Where Sea Meets Sky(106)
The needle buzzes and I feel the buzz in my veins. It’s addictive, this high that I get from getting inked. I’m glad Gemma brought up the idea or I wouldn’t have thought of it. She’s been rather . . . distracting.
She stands across from me, flipping through the book of sample tattoos and I take the time to admire her ass. You can bounce quarters off that thing. One of my favorite things to do is slap it with my dick. It’s like a cock trampoline.
I know she feels my eyes burning into her because she turns around gives me a wry glare. “I found my design,” she says though.
“Don’t tell me,” I tell her, wanting it to be a surprise.
About forty minutes later, I’m done. I glance at the tattoo in the mirror and smile. It’s pretty fucking awesome and couldn’t be more perfect. A time stamp of a person and a place I don’t ever want to forget.
It’s what the Kiwis would call a choice tattoo.
I glance at her over my shoulder. “Do you like it?”
She can only nod but her eyes tell me more. She loves it, both of our cultures melding into one.
The artist covers it up as Gemma gets into the chair and pulls up her hair, piling the massive waves on top of her head.
“I want it on the back of my neck, here” she says to the artist, pointing at the base. “And I want it in an infinity twist. Just like his necklace.”
The artist looks to me, briefly studying the greenstone. “Sure thing.”
As he begins to sketch it out, I stand in front of her, my hand going to her neck, the very place I like to hold her sometimes. “I thought you said no matching tattoos,” I say softly, massaging her there.
She cocks her head. “Your necklace isn’t a tattoo. You didn’t say it couldn’t match something else.”
Naturally, I’m flattered. More than flattered. I’m floored. I’m feeling a lot of things, and it’s not just the adrenaline from the tattoo. I feel like I’ve hit the ground and I’m still smiling and there’s another level below me that I’m about to fall through.
It gives me the craziest idea in the world.
When she’s got her tattoo, her time stamp of infinity, and we’re both buzzing from the needle and ink, I take her hand and lead her to one of the kiosks we passed by earlier. Two hours ago, it seemed like a death wish. Now I realize we’re both falling. Might as well make it even more real.
Because if you’re falling helplessly in love with someone, why not jump out of an airplane with them at the same time? I swear, I should write the advertisements for these companies.
I expect Gemma to scoff at my idea and call me a cliché tourist since Lake Taupo is the skydiving capital of the world, or at least question why someone with a fear of heights would want to do this crazy-ass thing.
But she doesn’t. She smiles. She agrees. She’s excited. She’s gone as nuts as I have. I realize that both of us can’t be trusted anymore with rational thinking. Everything seems to be coming from the heart, from some place that makes smart people do very stupid things, like get tattoos on a whim and then jump out of an airplane.
And so, the next thing we know, we’re at a small airport being fitted into a jumpsuit, a bathing-suit-like cap, and goggles. Thankfully, we don’t look as dorky as we did when we went black-water rafting at Waitomo. Holy fuck, does that seem like ages ago.
Of course we’re doing this in tandem with a trained instructor. I get outfitted into a harness by mine, some guy who has the unfortunate name of Nick. I try not to feel like this is a bad omen. Maybe Nick doesn’t always have to be followed by Dick.
I don’t feel the slightest bit nervous though until we walk out of the hangar and I see the bright pink plane we’re going to go up in. Once we’re inside and the doors close and we’re coasting up into the air, I want nothing more than to grab Gemma’s hand. But she’s chatting with her instructor like this is something she does every day.
It doesn’t help that the instructor is a young, strapping Polynesian guy with just the kind of muscles she liked in Nick. Damn it. Maybe this is a bad omen after all.
It definitely at least feels like a bad idea when the doors open. I’ve been trying to distract myself with the view and the enormous blue expanse of Lake Taupo beneath us, but now that air is rushing in through the plane at twelve thousand feet, I’m not sure jumping out of a plane is necessary. Can’t I just stay here and look at the scenery? Why would anyone jump out of a perfectly healthy plane?
But Gemma is up next and I barely have time to wave a fretful goodbye to her before she’s out the door.
Pins and needles swarm my arms and legs, my chest grows hot, and I’m instantly regretting everything. Shit, shit, shit. And then I’m hit with the fear of actually shitting myself, or worse. Like, passing out and then waking up on the ground to a bruised ego and soiled underwear.