Cheap Tattoo Summer

You moved in with a milk crate dresser

Plants all dying on the window sill

Left your shoes in the kitchen doorway

Said

“If I stay

I’ll probably stay for real”

Cheap tattoo summer on our arms and our fingers

Faded hearts

But the ink still lingers

We were broke

We were loud

We were sure we’d recover

Cheap tattoo summer

Thought it meant forever

We learned fights in the laundromat hallway

Neighbors listening through the paper walls

You cried hard on a Tuesday morning

Over nothing

Over everything at all

Cheap tattoo summer on our arms and our fingers

Faded hearts

But the ink still lingers

We were broke

We were loud

We were sure we’d recover

Cheap tattoo summer

Thought it meant forever

Now I see your mark when I’m buying cigarettes (yeah)

Tiny line on a stranger’s wrist

Funny how a crooked little drawing

Holds more truth than any promise we missed

Cheap tattoo summer on our arms and our fingers

Faded hearts

But the ink still lingers

We were broke

We were loud

We still sing the same number

Cheap tattoo summer

Cheap tattoo summer