A/N: Written by Chaser 1 of Montrose Magpies for QLFC Finals Round 1.
Prompt: Write about a shopkeeper in Knockturn Alley
Optional prompts: (word) ambiguous; (word) obsession; (word) feature
Word count: 2987 on Google Docs
Thank you so much to Emiliya Wolfe, Jily Trash, and AlwaysPadfoot for betaing this for me. This story was such a mess in my head when I finished drafting it, and your comments and suggestions were all so helpful and so amazing.
26 August 1994
"Almost finished," Jolina Scarrs reassured the man who was currently reclining in a chair in the back room of her tattoo parlour as she leant over him, her wand inches from his skin. For the most part, Wallace had handled the process well, staying quiet except for the occasional question or quip. The fifty-two-year-old had been in the business long enough to realise that he was trying to keep his mind off the pain, so she had joined in, engaging him in a conversation about his work before telling him about a few of the most bizarre tattoos she had ever done. "I just need to animate it, then you'll be good to go."
"That's great. I—" His voice cut off as she cast the charm, his whole body tensing as he grimaced. "That… Lina, it feels like my chest is moving—not the tattoo, but my skin."
"It takes some getting used to," she replied. After all these years, she was still ink-free, but her customers had commented about it enough for her to know that it was the most surreal part of the process. "But the good news is that it's all done now."
Wallace reached up to touch it, but she stopped him before he could. "I'm kind of regretting not using the Numbing Charm," he said wryly.
"You'll be glad you didn't in the long term." Jolina offered all of her clients the option of using it, but she always strongly recommended that they didn't. Unfortunately, the charm interfered with the other magic, seriously compromising the overall quality of the image.
Leaning back in her chair, she examined her handiwork with a critical gaze. On the man's chest, above the place where his actual heart was located, there was now a bright red love heart with a white ribbon wrapped around it. Inside the ribbon, she had inscribed the name of his late son: Isaac. It was, she had to admit, some of her best work. The colours and lines were all vivid and well-defined, and the calligraphy was neat and precise. The skin around it was still red and puckered, but when that cleared up, the slowly beating tattoo would look stunning.
"It's going to look fantastic," she promised him.
He glanced down at it, his eyes lighting up. "I just want to honour his memory."
"You will. You already are," she said, thinking of the work he and his wife had done to increase awareness of skin cancer after Isaac's death.
Wallace reminisced about his son for a few minutes, then Jolina ran through the care instructions with him and gave him a pamphlet on what he should and shouldn't do over the following weeks. When he left, she had a broad smile on her face. She was genuinely sorry for his loss, but this was the kind of art she loved to make—sweet, meaningful, memorable. Over the years, she had come to appreciate all of the aspects of her job, but this sense of satisfaction over a job well done was still her favourite part. If something she did helped a single person come to terms with a loved one's death, then even her greatest shame was worth it.
Grabbing the copy of the newspaper that her owl had dropped off that morning, she made her way out to the front desk. She didn't have another appointment for over an hour due to a last-minute dropout, so she had given the receptionist the morning off, telling her to come in after lunch. They had a system in place in case no one was available to welcome walk-ins, but in any case, it was likely to be a quiet day. The Quidditch World Cup had taken place the day before, and since the attendees usually celebrated until late into the night, the day after was usually fairly slow.
Jolina settled into the chair and opened the paper, looking forward to finding out how the game had gone. She hadn't had the chance to tune in on the radio the day before, so she had been waiting on tenterhooks for the results all night. She had been hoping that Wallace would be able to tell her, but when she had brought it up, he'd only said that he didn't follow the sport.
But instead of a recap of the game, the feature article was about—
No. No, no, no. Not again. It can't be happening. Not again—
As her eyes settled on the image that was accompanying the article, her breath caught in her throat. The Dark Mark was displayed prominently in the sky above the forest, the sickly green image of a skull with a snake for a tongue contrasting pointedly against the dark sky.
No.
-x-
2 October 1960
Lina sat at the front desk of her parents' parlour, huddled over her sketchpad as her quill darted across the page. Each stroke of her quill was delicate yet confident, speaking of years of official lessons mixed with doodling in the back of the classroom. Pausing for a moment, she leant back in her chair and surveyed the drawing. The rose's petals were beginning to take shape, giving definition and a sense of context to what she had drawn so far. Finally, the image she saw in her mind's eye was starting to play out on the parchment in front of her.
In quiet moments like these, she could almost imagine she was working for a real illustration agency rather than a tattoo parlour hidden away in a dimly lit backstreet.
She couldn't wait for the day that dream turned into a reality.
In the meantime, however, she was content where she was. Between her bright pink work robes and chipper demeanour, she knew she was the last person anyone expected to see working in Knockturn Alley. But she was thrilled with her role. The art world was notoriously difficult to break into; while she had been accepted into an art program that was due to start in the spring, that wouldn't be enough on its own. She needed an edge—and she had been handed the perfect opportunity to get just that. Her duties were split between running the reception desk and helping to create designs for the customers, giving her valuable hands-on experience that was sure to help her with finding a job as an illustrator after the program finished.
The gentle chiming of a bell alerted her to the presence of a customer. Clamping down on the urge to groan at the interruption, she set her sketchpad aside and forced herself to smile up at the young man who had entered the parlour. With just one glance, she could tell that he belonged to the less scrupulous half of their clientele. The hood of his cloak was covering his forehead, casting shadows over his face. She could just make out a dark scowl and a gaze that was as sharp as daggers. It cut straight through her nerves, leaving her feeling self-conscious and on edge.
Usually, with clients like this, she would send a memo to her parents to ask one of them to take over. But her father was in the middle of a tattooing session, and her mother was on her lunch break.
Lina would have to deal with him herself.
"How may I help you?" she asked, hoping she sounded more confident than she felt.
"I need to get a tattoo designed," he said. His voice sounded vaguely familiar. "I was told that this was the place to go."
"Markus Scarrs Indelible Tattoos prides itself on providing the best quality work in wizarding Britain," she replied, reciting one of the business' go-to lines.
"Forget Britain," he said. "This needs to be the best quality work in the world."
"Both of our consultants are occupied at the moment, but if you would like, you can make a booking—"
"That isn't good enough." His voice was low and unassuming, but there was something sinister in its quietness.
She knew what she was supposed to say: I'm afraid that's all I can offer you. She had said it before, even. But she was already on the wrong foot, and her instincts were screaming at her not to risk upsetting him further."How about you walk me through what you're looking for, and I'll tell you what we can offer you?"
When her mother returned fifteen minutes later, Lina and the man—Corban, she later found out—were sitting at the front desk as she wrote down the specifications of the job. It was against protocol in every way, but Lina was proud of how she had managed to de-escalate the situation while, it seemed, also winning over a new client.
She didn't know it at the time, but that was what she eventually came to think of as her greatest shame.
-x-
17 April 1985
Jolina read the deed for twentieth time in the past two days. It was simple enough; there were no hidden meanings or twists, and the more she went through it, the more utterly mundane it seemed. She wanted more than anything for it to somehow have the answers for her, to turn into a guide that would let her know exactly what to do—not just about this decision, but about every decision. But she was old enough to know that life didn't work that way. That kind of thing existed only in the realm of school essay rubrics and join-the-dots art.
She would have to decide her future on her own.
The issue was that it was such a small piece of parchment yet signified one of the most momentous decisions she might ever make. Working at Markus Scarrs Indelible Tattoos had always been a means to an end; ever since she had started, she had been looking forward to the day she left. Yet, for one reason or another, she never had. The job market had been scarce, or her life had been too uncertain to add a new variable to it, or she had received a job offer but had noticed a few red flags. The list seemed endless, but what she knew was that it added up to twenty-five years of working somewhere that she hadn't been particularly enthused about in the first place.
And now her parents were retiring, and while they had a potential buyer, they wanted her to take over the running of the parlour. She understood why; it was their pride and joy, their baby, and—she had thought, perhaps uncharitably, when she was younger—their obsession. They lived and breathed their work, and they didn't want to see it go to anyone else. They were willing to take less money than they could get from the other buyer and receive it over a longer period of time if it meant keeping the parlour in the family.
But Jolina couldn't help but feel that this was her last chance to get out and chase the dreams that she'd given up on a decade before. It felt final, like the last, resounding note on a piano, lingering in the listeners' ears and hearts even as the player's hands retreated and the sound itself faded. If she didn't do it now, it was unlikely that she ever would.
At the same time, she had come to genuinely love the parlour. It was a far cry from what she had pictured as a teenager; many of her clients were shady and morally ambiguous, and there was a time when that had made her feel shady and morally ambiguous by association. But while the incident still weighed her down, it had forced her to reckon with the fact that she had no control over the identities or actions of the people who walked through the front door. All she could control was how they behaved while they were in those four walls and whether she agreed to take them on as clients. Besides, a significant number of their clients were people who she was genuinely thrilled to help. And there was something exhilarating about knowing that people were so happy with her drawings that they were willing to have them displayed on their bodies for the rest of their lives.
It didn't hurt that she had a level of independence and creative control that she would never have achieved in a corporate environment.
She couldn't leave. She had given over half of her life to the tattoo parlour, and she knew it better that anyone except her parents ever could—and even that was debatable. She couldn't stand the idea of walking away and seeing someone else take over, judging each decision they made by whether or not it was the one she herself would have chosen.
Maybe it was originally her parents' obsession, but maybe now it had become hers, too.
Before she could second-guess herself again, she signed the deed.
-x-
6 February 1970
Lina pulled her cloak tighter as she strode down Diagon Alley. The thin fabric did little to protect her from the biting chill of the evening air, but she couldn't bring herself to care enough to muster the energy to get out her wand to warm herself up. She was almost at the tattoo parlour, anyway, and she would be able to get warm there while she waited for her shift to start.
The parlour. Over the past ten years, she had grown to hate the place with its dim lighting and shady customers. While their operations were all technically legal, tattoos were considered taboo by most of polite society, including many of her friends. That was one of the main reasons her parents had decided to rent a building in Knockturn Alley in the first place: to provide their customers with a sense of privacy and discretion. After all, given all of the dark objects and services that could be acquired on that street, nobody cared about whether somebody was stepping into Markus Scarrs Indelible Tattoos for a legal, if controversial, procedure. However, while that had set them up as the place to go to get a tattoo, it also gave off the impression that their business dealings were much shadier than they actually were.
Lina sighed and ran a gloved hand through her hair. She supposed that it wasn't entirely fair to say that she hated the parlour. It held a special place in her heart, despite its issues. The thing that she hated was the fact that she could feel her dreams slowly slipping away with every year she worked there.
Ever since she was young, she had felt that all she was good at was drawing and interacting with children. But most employers didn't seem to like her style, claiming that it was quirky and distinctive but didn't suit their audience. And she was finding that there weren't many parents who wanted to hire a nanny whose work history was limited to a tattoo parlour and a handful of freelance or commission pieces. One couple had even outright stated that they were rejecting her application because working in Knockturn Alley was a sign of moral failing.
It didn't matter that she knew it wasn't true. It didn't matter that her friends attested to the fact that she was the same rule-abiding dreamer she had always been. All that mattered was that, for the reason, her means to an end had led her right into a dead-end, and she was starting to fear that she would never find her way out of it.
As she turned onto Knockturn Alley, she heard a loud commotion from somewhere behind her. Turning, she saw a young wizard staring up into the sky with a terrified look on his face.
Her stomach sank. She didn't even have to follow his gaze to know what he was looking at, but like a moth confronted with flame, she couldn't resist.
A large, glittering skull hung high in the sky, its open mouth revealing a serpent in place of a tongue. It was a haunting emerald in colour and was surrounded by green smoke.
Lina's breath hitched, and she had to fight the urge to vomit as bile rose in her throat. She knew what that symbol meant; everyone did. It meant terror, and it meant death, and it meant tragedy.
And to her, it meant shame. Although she had never confessed it to anyone—and would never, if she had her way—it was one of the reasons she was so conflicted about her job.
After all, if she hadn't been there when Corban Yaxley walked into the tattoo parlour so many years before, she would never have designed what had come to be known as the Dark Mark.
-x-
26 August 1994
Jolina's hands shook as she put aside the newspaper, trying to force her breathing to slow. It wasn't as bad as she'd thought. It wasn't as bad as she'd thought. It wasn't—
It was still bad. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named wasn't back, but his mark flew in the sky once more, and that meant that his followers were stirring. Whether they had a way of bringing him back—the Ministry insisted that it was impossible, but there was a necromancer on the same street she worked on—or were just trying to start again with a new leader, it didn't bode well.
That familiar wave of guilt threatened to overwhelm her again, but she pushed it down. She thought about Wallace, who had asked her to create a memento to honour his son. She thought about how—due, in part, to the parlour's influence—tattoos were becoming more socially acceptable. And she remembered that it wasn't all bad. She still hated the widespread judgement and sense of sleaziness, but she had grown to love both the job and the people.
And if there was one thing she had learned, it was that, for her, that was enough.