Poison Ink - Christopher Golden
Sammi is a floater. She has friends in every clique at school, but doesn’t really fit in with any one of them. Her only close friends are four girls just like her. They started hanging out together because they didn’t fit in anywhere else. Just hanging out has turned into four of the strongest friendships Sammi has ever had.Sammi, Caryn, Letty, TQ, and Katsuko are inseparable. One night during a sleepover, the idea of getting a tattoo to represent their bond to each other develops. Immediately they are all excited - except for Sammi. She knows her parents wouldn’t approve and with them teetering on the edge of divorce already, she doesn’t want to give them anything else to fight about. Sammi hopes the idea of the tattoo just falls by the wayside and eventually is forgotten. Unfortunately, that isn’t the case.Together they come up with a plan to get out of the house and go to a tattoo shop close to Letty’s house. The creepy tattoo artist doesn’t ask to see their IDs and they all start to plan where they will place their tattoo. Each girl chooses a different location, but all will have the exact same design. After all of her friends have already been tattooed, Sammi decides she can’t go through with it.Immediately, Sammi is shunned and becomes on outcast in her group. They even go so far as to defriend her on her Instant Messaging Buddy List. Soon after the application of the tattoos, Sammi notices a change in TQ, Caryn, Letty, and Katsuko for the worse. They become violent, promiscuous, and horribly mean. In the middle of a fight that lands Sammi in the hospital, she spots the tattoos on her friends’ skin and sees that they have changed. Tendrils have started to emerge and cover more of their bodies. Sammi realizes something sinister is going on and that the creepy tattoo artist must be behind it. She decides to find a way to save her friends and get them out from under the control of the poisoned tattoos.