Stitch Stitch

Somewhere in the United States of America, in one of the many small, no-name towns, lives a perfectly ordinary human male in his early twenties that went by the name of of Ezera Tailor, living life from day to day in the same exact mundane manner. Ezera never leaves town, doesn't leave the house too often, and prefers animal company to humans. He doesn't know why this is, but he has always accepted his way of life as he spends his hours playing video games, reading fantasy novels, or just loafing about, taking naps here and there if there is nothing he feels like doing.

In other words, the youngest Tailor of the house is a bum without drive and dream. Now; he always thought himself and his habits normal, after all, what is a young twenty something supposed to do in the Summer when he isn't attending college classes he was forced into? But then one day, in his infinite boredom, he gets to surfing the web, taking random and inane quizzes that have no impact and finds something...exciting.

The furry community and all of its sub groups were a new world Ezera had never heard of and was immediately intrigued. They were people who dressed as animals! He wasn't quite sure of the reason behind at first, and possibly never totally grasped it, but he began to gather that the fur fan base was like any other community. Some dressed for fun, others expressed their inner alter ego, other felt more comfortable acting less than human at times, and so on. He was hooked and quickly became obsessed.

His parent warned him away, or tried too when they found their layabout brunette holing himself up in his room for days on end after frantic runs to fabric shops and craft stores. Boxes and boxes of sculpting and other art materials began to show up daily, all of them disappearing into the suddenly forbidden room in a matter of minute upon arrival. And then there was the sudden trips out of state that lasted anywhere from a few days to a month. They had never seen the youngest Tailor so happy and driven, but there was something in his secrecy that disturbed them and drove the husband and wife to enter his room unbidden.

Inside they found dozens upon dozens of costumes, all in varying stages of development. With their son gone on a trip, they knew they had time to look around. There were many suits tossed carelessly in a corner, their designs basic, but flimsy and crudely put together, but as they moved around the room, they found the craftsmanship to improve dramatically in their realistic intent as well as the fit to their son's short, slim frame. By the end of the line, they noticed the last three costumes had built in stilts that mimicked natural movement, but lacked a foot stand and the inner layer of the suit had the oddest texture. The 'paws' or 'hoof hands' seemed to be finely crafted with sensitive mechanics inside, but how their son moves the fingers without an grip, they didn't know. They moved on to the final piece of the suits; the masks.

They hadn't ever seen anything so finely detailed, so life like. The heads were all mounted delicately, mouths partly ajar with no one to keep them closed. The mother swore that if she reached out and touched one of the pink tongues, that it would feel moist and warm. The father swore he saw the glistening eyes move. Neither of them expected the sudden slam of a car door opening and the swift and sharp bang of the front door when it swung open wildly in their son's now normal, hurried entrance into the domicile.

They both knew that with Ezera's haste, they wouldn't be able to make it out the door, so they hid behind a rack of long forgotten suits that could hardly compare to the three they had just finished observing. The twenty something wasn't supposed to be home for a while. Was the convention canceled? Did he forget something? In any case, they were trapped, watching as their baby boy slipping into the room, fully decked out the suit they hadn't seen as it was the chosen piece he had taken with him. The father knew immediately that something was wrong. His son's movements...too smooth for mere puppetry and the way the eyes flitted around the room, the pupils of the glowing green eyes expanding and contracting as they grew used to the dim lighting of the desk lamp that was always on was just too realistic. Their son had bought art supplies, not advanced machinery that could dare to hope to achieve such actions. The mother, blind to the creeping feeling, noted the convincing motions of the tail as it twitched and swayed to keep her baby boy's balance. Had Ezera become a master of costume making in his sudden need to seclude himself from all things living? Her mental questions were halted by the scream that had ripped out of her throat without her permission.

In their own pondering, they hadn't paid attention to the little song their son began to sing softly, the muzzle of the mask moving in perfect sync as he started to remove his suit. What was inside looked human, but only if that human had some how managed to survive getting skinned and in one of his 'paws' was the pale flesh of their son's actual skin, the hands and feet dangling heavily with the left behind muscle, tendon, and bone. The stilts hadn't needed a foot brace, there was no foot to place there and the hands need not a grip for there was no hand to take control of it. If he heard his mother's horrified scream, he didn't act as though he did, he was too busy singing and peeling off his current skin to settle into his old one.

"Stitch, stitch,

stitch a new life.

Stitch, stitch,

stitch a new skin.

Stitch, carve, cut, bind,

give life that's mine."

Ezera's voice was gentle, almost loving as he sung the verse over and over until it came time to remove the 'head' of the suit. It slipped off easily enough, leaving nothing behind but a barely enclosed brain. Not even his old eyes were there, just hollow black pits that focused on nothing and everything.

Ezera's mother - near ready to collapse, but frozen in place - felt a surge of primal fear when her once son turned those hollow sockets on her, their searing and yet empty gaze fixed on her place behind the current of abandoned skin not worthy of his body. "Stitch...stitch...mother." A second scream rang, high and shrill followed by a third that was deep and resonating. Both were filled with a pain that would have made the devil shiver and wince. Neither of the parents were seen or heard from again after that, but rumor has it that if anyone is foolish enough to try to gaze upon the skinless and disfigured body beneath Ezera's handmade hides, they too would become skins for the last Tailor to wear.