe."
"I might be an hour maybe more."
"Perfect," she said, not wasting a second to get out of the car. Once she heard Lucas' car door side close, she made her way into the shop. She wasn't a very strict babysitter and Lucas took that into consideration for anything he did. His mother was however strict.
Anytime Lucas wanted to go anywhere he wasn't supposed to, he always made up the excuse that Jackylen would be with him and the conversation would end there. Jackylen was aware of this and didn't mind completely but always get a little annoyed anytime Mrs. Sinclair would call and ask her.
As she entered the shop, the sound of hard core rock music met her ears and the sight of a girl with crazy dyed purple hair.
"Hello, what would you like to get, tattoo, piercing?" The lady said, looking up from her papers.
"Hi. Tattoo please. Do you need a signature from someone over eighteen or something?"
"No. As long as you have a driver's license then we don't see why not," the girl informed her. "But I can see you're not eighteen yet, right?"
"No but I can drive," Jackylen informed her, pulling her license out. As the lady scanned it over, she seemed pleased. She gestured over to one of the chairs and sat on a small leather swivel chair and began to take out a red sharpie from her pocket.
"What are you thinking? How big?"
"Could I get two? One on my right forearm and the other on my left wrist?"
"Do you care if two people work on you at the same time?" The girl retorted.
"Sure."
"Gerry, get out here!" She yelled behind her. A few seconds later, Jackyeln was presented with a man who looked to work at a farm in brown dirty overalls and a truckers hat. "Can you do one of the girls' tattoos?"
He simply non end and sat in another chair over her right forearm. The guy looked up at her questionably while pulling out a red sharpie of his own.
"Could you do an outline of a katana in black then an outline of a dragon going around it in red?" He nodded and began to draw on her arm for the sketch. As looked over, she saw the girl who was patiently waiting, wanting to start.
"Could you draw a Walkman with headphones? And under it put the quote, 'Be carful what you do. And don't go around breaking young girls' hearts'? It's from my favorite song."
"All black?" Jackylen nodded. "Okay. Lay back and relax. You will feel some discomfort so if it's getting too much just tell us."
As she laid back, she didn't worry about too much pain. She already experienced pain. A needle repeatedly stabbing into her skin was nothing. An hour and thirty four minutes.
That's how long it took for Lucas to go shopping for snacks for their annual Christmas campaign and for Jackylen to get both of her tattoos done. Even though the Walkman tattoo didn't take as long as the other one. Once Lucas was done shopping, he went onto the tattoo shop right as Jackylen was about to pay.
"You can't be in here kid," the purple haired lady said. "Not unless you're with someone."
"Don't worry," Jackylen quickly interrupted, putting an arm around the boy. "He is with me." As Jackylen handed her the cash, the girl seemed pleased.
"Now for the first forty eight hours you can't get them wet. When the time is up you first gently expose them to water and then you'll be good to go." Jackylen and Lucas said they're goodbyes and headed back to the car.
"Jackylen, isn't your dad going to freak out of he sees you have a tattoo? Two none the less."
"What are? My mother?" Jackylen scoffed, getting in the car. "I'll just hide it. No big deal."
"Okay. Don't tell me I didn't warn you."
"Lucas," Jackylen began, driving back to the young boys house. "You have a decent life. You have good friends and your parents worry about to the extent you need a babysitter. Do it take that for granted. Some kids wish they had that kind of life."
"But I get bullied at school all the time. How would want that?"
"Everything isn't so black and white. And they're is no life without pain. Yes when you grow up the pain will always be there but as we grow it doesn't take us over that much anymore."
"It sounds like your talking from experience," he scoffed, looking out at the road passing by.
"Lucas are you even fucking listening?" Jackylen asked, now getting a bit outraged into the young middle schoolers listening skills.
"It's like... D and D. If you use your characters uses they're power they're is always a consequence. It isn't as straight forward as some may think."
"How you know about that?" Lucas asked, referring to the D&D reference.
"I used to play in another life time," she said, playing it off. "It's no big deal."
"To shit 'it's no big deal'!" Lucas said, now starting to shout.
"Damn it," she said, under her breath. "Drop it Lucas. It's not like I went to fucking war or anything. Change the subject or I'm telling your mother you went into the woods with Mike yesterday."
"Okay fine!" He said, getting quiet. "How is Will?"
"Jonathan called yesterday and said he going to be off bed rest by the end of the week."
"So he can come to our campaign Sunday?"
"Hold your horses. They said everything will go back to normal before Christmas."
"Nooooo," he ground, leaning back.
"You asked!"
"I wasn't expecting it to be depressing!"
"Lucas!"