Owen Minor moved to Pine Deep and settled in. He enrolled in school, finished his degree, and got a good-paying job. He worked extra shifts in order to save money and vacation days to fly all over the country to attend tattoo conventions. There were a lot of them. Often they were the same people—artists, tattoo junkies, artists’ groupies, a few celebrities—and he cruised the edges of that world. By now he had forty blowflies on his arms and chest and stomach. And one each on his upper thighs whose wings brushed his hairless testicles.
Owen volunteered his services at the conventions. Very few of the cons had any kind of medical staff on hand, though they should have. Regulations for those events were sketchy, leaving hygiene and first aid up to the individual artists. Most of those artists were conscientious enough to handle things themselves, but things happen. Accidents, newbies who panic when the needle begins grinding, people who bleed too freely. A registered nurse volunteer was a godsend. Everyone was happy to see him. And Owen was always careful about who he touched, and when. He listened to the stories people told as they browsed the various stalls. If they were merely looking for novelty or impulse-buy ink, Owen could not have cared less. Those memories were worse than trying to find decent nutrition by gorging on cotton candy. Empty memories rather than empty calories.
Patience and paying attention helped him find the right targets. A broken heart, a lost friend, a buried child, failed hopes. Grief, survivor’s guilt, shame, regret, bittersweet nostalgia—those were the choicest cuts. Bloody and juicy.
He wore nitrile gloves, but on certain days there were tiny holes in the pad of one or two fingers. Only for a few minutes, only long enough to make a touch. And almost always on the last day, before the con broke up and people scattered back to their lives.
Owen would also head back home, too. To Pine Deep. To the new Fringe neighborhood that was growing larger and more interesting every day. To his job at Pinelands Regional Medical Center. To that abode of ghost stories and urban legends, of darkness and despair.
To the only real home he’d ever known.