"Alright." He pushed his bar stool from the black toolbox he used as a desk and brought it over to her. "So, Do you like it?"
Marinette looked at the drawing and her eyes wandered to his sleeve tattoo. It was different than any others she had ever seen. It didn't seem to have any rhyme or reason. It was a bunch of swirls and black cat silhouettes hid among them like creatures hiding in dead trees. Their eyes were a neon green and they peered out from the ornate design and strange shapes.
Chat cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow at her. "Is it what you had envisioned, Marinette?"
Marinette shook her head and brought her eyes back to the drawing. "Yeah. It's beautiful. I'm excited!"
"I'm glad. Let's start then." Chat smirked and grabbed black latex gloves from a box on one of the tables near him. "Go ahead and sit facing away from me on that chair. Straddle it and hold this pillow in front of you." He handed her a pillow in a sanitary case.
She took it and turned around in the chair to where the back was in front of her. She put the pillow between her breasts and the chair.
"You're going to have to ditch the shirt." Chat smirked and looked at her from the corner of his eye, while he set up the gel and inks.
"Right." Marinette laughed and blushed, nervously. She let go of the pillow and grabbed the hem of her shirt. She arched her back and pulled it over her head. He tried not to notice how her back arched or how her ass stuck out perfectly.
She was left in a red black spotted bikini top that had black ties.
"You really like ladybugs don't you?" Chat chuckled at her.
"Why else would I get a ladybug tattoo?" Marinette smirked back at him and took out a black hair tie from her pocket and put her hair up into a messy bun.
Chat nodded. "Good point. Alright, you ready?"
Marinette rested her hands on the pillow and got comfortable. "Ready."
"Lean forward on the pillow." Chat got the stencil ready and set it all up, before he pressed it to her back. He ran his fingers over it, so that the blue ink would transfer to her skin on her shoulder blade.
Chat slowly peeled it off and rubbed away any smudges. "Nice, it came off clean. Go check it out. Make sure it's where you want it."
Marinette stood up and walked over to a full sized mirror that was in a hallway. She looked over her shoulder at the ladybug and saying. "It's perfect." She was so excited, she could barely contain herself.
"Good. Come back over and we'll get started. We can break whenever you want. Just say the word and we will." Chat changed his gloves for new ones.
Marinette sat back down and went back to hugging the pillow.
Chat opened a clean outline needle and fed it into the back of his neon green tattoo gun. It had a black cat painted on the side that looked a lot like the ones on his sleeve tattoo. He pushed down on the pedal with his right foot and it buzzed to life with an iconic sound. He released and added pressure a few times and added black ink to it, before hovering his hand over her back. His right thigh touched her hip and a shiver went up her spine.
He touched her spine with his left hand and held the gun in his right. "Here's the first dot." He pressed the needle down onto her skin.
Marinette felt like he was surrounding her, intoxicating her. His cologne was dark and seductive. It was so alluring and she couldn't stop drinking it in. She bit her lip, tensed up, but quickly relaxed after she got used to it all.
Chat picked up the needle and wiped a cooling gel over the dot. "You okay?" He backed up a bit from her, leaving her hip untouched by his leg.
"Yeah, that wasn't as bad as what everyone said." Marinette smiled over her shoulder at him and felt better now that he wasn't so close.
"Alright, we'll keep going." Chat smiled at her and brought the needle back to her skin and his thighs brushed against her again. His scent overwhelming her.
He alternated between tattooing the outline and wiping cool gel along the lines. Marinette zoned out. It felt like a million scratches on her skin, but other than that it wasn't too bad.
"This is the worst area. It's near your spine." He tapped her spine with the side of his right hand, before pressing the needle down again.
She gasped, but still kept quiet. It felt more like she was getting a shot in her spine rather than scratched by something. Her grip tightened on the pillow.
Chat stopped and wiped gel along the linework again. "Still okay?"
"Yep." Marinette went back to zoning out, but her mind soon filtered to his arm tattoo. "Your sleeve is nice. Did you do it yourself?"
Chat kept working on the outline and rinsing his gun out and dipping back into the black ink. "I don't really… talk about it. Sorry, it's personal."
Marinette bit her lip, as he pressed the needle back to her skin. "I see. Well, it's beautiful work. I've never seen anything like it."
"Thanks." Chat stopped tattooing and wiped cool gel on her back again. "The outline is done. Do you wanna take a break before we shade?"
"I'd rather just keep goi-" She stopped herself and turned back to him. "I mean- unless you need a break."
"No, I'm good. I can go for hours, ladybug." Chat flirted with a smirk and filled more white caps with black, grey and white inks. He changed out the needle to a sterile new shading one.
Marinette didn't miss his comment and she rolled her eyes. "Why'd you call me ladybug?"
"You like ladybugs." Chat shrugged and dipped the gun into the grey. "I thought it was fitting." He pressed the pedal several times, sending the needle to life.
"Pfft." Marinette giggled at him.
"Alright, let's bring that ladybug to life." Chat waited for Marinette to get comfortable again before he put his left hand on her spine again and rested the heel of his right one on her shoulder to shade the ladybug in with the tones first.
"So, how long have you been tattooing?" Marinette rested her chin on her folded arms.
"Hmm… let's see. Maybe, eight years? I started when I was twenty." Chat cleaned out his needle and picked up a different shade.
"Why'd you decide to start?" Marinette was curious about him. If his tattoo was a mystery then what else was locked behind his door.
"It's not important. I love art." Chat shrugged. He hated talking about it. He didn't want to talk about it.
"Oh. I'm sorry." Marinette bit her lip and tried not to move her head or anything.
"It's okay. Everyone asks me. I just-" He wiped gel on her back again and washed his needle out, before filling it with ink again. "don't talk about it."
"I see." Marinette bit her lip. The tattoo was beginning to burn and each time he would rub the cool jelly onto her shoulder, it's set the flames out. She sighed at the coldness of the gel. "I think I'd die if you didn't use so much of that gel."
Chat laughed. "I don't know if you'd die… But it'd be a hell of a lot more unbearable."
"For real." Marinette giggled and went back to zoning out in silence.
"The base shading is laid out. We should stop today. Give your skin some rest. We can add the color next in a week or so." Chat cleaned his tattoo gun.
"Alright. Sounds good." Marinette sat still, as he wiped more gel over her tattoo.
"Check it out." Chat sat back and Marinette stood up to walk over to the mirror.
She looked over the black and white ladybug and the words that were beneath it were beautifully done. She read them quietly out loud to herself.
"In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.
"Do you like it?" Chat changed his gloves again and came over with plastic wrap.
"It's beautiful. Thank you." Marinette felt tears prick the corners of her eyes.
"Don't thank me till it gets the color added to it." Chat chuckled. "But you're welcome, Lady-bug."
She smirked at him in the mirror. "I barely know you."
Chat shrugged his shoulder and taped the plastic over his work. "Would you like to?"
Marinette's eyes flew wide at his words and a red blush appeared on her cheeks. "I'm sorry what?"
"Would you like to get to know me better? Say dinner and a movie? My treat. Saturday night?" Chat took his gloves off and threw them in the trash.
"I-" Marinette didn't know what to say. She had expected a tattoo, not a hot tattoo artist along with it. She bit her finger nail and spun to face him.
Chat was back at his station cleaning up the inks, his gun, and water cup with his back to her.. He took the gloves off and threw them into the trash. He turned to face her with his hands gripping the table behind him. Chat put one foot over his ankle and waited for an answer.
"I don't know what to say." Marinette looked down at her black converse shoes and bit her bottom lip.
"Say yes. It'll be fun. You look like a girl that doesn't get out much." Chat smirked at her.
Marinette laughed because he was right. She didn't get out much. Her online clothing shop through Etsy kept her constantly busy. Funnily enough it was called Little Red Bug and her logo was a ladybug.
"Alright. I'll give you a chance to impress me." She smiled with her thumb nail in her mouth. "But I'll meet you there. Again, I barely know you."
"Fine." Chat held his hands in the air and looked down at his feet with a smile. "See you at the cafe down the street from here, say around… six?"
"The one that's called La Fee?" Marinette questioned him, slipping her shirt back on and pulling her hair from the hair tie. She tosseled her hair with her hand and pocketed the black tie.
"Yep, that one." He smiled at her and tried to not focus on how her neck looked in the light or how she smelled like baked goods and brown sugar.
"Alright, how much do I owe you?" She looked at him and took her wallet out of her purse.
"Half now." Chat simply put and watched her pull money out of her wallet with an arch to her back. He licked his lips and tried to look away from her.
She handed him half of what she owed and a twenty euro tip.
"Thank you very much. I look forward to seeing you Saturday evening, Ladybug." Chat smirked and counted the money. "Oh, when you get home, you need to wash the tattoo off with antibacterial soap. Then you're gonna wanna keep putting Aquaphor onto it to keep it from drying out. Also, no swimming or anything like that. Here's a list of stuff. If it looks red, irritated, or if it begins to blurr...then that means it's infected. The symptoms to look out for are on this paper. Hasn't happened in all my eight years, but it's just a precaution."
She took the paper. "Thanks, Chat. I'll see you this weekend."
He watched her walk out of the tattoo shop with a slight sway in her hips that hadn't walked in with her.
"You got it bad, man…" Nino laughed at his friend.
"Shut up, Nino." Chat scolded him and went back to cleaning his area up, so that he could pack up and go home.
Her tattoo session had taken a lot longer than he had thought it would have.
Quote: "In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different." - Coco Chanel