The Tragic Tale of a Guy Who Really, Really Needs a Tattoo Cover Up

Before I dive into the most pathetic thing you’ll read all day, possibly all week, let me clarify that this whole ordeal is by no means the fault of a tattoo artist. The fault lies in my dumbass friend, who does a lot of dumbass things, and is now stuck with a giant Roman numeral date on his bicep that means absolutely nothing.

I have this friend. He’s not exactly a good friend, which isn’t to say that we’re not close. We’re hella tight. But he is, to his very core, a bad person. Not that I really care; his shit-for-brains antics are successful in providing me with a literary muse. I pretty much just let him do what he wants and make sure to be there at the end of every debacle with a cold beer and a shoulder for him to cuss himself out on.

Let’s call him Charlie, because that is his actual name and my mother didn’t raise a liar. Charlie is a nice enough guy, aside from his general disdain for people. He’s the big, brooding type, which is probably why everyone is usually intimidated by him. But none of this really matters—the only thing you need to know about Charlie is that he and the law aren’t exactly the best of friends. Simply put, he is completely incapable of counting how many times he’s had less than amicable run-ins with the police on both hands.

So when he found himself under a probation order, no one was really surprised. Well, that’s not true. We were all pretty shocked that he wasn’t in jail. But I digress. He spent a little more than three months reporting to the same stickler officer, and made sure we all knew exactly how much he hated his forced community service and sober life.

One day Charlie called me, absolutely ecstatic. He told me that a judge had allowed an early release from probation, and he wanted to commemorate the end of what he called “a prison sentence with perks.” He told me he wanted to get a tattoo of the date on which he would be free, and I agreed to go with him. He ended up settling on a huge Roman numeral display of the date on his left bicep, and he couldn’t have been happier with how it came out.

Only Charlie didn’t get off probation as planned.

I’m not exactly sure why, and as I’m sure you can imagine, the kid is pretty reluctant to talk about it. He’s either embarrassed, or pissed, or both. Knowing Charlie, I highly doubt he was dumb enough to screw up the dates. No, he probably violated probation and extended his sentence by skipping his service or failing to appear at a scheduled court appearance.

There are several morals to this story. The first is that you should do everything in your power to avoid getting caught doing whatever illegal shit you do on a regular basis, lest you be put through the hell that my friend has seen. The second is that if you’re going to get a tattoo of a date, you need to make damn sure it’s the right one. And the third is that if you’re going to royally fuck up in the manner that Charlie did, make sure your friend isn’t going to write about it and put it on the Internet for everyone to read.