A/N: A part of AsterLea's Tattoo Challenge on the HPFC Forums. This is my very first time writing for Cho Chang who, I admit, is not my most favorite character. Still, it was a fun piece to write and a perfect prompt! I hope you all enjoy reading this!
In most cases, people get a tattoo because they want it. They think it's 'cool' and 'in style' and will make them more popular. Sometimes, it's just because they think the idea of having an inked piece of art on your skin, being a walking painting so to speak, is an attractive one.
They like how they look. So they get them.
For Cho Chang, it was because getting a tattoo set her free.
~X~
"Are you sure you want this put there?" Lydia Pinkett asked, one thinly plucked eyebrow raising. There was a note of amusement in her voice as she tapped the picture that had been brought in to her.
Lydia was a thin, pinched face woman. Her grey-streaked black hair was pulled into a messy bun, one that was falling off the side of her head and in front of her eyes, was the only thing that gave away the fact that she was any older than Cho herself was.
And, in the entire village of Hogsmead, she was the only wizard that was willing to put ink on an under-age wizard. Not exactly legal but perfect for what the Ravenclaw girl needed. She was only two years away from being eighteen.
It wasn't like she was a First Year.
And Cho had made sure to choose something that she wouldn't want removed in a few years. Something that, when all was said and done and she was finally out of her parents house, she wouldn't be ashamed to show off. She wanted something that was completely and utterly her.
That was why she'd taken her time and drawn the image herself. Every ink-covered line, every penciled in shadow, had come from her imagination. It had come from her mind and her heart; not a book in some shady tattoo parlor on the outskirts of the village.
"I'm sure." Cho nodded. "And I want it in normal ink, not magic."
~X~
Perfect is a word that Cho Chang knows well. Talk perfectly, write perfectly, fly perfectly, brew perfectly.
Be perfect.
It's what her parents want more than anything. A perfect daughter. Someone that they can brag about to their friends and drag along to all of their fancy dinners during the holidays. Who they won't be afraid to loose when the war comes back, as they both know it will, because a perfect child wouldn't make her parents worry.
They loved her and they wanted her to be perfectly safe. They knew what being wild rambunctious teenagers led to. Her mother had been disowned when she went after a Muggle and her father deemed insane when he tried to explain to his parents exactly what he'd fallen in love with. And a perfect child wouldn't do that.
Perfect is not what Cho wants to be. No, she wants to be wild and she wants to live. She wants to be able to fight for her friends and for Cedric's memory. Cho has always wanted to make mistakes and learn things on her own, to grow up without her parents looming over her shoulder and directing her every move.
To do something that they would hate her for but that she could love herself over.
~X~
"Oh my God! Why would you get one there?" Padma, wide-eyed and voice heavy with surprise, dropped heavily onto the bed beside Cho's.
Cho merely shrugged, tugging the sleeve of her dark blue nightgown back onto her shoulder. The movement caused the rest of her sleep wear to rise back up, successfully covering up her recently acquired tattoo. "Because it felt right, I guess."
Of course, getting it on the skin just above her left breast wasn't exactly a typical spot for a tattoo. It would only show if she was wearing a low-cut shirt or something strapless; neither of which were things that her parents permitted her to wear.
Dropping her voice down, despite the fact that they were the only two up in the common room, Padma leaned towards her room-mate. "Do your parents know yet?"
"No." The smile dropped from Cho's face. She stretched out on her bed, arms folded underneath her head and eyes locked onto the top of her canopy, and closed her eyes. "Do you think I'd still be here at Hogwarts if they did?"
~X~
Her father was a Muggle man that fell in love with, not only a Witch, but the Wizarding World itself. He thought that there were so many more opportunities there then if you lived a life without magic. Thought that there was so much he'd missed out on as a child because he hadn't had the gift of magic.
Cho's mother full-heartedly agreed with him.
Because of that, Cho didn't grow up with the luxuries that most Half-Blood children had. She didn't have the 'best of both worlds' like Ronnie Jenkins or Penelope Clearwater. It was always magic. Always spells and charms and flying lessons on birthdays instead of pony rides around the back yard.
That's why she chose to get her tattoo done in Muggle ink. Because it was her choice and it was a glimpse into the world she grew up knowing almost nothing about. It wasn't magic but, like the love she was sure her parents felt for each other when they first met, it was magical to herself. It had meaning. More meaning than an image that moved would, that much she knew. Even if her friends thought that a still image was something she would soon grow tired of.
Cho knew that she never would.
~X~
"I want it gone!" Madame Chang shouted. Her face was flushed with anger and her dark brown eyes, mirror images of Cho's own, were narrowed in anger.
And Cho had always backed down before. When her mother got mad, and her father left the room as he had now, she would quit. Drop whatever point she was trying to bring to life and just accept that 'mother is right'. It wasn't usually worth it; worth the drama and the anger and the tears that her mother would conjure up to get her own way.
This time, it was different.
"I'm eighteen, Mother, I don't need your permission to have a tattoo. I was just letting you know out of courtesy." Cho didn't deem it necessary to let her mother know that this 'courtesy' was a good few years late. The date that she got the tattoo wasn't important, anyway. Just that her parents would finally know it was there.
And she had almost hoped they would both be fine with it. That her father would smile at the ink because it didn't move, because it was a testamant to his old life and to Cho's heritage, and that her mother would realize it was time to let her little girl grow up. Of course, neither of these things happened.
Her father had thought it was plain and boring and 'horribly unacceptable behavior'.
Her mother was outraged by it. By the defiance to everything she'd ever preached about and forbid her daughter from seeing and having was right there, forever bound in black and white and grey ink.
"I don't care how old you are!" Madame Chang shouted. "I want that piece of-of filth off you! Now!"
Again, Cho held her ground. She crossed her arms over her chest, over the dark green wide-necked shirt she had bought just because it showed off her tattoo, and gave her mother the most level look that she could. "No. I'm not getting it removed, Mother. I didn't get it just so you could make me get rid of it!"
"Then you'll leave my house." Madame Chang's voice dropped, low and cold, and she pointed one thin finger in the direction of their front-door.
And the sound of a door slamming had never sounded so loud to Cho. But it had never sounded so right, either.
~X~
It was a swan. Wings spread and neck outstretched towards Cho's neck, it was the image of a bird caught in mid-flight. Nothing fancy and no words. Just that one animal; the same animal as her patronus, actually, though that had come to light after she picked out her design.
The ink was black and white and grey. No vibrant colors and nothing to attract attention to it. Just those three monotones.
It was simple.
And everything about it, from the style to the artwork to the ideas behind, was so very Cho Chang.