#but I'm really not a good artist or illustrator

[basilone]

71) a crucifix and a thigh tattoo for whoever strikes your fancy!

Thank you very much for sending this! 💙 When I saw it, I immediately went "this is a John Brady thing" and that naturally led to a "Brady as tattoo artist"-AU that I didn't even know I needed until I had it. 😂 Soooo. I'm sharing the goodies.

“That looks really blasphemous.”

John exhales softly as the latest line, by some miracle, still ends up looking straight despite her snicker of amusement. “What does?” he asks, wiping at her skin just to check. Yeah. Straight line. “Stop moving, Maddie”– he adds, tapping her hip in warning –“unless you want these flowers to look wonky.”

“Sorry,” she says, booming her apology around the shop with all the aplomb of a woman who’s never been quiet a day in her life. Her next words are slightly quieter. Reserved only for him, if he listens closely enough. “Your necklace. It was on my thigh.”

He grunts, squinting at the rest of the linework that still needs doing. “And?”

“Crucifix on a demon? I’m surprised I didn’t catch fire.” She snickers again, louder once more, nodding at her leg. “See what I mean?”

John glances down, sighing as he realizes his gold chain has indeed escaped his shirt. Half his crucifix is dancing a slow pattern on her thigh, almost as if it is following the lines of the many peacock feathers that adorn the demonic figure he has painstakingly tattooed on her. He’d laughed when she’d first shown up with the idea for it – something from a French illustrated dictionary of demons, fine-lined and intricate – and the flowers he is crafting on her skin now flow forth from the topmost feathers well enough.

“I see it,” he says, mouth quirking around a smile he can’t bite back. “You should really get that angel done on your other thigh, Maddie”– he bows back over his work, not bothering to tuck his necklace back into his shirt –“instead of relying on me to save whatever’s left of your soul.”

“Oi!” Her indignance is a playful bark, as is the tease that follows. “Do you treat all your very beautiful paying customers like that, John?

“I’ll let you know,” he says evenly, starting work on the next petal, “once I find one.”

Maddie’s groan thankfully is not accompanied by any further movement on her part. He smiles to himself as she taps the table twice. You win, she says without speaking. Concedes her defeat more easily than he would, though he has a hunch she’ll try and find something else to win over him before the session’s done.

She always sits without complaint. Marathons a tattoo session the way Bucky Egan marathons baseball reruns, which is as admirable as it is mildly terrifying. He knows to clear his schedule for her. Gets Evelyn to run out for lunch and dinner, in the rather vain hopes that the girl will somehow find her voice somewhere between all the order mix-ups. He hasn’t had to threaten Maddie into eating in the shop since that first session when she’d almost fainted, with Buck’s mild tsk sound the only warning John had gotten just in time.

“You still good?” he asks, all the same, even though it hasn’t been twenty minutes since he last asked. Taps a pattern of don’t lie to me on her lower belly, just above her waistband. “Feeling okay?”

“Peachy, John,” she sighs, head tipping back onto his table when he wipes the excess ink off her skin. “I like this area a lot, it’s a fucking good ache you’re giving me. Don’t know what the heck Max was complaining about”– she continues, obviously remembering Maxine’s loud bitching session on Lottie’s table as well as he does –“because it ain’t as bad as the one you tried on my foot.”

“The one you almost kicked me in the nuts about some four times before Lottie finally quit laughing herself sick and took pity on me,” he grumbles, holding her steady on his table with one hand splayed out on her stomach. “I think Buck’s still got a photo of it that he’s keeping as blackmail material.”

“Blackmail material for you or for me?”

“Me,” he answers, shrugging as he dots a few short lines at the heart of her new flower. “Buck’s not that mean about you girls.”

“Unless your name is Lottie and he’s stinkin’ mad at you.”

John lets out a snort. Leans his arm on her and bends over the last line, which he has planned to sweep up to her ribcage. “They’ll make up. Last time she punched him before they made up and he got weirdly proud about that.” He rubs a small circle on Maddie’s stomach as he hears her sharper breath intake. “Breathe it through, Maddie,” he murmurs, keeping his voice soft and his touch even softer amid the sharp needle punctures, “that’s it. Good. You’re doing great today.”

She sounds almost drowsy. “Yeah?”

“Like a real angel.”

“Means a lot, John, comin’ from a Catholic and all. You’re still trying to balance my scales, huh?”

“Well,” he remarks, working as quickly as he can in the area he knows aches the most, “I’d have you know angels aren’t like those Cupid garden statues you keep thinking I’d tattoo on you. Real angels are beautiful and terrifying at the same time.”

“How does that work?” she asks, softer-voiced than he’s ever heard.

“They exist so close to God that the human mind cannot comprehend what it sees. We know there’s beauty in that – in the colors of a gemstone, the glowing coals of a fire, whatever they are likened to – but also a deep and strange sense of being other, of a sort? They do introduce themselves with be not afraid,” he remembers, as lost in his knowledge as he is in the very last of this line on her skin, “and I believe at least one prophet saw many eyes and many wings.”

Maddie’s voice doesn’t rise above a whisper. “Maybe you should draw a real angel on me after all, John. Just to be sure.”

“Next time I will,” he promises, and tucks his crucifix back into his shirt.

[pookasluagh]

I've started something new!

Ch 1 — Bad Omens: In which Zira wildly misinterprets an overture, Crowley makes an arse of himself, and the two board a transatlantic cruise as enemies. (And also as anonymous online partners, though they don’t know this yet, of course.)

Fic: Human AU, fluff-and-smut, enemies-to-lovers, E rated.

Excerpt under the cut:

His face closed up into an expression that he knew people considered supercilious, though in reality, it was the only way he could prevent himself from spilling something mortifying, like a whimper. Or tears. The stranger’s smile faltered slightly, and it gave Zira the strength to speak.

“If you’re looking to queue-jump, I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong person.”

“I—no—um—”

It felt good to fight back. Zira could feel the indignation burning inside him now. He was fifty-five, not twenty-five; long past the age when he let straight men take advantage of him simply by flashing an inviting grin. How dare he! “The back of the line is that way,” he said, pointing.

The man’s forehead was scrunched up, his smile completely gone now, but with the glasses hiding his eyes, Zira couldn’t read the expression. After a moment, he gave a sarcastic salute and the hint of a bow as he said, “Right. Okay. Message received. Have a good trip.”

[monotcchi]

dragon roast dreamin' 🍖💨✨

[khickuwa]

a momentary respite.

[tradingjack]

how bout them apples

[mienar]

sunrays and quiet moments

instagram | shop | commission info

[synth-ab]

Zelink is taking over my brain again

[deoidesign]

this is still one of my favorite paintings of all time...

print of it

[call-me-chips]

Drew Skara cuz her design pretty

[flourish-of-steel]

1899

[martyryo]

Him being cunty, him slaying, him mothering blah blah blah you get the point.

[ellenent]

Tears of the Kingdom HYPE!!

Here's a Toon Zelda because yes <3

[cleverreports]

We report: this is one we saw while lying on our back. We were determined to keep our mind as empty as possible, and so we made it our task to let our eyes follow it through its journey. It was a slow one. Our neck feels somewhat tender. Our mind is suitably empty.

[chalkrub]

thank you for the birthday wishes and thank you very very very much for 5000 followers!! wow!! i hit this around a month ago i think, but it's a big number and i want to once again say I appreciate everyone for all the support <:'^)

i'll try not to write a mini essay and wax poetical, but it's coming up on three years since i started this blog after years of putting it off and i'm so glad i did. thank you for following and for all the nice comments you leave, it makes me super happy......much love. muah. MUAH

[jessidogg]

Me: yah, I'm an an artist. i have pens and everything! *flips hair*

An artist that actually knows how to do art: oh rlly?! Can I see some of your art? 😀

Me:

I CAN'T ART GUYS HELP-

[the-nothing-maker]

POV your existence disgusts those you try to cheer