Auction - 30.3 - Tattoo artist

Back to school - 7. Having a crush on someone

Task 4 - Travel and Tourism - Task 3: Write about something taking time to be completed.

Cats - Charlie / Forbidden Forest - "I'm so glad it's over."

Writing Club - 3. Steel: (colour) Gold (bonus)

This or That - 6. (Action) Serving someone

Elizabeth's Empire - 5. (word) fraud

Hobby Hole - Pairing: Neville/Charlie

Artist Appreciation - 2. The Best: Prompt - (dialogue) "You're better than the rest, [Name]."

Buttons - Character (1) Neville

I could be in no better place

Charlie gets to know Neville whilst doing his tattoo.

Charlie Weasley is used to people coming in for tattoos. Each has a certain look about them and he likes to guess what sort of thing they're there for.

More often than not, he can guess what the tattoo will be. An animal, a name or just something meaningful. He can get an accurate ball-park idea.

But when this man - Neville - according to his appointment book - walks in, Charlie finds him hard to read. The man doesn't give anything away, and Charlie leans in the doorway, staring at him, whilst Neville looks around at the pictures.

Finally Neville notices him, and Charlie starts forward.

"Hey, welcome to Dragon's Ink. Do you have an appointment?"

Neville nods. "I'm Neville. I'm here to talk about a tattoo design," he says. "You deal with magical tattoos, right?"

"Yeah," Charlie says, eyeing the man.

"Your brother recommended you, actually. He was my roommate at school. I mentioned wanting a tattoo and he said that there are some frauds out there, the magic wears off quickly. He said you're better than the rest, Charlie, by a lot."

Charlie grins. "Oh. You're /that/ Neville. My brother mentioned you."

"Bad things?"

"A lot of accidental things, a broken wrist and… he did not mention you're so handsome." Charlie smirks as Neville reddens. He did mention Neville liking men though. Charlie is suddenly glad for this conversation. "Oh. And you killed a snake." He winks to show Neville he's messing around. He knows the importance of the snake. "What are you having?"

"A phoenix," Neville says quietly, as though he's worried that Charlie will laugh at him. "A magical one that cycles through the stages."

Charlie looks at Neville, assessing him. From what he knows of the man, he'd have assumed something to do with plants and herbology, or maybe a magical symbol that means something. But as he considers a phoenix, he realises that this is quite fitting for Neville. The changes from the small boy into the man he is now.

"Let's talk about designs," he says. "Follow me and sit down and I'll start sketching. Today we just do the design. Then we book the actual tattoo."

Magical tattoos take a long time, and this is no different. But this one actually takes longer. It starts off small, with the ashes on Neville's lower back, flames burning around them, and slowly, the phoenix is born.

That part alone takes a session because there's a lot of charmed ink and a lot of magic put into it.

The second and third sitting, Charlie focuses on the phoenix developing through it's life, and day four is one at it's full power, gold-flamed wings outstretched across Neville's broad shoulder blades.

They talk a lot as the sessions go by. Neville talks about Hogwarts, he talks about his plants, and Charlie enjoys the passion in his voice as he does so. Neville likes cultivating life, Charlie understands. So a creature that can be reborn over and over holds more than one bit of significance for him. It's not just that Neville may relate on a subconscious (or conscious) level to the creature. But he also values what the phoenix can do.

Finally they reach the last sitting. The phoenix winding down, reaching the end of his life and turning back into ashes. It's quick to handle the tattoo. It's long to get all the spellwork done. To watch the cycle and fix mistakes. To make sure the timing is good, to make sure it loops through life without stopping, without ending. To have the phoenix move around Neville's body. That's the last spell he does, because otherwise it'd be tricky keeping an eye on it as he's working.

But finally, he stands up and he grabs a mirror, holding it up so Neville can look through and see the phoenix.

"Thank you. It's beautiful," Neville murmurs. He heads over to the counter and he pays the rest of the cost of the tattoo. "I'm so glad it's over. It's hard to sit still for so long, but I enjoyed chatting with you. It made it a lot easier."

"I'm going to miss these appointments," Charlie admits. "Hey. I'm just about to close for lunch. How about you join me?"

"Me?" Neville looks surprised at the invitation.

Charlie nods easily. "Yeah. After these last few days, I don't think there's anyone I'd rather go on a lunch date with." He makes sure to put emphasis on the word /date/.

Neville smiles nervously, but he nods. "I feel the same, I'd love to."