The Corpses I Stitch Can Talk

My hands have stitched together those who died sudden deaths, wrongful deaths, and deaths steeped in grievance.

I stitched corpses at a funeral home for three years. Then, for the first time, one walked in by itself in the middle of the night.

He had a flawless, impossibly perfect face, but below the neck his body was a bloody mess, made of golden nanmu wood.

He looked at me and softly said two words: “Stitch me up.”

I refused. “...I only stitch the dead.”

He gazed quietly at me. “Then I'm your exception.”

As the first stitch went between his brows, I saw him standing with his hands behind his back amid the vast, primeval universe.

The second stitch went into his chest. Images of him being brutally dismembered, his body scattered across the land, replayed in my mind. A searing pain swept over me in an instant...

He opened his eyes and said, “Now that you've stitched me back together, you're responsible for me.”