Etched Scars

“Did that hurt?” A voice said in a soft nasal tone.

               Jacob looked down to see a blond-haired kid in a brightly colored aloha shirt staring back at him. He was pointing at one of the tattoos on Jacob’s right arm.

               Of course it hurt, he always thought to himself whenever he was asked that redundant question. But a tattoo is more than just the pain of a few needles stabbing your epidermis thousands of times a minute. It’s the release of endorphins as your skin burns from the self-inflicted wounds. It’s the bleeding, the soreness, the raised skin as your body fights the foreign substances. It’s also the care long after the session, the attention to detail, the cleaning, the itching, the scabbing and the healing. Finally, it’s the complex scarring of colors and shades, skilled artwork that has been honed to create an everlasting story for the world to see and only you to know the true tale. A piece of your story forever etched on your body.

               Jacob rolled down his sleeves to cover his exposed arms as he placed his basket on the conveyor belt. The kid’s mother tugged on his other hand and scoffed as she directed him towards the exit, he continued to stare at Jacob. Jacob began to empty his basket of various produce, breads, cheeses, herbs and a whole arsenal of tastes for a chef’s palate. For good measure, he added a few beers to the mix. It was, after all, his time away from it all.

               The drive to the cabin is one of Jacob’s favorite experiences. He makes sure to drive with the window down so that he can feel the crisp air swell around his face and the aromatics of the cedar and pine fill his senses. Freedom, isolation, relaxation. He’s always enjoyed the outdoors. There’s just something about nature that reminds him of how out-of-control human existence really is. His chance at Transcendentalism. He gently bobbed his head as he turned up the volume, The Talking Heads were speaking to him on the radio.

               By now, he had the dirt roads mapped out in his head and can make the drive with certain ease. After his grandfather passed and left him the cabin, it was the only place he went to that wasn’t school. It eased his mind and helped him relieve the stress of being an adult, if even temporarily. He turned onto the dusty path that led to the property, put the car in park, exited the vehicle and opened the gate. He repeated the process in reverse as he entered the estate, the large “Private Property” sign banged against the fence as he closed and locked it. The chain rattled as he interconnected it with the enormous padlock. Jacob wasn’t a fan of that sign, it was placed there by his grandfather, but it kept it there because the noise always reminded him that he had made it to paradise.

               Arms full of paper bags from the grocery store, he turned the keys in the locks and opened the door. The familiar musty smell of the cabin immediately filled his senses with emotions as he remembered everything attached to those scents. He placed the bag on the outdated counter and looked out the window above the sink that overlooked the pond that sat in the foreground of a scenic view of mountains and evergreens. Fields of flowers encased the forest floor basking in the light shining through the canopy. Gaia liked to show off.

               The cabin sat four hours outside of town (on a good day) and was placed smack-dab in the middle of Gods country. His grandfather built it after he returned from the war. After developing some adverse effects upon his return, he decided he needed to keep himself occupied and his mind off of other issues. “Idle hands are the Devil’s playthings” he used to tell Jacob growing up as they played cards, or chess, or worked on odd projects around the cabin together. Jacob, of course, never understood that meaning until he was much older, but it always resonated with him, nonetheless. Like Jacob and his family, his grandfather didn’t live there full time, they merely visited when they needed an escape, however, once Jacob’s grandmother passed, his grandfather began to spend a lot more time up there until one day he never left. As Jacob got older and more mobile, he would visit him more and more. He enjoyed it there. He and his grandfather had a great relationship.

               Jacob was 17 when his grandfather passed. To his, and his parents’ surprise, the cabin was left to him in the will. It made sense, really, Jacob was the only one who wouldn’t sell it the second he could and would use it for its intended purpose. Not that his parents were greedy, they just had no use or time for the cabin like Jacob did. Jacob continued working odd jobs on the cabin to maintain it. He cherished his grandfather’s legacy. He enjoyed the fresh air. He enjoyed the solitude. Transcendence.

               He sat down on his grandfather’s favorite suede wingback armchair and sipped from the black coffee he made himself. It was creeping into fall and the nights were getting colder. In preparation, he had returned this weekend to fortify the insulation of the building as well as chop wood for the furnace for any future visits he may take heading into the wintery months. Last year was poorly planned and he recalled how he nearly froze as he wrestled the catch out of the icy pond. He wouldn’t make that mistake again this year. He panned his eyes across the photographic memories across the mantle and smiled at what he and his grandfather had created here. The coffee warmed his soul.

               Jacob woke up in a sweat. The one thing he always had trouble doing was sleeping at the cabin. Noises kept him up most of the night, they haunted him. Ghastly reminders of his past keeping him at attention and nagging at his conscious. Screams of horrors and agony. Nightmares.

               He walked into the bathroom and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror that rested above the pedestal sink. On his chest scrawled a poorly etched rose. His first tattoo. His grandfather’s favorite flower. He stared at it and remembered that night, stumbling into a friend’s house party, half drunk, nerves shot and asking for one of his infamous “homemade” tattoos. Although only 17, somehow Mark had acquired a tattoo gun and would use that power to wield it for popularity in high school. Drunk adolescents would ask for lame tattoos that they would regret as they got older. Choppy lines, poor color, barely visible. But damn they did give you cool points with the rest of the school. Jacob wanted a rose. Jacob got a wet noodle tied to a red blob. Jacob hated it but cherished it in the same breath. You never forget your first. It was painful, healed horribly and left a vicious scar, but it was part of Jacob’s story.

               To keep himself busy and drown out the noises in his head, Jacob put on his jacket, grabbed a lantern and went outside to chop wood. He placed a cut log onto a well-worn tree stump and grabbed his sharpened axe. He raised the axe with both hands above his head and jammed it down onto the log splitting it in half immediately. He continued this process until he was winded and had a decent pile accumulated near his feet. He leaned the axe against the pile and he wiped the sweat from his brow.

               Entering the cabin as the sun began to rise over the mountains, he laid down on the couch and tried to get a little bit more sleep before he truly started his day.

               The morning sun poured onto his face like a natural alarm clock and the warmth woke him from his nap. He perked up on the sofa, yawned, stretched, and reacquainted himself with the room. His stomach reminded him that it was time to eat, so he made his way towards the kitchen to prep some of the food he gathered from the store on his way out. He diced up some of the produce, whipped up some eggs and brewed some coffee. He turned on the stove and placed a large black skillet atop the flame and slapped a hefty piece of butter inside. The aromatics filled the room as he plated the breakfast concoction onto two plates he found in the cupboard. On one of them, he placed the pedals of one of the white flowers he gathered on his hike with Heather yesterday, the ones he sneakily concocted tea with to calm her body afterwards.

               He slowly made his way down the hall with the plate with the flowers and some coffee. As he approached the door to the room at the end of the hall, his grandfather’s old room, he took a deep breath and prepared himself.

               Heather was sprawled across the bed in her own bodily fluids. The blankets that once propped her up on the mattress had become a chaotic torrent in the room. Her raspy voice was barely audible.

               “I…don’t feel…so…well.” Makeup was smeared on her face and the sweat poured from every pore on her body. Her clothes ripped and tattered. She constantly moaned in pain and anguish. The same wails that kept him up the night before.

               Jacob carefully placed the coffee on the side table and tried to hand her the plate of food. “I tried to find some medicine in town. But first, you need to eat and drink something.” She tried to force a smile as she noticed the flower on top, a reminder of their wonderful outing the day prior. “It’s edible and, in fact, I checked one of my textbooks it may have some medicinal properties.”

               Plants were a big part of his life. His grandfather instilled in him the idea of living off the land and would show him various flora about the forest that would help one survive. Those interests carried Jacob through school and into college where he majored in botany. Excelling in his field, he was currently writing a dissertation about the effects of plants on people.

               It didn’t take long for the next round to affect her. He scripted a few notes in his field journal as he sipped some beer next to the large fire that he had constructed in a barrel a few hundred yards from the cabin. The thick, black smoke filled the beautiful blue sky to only be seen by him and God.

***

Frazzy, his tattoo artist, was just about finished with the artwork on his forearm when he asked him about the rest of his tattoos.

               “You know, you’ve been in here a few times, but I have never asked you, why all the flowers?” He motioned to Jacob’s arm. It was covered in colorful plants. Greens, whites, purples, red. His arm looked like a bouquet.

               Jacob paused. “I enjoy flowers. Botany, I want to be a botanist. These are a subtle reminder.”

               “A reminder of what?”

               Jacob laughed, “no one beats nature.”

               Confused, Frazzy responded, “huh?”

               He pointed to a group on his shoulder. “You see this pink group here? Kalmia latifolia. Symptoms appear in about 6 hours. Anorexia, foaming at the mouth, heart palpitations, coma, death. These blue badboys over here?” Another branch on his underarm. “Delphinium. It gets you quick, too. You lose control of your muscles, you spasm and suffer horrible heart issues. The one you are tattooing? Cicuta. That one is especially bad. Unlike the others, the death is slow. Seizures, vomiting, sweating, hallucinations, just a whole range of horrible stuff until eventually you succumb to it.”

               “Holy shit.” Frazzy stopped tattooing.

               “No one beats nature.” He said shrugging in a sing-songy tone.

               Frazzy continued to finish up the tattoo but kept peering over at the other flowers, shocked. Thinking about all the other flowers he didn’t mention. “It looks like you are running out of room on this arm, sadly enough.”

               Jacob laughed and raised his left arm. “I still have another arm to fill.”

“...And I plan on doing just that," commenting eagerly.