jericho king d5 cbd3 [fin]

Your family is different from all of five.

You don't walk a normal life with your lessons of life hidden behind cold eyes. The world is shown your lessons in the art you get plastered to your skin. Ma says it's a way for you to remember what the spirits of the world have given you. The owl's eyes upon your collarbones for the wisdom your ma taught you over the years, but all you see is the paranoia of the spirits in those haunting eyes. The broken chain that lines your right shoulder blade being the disappoint your father left you with when he ran away. You grew up with ma painting symbols over your body, making sure they stayed for as long as possible, until you were old enough to have her family friend mark them on you forever.

Adults would speak behind your back, whispers of you being a King. The whispers of people trying to see the marks on your body, trying to solve the puzzle that you were. Your first boyfriend left bluebells that grow from your hip to your belly button, Ma said it was humility. A lesson that was always learned by first loves. Soon enough, you found yourself believing in those marks. Curiosity eating away at your chest as you asked your ma about hers. The forget-me-nots along her arms had been your father's. True love. As if such a thing existed in this world.

Still, you dream of what lessons will get marked on your skin, always a feeling that sank into your chest when you knew you had it right. Always knowing after awhile what lesson people taught you. Your skin is littered in markings now, as you prosper in the little artwork shop that was yours and ma's. Painting artwork onto people for a living, you never made much, but it was enough for you and ma.