BOOK OF DARK-STORIES

THE STICH UP

Ade la

The story could be titled *"Stitched Fate."*

At twenty-eight, Claire Daniels was no stranger to death. She worked in the quiet corners of the city’s morgue, skillfully stitching up the dead to give their loved ones one last peaceful look before the grave took them for good. Claire’s hands were known for their precision—threading needle and silk through cold, lifeless flesh was her way of paying respect to lives lived. But that delicate control faltered when her life at home crumbled.

Her marriage to David was fraying at the seams. That morning, their fight was worse than ever. Accusations, shattered glass, words they couldn’t take back. By the time Claire left for work, she felt like the world was falling apart around her. She dragged her exhausted, tear-stained face into the morgue, her mind swirling in a chaotic haze.

The day’s task was a new body, a man who died suddenly—an apparent heart attack. His face, gaunt and pale, showed the telltale signs of a life that ended in distress. Claire started stitching, but the argument replayed in her mind like a broken record. Her hands shook, her vision blurred with frustration and fatigue. She barely noticed how sloppy her work had become. The sutures pulled too tight, the skin uneven and rough. She looked at her finished work and sighed. It wasn’t her best, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

She returned home that night, but the uneasy tension from the morning still clung to her. David was silent, the house cold. Claire tried to sleep, but her dreams were haunted by that body, the face twisted in death, her botched stitching staring back at her like a cruel reminder.

Then, the nightmares spilled into reality.

At first, it was just a whisper in the corner of her room. “Stitch me right.” The voice was low, barely audible, like a breeze passing through. Claire shot up in bed, her heart pounding. She scanned the room—nothing. Shaking her head, she told herself it was the stress getting to her, the unresolved anger of the day seeping into her dreams.

But the whispers didn’t stop.

“Stitch me right.”

The next day, she heard it while washing dishes. A reflection in the window. A shadow in the hallway. The face of the man from the morgue started appearing everywhere, his cold, dead eyes locking with hers, his lips curling into a sinister grin.

“Stitch me right, Claire.”

She screamed, throwing the plate she was washing, shattering it on the floor. David rushed in, but when she tried to explain, he looked at her with confusion and worry. No one else saw the ghost, no one heard the voice. Claire was convinced she was going mad.

The ghost’s demands became more insistent, more terrifying. He appeared by her bedside, in the bathroom mirror, even at the morgue, always with the same phrase.

“Stitch me right, Claire.”

She refused. She tried to ignore him, but his presence grew more intense, more sinister. His body, mutilated by her rushed stitching, was decaying before her eyes, flesh rotting, sutures breaking open. He would loom over her, showing her the ruined work, his cold breath on her neck.

One morning, the city awoke to a gruesome sight.

Claire was found dead in her own home, her body horrifically stitched from head to toe. Each stitch was tight, rough, like a mockery of her once delicate work. Her face, twisted in terror, bore the same uneven stitches she had left on the dead man.

There was no sign of David. Some whispered that he had fled in horror, others believed he was involved. But those who knew Claire’s work