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ZITAO

Earlier that night. 

"Disculpe, no entiendo", said the young man who mastered the art of pretending not to speak certain languages. Sometimes he couldn't speak anything but cantonese. Sometimes it was mandarin. Sometimes english or korean or, like this particular time, spanish. It would depend on the situation. Right now, he was in a hurry to escape from a possible problem with the match of an old client.

Back to the old, first days of doing his job, he barely asked about the client's situation. The why's. Those were surely important and even if some lied or decided not to speak, most of the time it helped to prevent awkward situations like this one. It was easy to pretend that he couldn't speak korean, but then, it wasn't true. His biggest punishment was to understand every single thing the woman said.

"I wanted to tell him, I really did. I- I thought that we'd be destined doesn't matter what and now... nothing" she cried, sitting in front of him, leaning in as she hugged herself and wiped away her tears. As she explained, she knew her best friend was her match. She just knew it was him, and he probably felt the same too. But she hesitated and delayed her confession as they had to part ways because of personal reasons. She just couldn't be with him for a while, even if she'd love to. And she came back to discover that he removed his tattoo. "That's why mine is disappearing... That's... Just look at this."

She stood up and carefully pulled down her right sleeve so he could see part of her bare shoulder. A fuzzy mess of ink decorated her skin and one could guess that once a huge J surrounded by roses was visible there, but now it seemed like a painting canvas that fell on a puddle. "I thought it was like this since we were apart, because of distance..."

But it's my fault.

He held her gaze and maybe she could peek into his thoughts. She just went straight to the point, thank goodness. "You got to do something."

"¿Hay gato?" well, he tried. The gato in exchange for got was a great move, he had to recognize it. Sadly Kai wasn't there to praise him... And the hay in exchange for I totally ruined his moment. How could I've know that I'm supposed to use I? Great. Next time, he had to work harder. He was still the king at playing dumb, though. "Pero... look? Maybe help erase tattoo?"

A few seconds passed in silence and she slapped him really hard. He had no reaction. She just left, pushing a chair on her way and shutting the door with an expensive rage.

Now, Zitao was used to the look of disgust on her face. To being hated and judged, too. To have his things crashed, kicked and even burned. Too used to be good, but as far as he knew, he was okay. Both okay as a person and okay as the only one in the city that could do that kind of job. When he started, that kind of outcomes were common. Blurry or distorted tattoos on the other person, terrible feelings in both parts... And just problems. An slap was nothing but a goodie, and the woman ended up being nice. Very nice. She was just broken.

He wished he could fix her. He really did. But then, it drowned his emotions in a terrible way. That's why he improved, and even stopped doing the removals for almost a full year. Also, he always warned his clients about the impact that it could have on their lives. He never removed anything against anyone's will.

Tao wasn't the one who ruined the other's mark. That was effect of the tattoos o