Part IV Of The Nightmare (Finale)
Author: Lev Lu (he/him)
Returning home from my shift at 6am the next morning, I crashed into bed and entered a deep slumber for a few hours. When I woke up, my nightstand clock read ‘11am’. I didn’t feel like getting up, however, my stomach was growling otherwise, coupled with the feeling of thirst. I sighed deeply before climbing out of bed to head to the bathroom to freshen up, then proceeded to walk to the kitchen. After downing a glass of water, I prepared a bowl of oats.
While waiting for it to microwave, I read the new messages Eden sent me. Alongside a horror meme, there was a video of escape room players outsmarting a live actor in a game different to the one we played. “Damn” I said aloud to myself while viewing the video. The sound of the finished cooking microwave slightly startled me as I was immersed in awe. I replied to Eden saying, “THAT’S LIKE WHAT YOU DID IN THE ROOM WE PLAYED. Is that where you got the idea from?”. Continuing, I messaged, “I still think about the Jigsaw mask stunt you pulled by the way. It continues to baffle me how fearless you were”. I then put my phone away and enjoyed eating my oats in silence while being conscious of my thought streams.
Later that afternoon, I read Eden’s replies to my messages. It said, “Yes, I saw videos of people outsmarting the terror of live actors before in games, and I also wanted to turn the tables”. The next message read, “I appreciate the compliment, friend. As I mentioned in the escape room, I’ve learnt to tame fear and use it to my advantage. I’m not so much fearless, but instead, leverage fear as fuel”. Fear as fuel. Fear as fuel. These three words immediately glued itself into my mind as I continued staring at the messages. After a brief moment, I asked Eden, “How did you learn to use fear as fuel?”.
An hour passed, and while I was playing a jungle survival game on my laptop, my phone rang. It was a video call from Eden. I answered, placing the phone in front of me on my desk while pausing my game. “What’s up, Kyle?” Eden greeted. “Not too bad, although, still a bit groggy from lack of sleep”, I answered. “Nursing life, hey. I totally relate. Anyway, I wanted to call you to answer your question instead of typing an answer” Eden responded.
Continuing, Eden said, “So, it’s actually hilarious because I used to be terrified of horror up until we met in year 10 psychology. We didn't know each other well at that point. Seeing a horror movie, or even a scene from one would give me nightmares for weeks. I felt like I was constantly sleeping with one eye open since my imagination would run wild. Then, it would fade until I encountered another jumpscare or horror scene, whether real or on the screen”. “That sounds horrific, pun intended”, I replied.
After a chuckle, Eden continued, “It was actually something so seemingly simple that allowed me to overcome the fear of horror. As you know my dad and I both train in martial arts. Something I haven’t told you is this line he said to me. It goes, ‘You know how to fight. Why are you scared of horror?’ Ever since that day, I’d never looked back. I am a fighter, and it’s adrenaline and emotions in a fight that I use as fuel, and I applied the same concept to horror. It's also about feeling the fear and going forth anyway; leap of faith”. After another thirty minutes of conversation, we said our goodbyes, and I was left digesting Eden's words like a nourishing meal for my body.
Two days later, I had my next therapy session, scheduled two weeks since the initial meet. I updated my therapist about the dream I had and how the visions occur more sporadically, not semi-frequency. “As for the physical symptoms, it’s still lingering, some days more intense than others. Doctors have no explanation for it”, I explained. A question that took me aback was, “When did these visions and medically unexplained symptoms start?”.
After two to three minutes of thinking, I replied, “Only in the past four years, I think. Definitely not during my childhood or adolescence”. That was a realisation I had at that moment while noticing my therapist taking down notes. After beginning to dive deeply into these experiences I’d been having through back-and-forth discussions, my therapist suggested emotion journaling to help identify more nuanced patterns. That concluded the session.
Throughout the next two weeks, both during work shifts and days off, I tried to be conscious of my emotions and how it possibly links to certain experiences. I perused the app store on my phone until an emotion tracking app of interest caught my attention like a reflected light on the surface of water. It had amazing reviews, so I gave it a go. Admittedly, it felt awkward and overwhelming at first as I’d never done it before. It was also mind-blowing how many emotions were listed on the app, given how I’d often say ‘good’ or ‘not great’ to describe feelings. While only a short period of time has passed, I noticed a clear pattern in the app.
Whenever I feel stress, discomfort or misery, physical symptoms plagued me like an internal pandemic, and at the extreme end of anguish, I encounter The Grinning Stitcher. In my nightmares, he appears when I feel intense stress due to work, the images of those unforgiving begging eyes still circle in my mind. I can’t remember the last time I saw him in real-life; it must be fading. What’s changing though? I’m not entirely sure. Conversely, when I felt free as a bird, it’s like hell never happened. The same thing that happened when I went on a trip to The Gold Coast. Despite having this evidence, I struggled to understand the root of what it’s supposed to mean.
Before long, I saw my therapist again, and after I provided updates on my emotion journaling, and two-way delving into the specifics of The Grinning Stitcher experiences, my therapist asked, “What do you think The Grinning Stitcher is?” “Uh, a living nightmare that confuses the life out of me”, I replied, unsure of the answer he was expecting to hear. After a moment, my therapist asked, “What about this nightmare boy resonates with you, as you mentioned him being eerily similar to you?” That was a question alright. “Give me a minute…uh”. I hate being put on the spot as my mind usually needs time to digest such a heavy question prior to answering.
“Probably the fact that his attire remains the same every time, and it’s the identical green camouflage shorts and T-shirt I wear in warmer weather. The exact one. He’s also the same cultural background as me I think, and something about his eyes of begging”, I said. “I have a theory”, my therapist said. I looked at him in hope of having an answer for me. “YOU HAVE AN ANSWER TO THIS NIGHTMARE?” I wanted to shout aloud, but I didn’t. “Hopefully it’s helpful food for thought”, he said. Continuing, he said, “I think The Grinning Stitcher is a younger version of you trying to say something. Perhaps your inner child is showing itself. We also know that psychological trauma can be carried by the body, and perhaps these symptoms are your unconscious mind’s way of redirecting you”.
As soon as these words entered my ears, I stared at him with wide eyes in disbelief. Unsure of how long I’d been out of it for, I managed to utter, “It’s me?”. “It’s a theory, and we’ll explore it more in future sessions. Time’s up unfortunately”, my therapist said while eyeing the clock above my head. I let out a long “nooooooooo”, not wanting the session to end, however, begrudgingly farewelled my therapist and left.
Remember to take a reading break if needed. There’s a lot of words here.
On the same day, I called Eden, who luckily had a couple hours until his work shift, to discuss these newfound ideas. “That’s so interesting dude. I never thought of that”, Eden replied after I disclosed theories from therapy earlier. “How are you feeling?” Eden calmly asked. “Conflicting emotions; partly relieved I have an explanation of sorts, and a bit scared at how he could be me”, I replied. Eden gave a non-verbal nod of acknowledgement over the video call.
After a brief pause of silence, I said, “This is quite literally a real-life horror game. It's like The Quarry or The Dark Picture Anthology series, where decisions have a butterfly effect. Perhaps I've been making less-than-ideal decisions, and The Grinning Stitcher is like a warning premonition. A bad omen”. Eden pondered for a moment. “I'm gonna take that food for thought”, he said.
I stood up from my desk, taking my phone with me while remaining on call with Eden. I paced around my house, lost in thought, and we were enjoying each other's silent presence for five minutes. “Oh, dude”, I said, reigniting the conversation. “What if I've been seeing The Grinning Stitcher all wrong? What if he's a friend, and not a foe?” “It's a possibility”, Eden chimed in. “I'm going to share something similar but different I've been through”, Eden continued.
“As you’re aware, I’m autistic, and sensory regulation is important to me. I didn’t understand why I kept feeling fatigued in certain environments until I got assessed for ASD, amongst other things. I thought I was broken; that something was wrong with me. Turns out the world we live in is utterly screwed and not very friendly for diverse needs”.
A puzzle piece clicked in my mind, and I replied, “I found flights to be obnoxiously loud, and sometimes the bright hospital lights irritate me”. “Wait, you don’t think I’m autistic or neurodivergent, do you?” I posed. “I cannot confirm or deny, but you do have some similar experiences to me. I recommend getting a formal assessment if it’ll reassure you”, Eden said. I nodded in acknowledgement before wrapping up the call as it’s been a mentally heavy day. I spent the rest of the evening taking it easy to have mental workbench space to process the events that have unfolded.
The next morning, before my afternoon shift at work, I checked my bank account and started rationing savings to go towards assessments. It was atrociously expensive, and I’m not entirely sure if I want to proceed, but my gut instinct had a clear answer - to do it. I’m still learning to trust my gut intuition as opposed to ignoring it. This is one of those times I reluctantly listened to it, despite ambivalence.
I don’t know how long it’ll take to save up for it, but I’m in no rush; at least I have a direction to go in now, despite uncertainty of what the path ahead entails. Besides this, my therapist’s theory from yesterday has sunk deeper into my unconscious mind, and it’s almost like I could feel my brain connecting all of the unlinked dots together in its circuitry. “It makes so much damn sense though”, I muttered to myself.
At work, an overwhelming feeling in my gut screamed at me, “You need to work less shifts in the interim. You're going to crash and burn again if you don’t”. It lingered throughout my shift as I actively tried to suppress it with some luck. Thankfully, the emergency room admittances during this shift aren’t as gory compared to other shifts. Near the end of my shift, I spoke to my manager about taking on less shifts for mental health reasons, and I got the green light. Not all managers are this understanding of mental health in healthcare workers. I reckon I got lucky with my team.
The next day, I decided to go full detective, escape room player mode. I took out my A3 scrapbook, a bunch of pens with different colours and sat down at my desk, iced matcha latte in hand. I had all of these ideas and puzzle pieces, and it was time to get every single thing out of my head. I don’t like continuing to consume brain memory in attempting to remember a library of information. I started with noting down observations of The Grinning Stitcher.
Young teenage boy of Asian descent, short hair and average build for his age. Attire remains constant throughout every encounter: camouflage green T-shirt and shorts, with green camouflage socks and black runners. That expression with lips stitched together and forced into a smile that's clearly forced, with blank eyes turned into begging. Appears both in deep slumber and real-life as hallucinations. Real-life encounters at work in the bathroom, at home while I'm gaming and at work again during a patient emergency. My personal feelings started as fear and denial, and started shifting into sympathy and confusion.
Now wishing to understand him has joined the party. Next, I opened my emotion journal tracking app to see the cumulative results from the past month or so. I noted correlations between certain moods and what I was doing or experiencing at the time. It was clear that less stress meant less tension in mind and body, and no nightmare visions, and vice versa.
I suddenly recalled the echoes of ‘help me’ in one of the nightmares I had with The Grinning Stitcher. Using a red pen, I wrote “HELP YOU WITH WHAT?????” on the page, and frustratedly circled it multiple times. “I have all of this, but still not a definitive answer” I said aloud, wearily. I'd been so engrossed in this mind mapping the mental existence of my drink banished. I stood up, grabbed my latte and went to stand in the bright sunshine outside as a break. After ten minutes, I went back inside, took photos of my documentation and sent it to Eden, emphasising the question written and circled in red.
A couple days later, when we both had a day off, I went to Eden's place to hang out. We played multiplayer Minecraft on his PS4 while chatting. “I read your messages with the compiled evidence. It's well organised. But that big question of what remains unsolved”, Eden voiced. “That's what I don't get”, I replied. “What about the inner child did your therapist suggest again? It slipped my mind”, Eden curiously asked.
After a minute, I replied, “He theorised that perhaps The Grinning Stitcher is actually a younger version of me trying to say something to the adult version of me”. I still shuddered at the thought. Eden nodded as we continued mining blocks in the game to continue building our joint random art. Five minutes of silent gameplay passed before Eden paused the game, restarting the conversation.
He turned to me, asking, “Have you ever heard of masking before?”. I shook my head left and right to indicate no. “Being neurodivergent, I was implicitly taught to mask. To put on this facade of ‘being normal’ to fit in. To not stand out by being different. I lied to myself to get others to like me, or more correctly worded, an alternate, ‘presentable’ version of me. It was torture, and it ate at me for years until my later 20’s when I decided enough is enough. I also saw a therapist to help with this process. I'm learning to be a free bird now”, Eden elaborately explained.
“That sucks dude. You didn't deserve that”, I responded. “Thanks friend. In saying that, it's possible that your supposed demon is telling you to change something; to do something differently in your life. Maybe that's what the ‘help me’ means”, Eden suggested. Eden's an emergency nurse who specialises in mental health, and he delves in psychology on the side. No wonder why he understands this so well. “I'll think about that”, I said. We swapped to a virtual escape room game to play after our discussion.
Remember to take a reading break if needed. There’s a lot of words here.
A week later, on the night after seeing my therapist to continue exploring his theory and receiving more insight into masking, my brain subconsciously went into overdrive. I felt heavy and fatigued despite no intense exercise. It’s mental mayhem. I went to lie on my bed, earphones in and played the calming sounds of flowing water with a fireplace crackling.
Closing my eyes, I drifted into an altered state of consciousness, almost a deep slumber within an unknown elapsed time period. My leg muscle jerking spontaneously brought consciousness back, although my body still felt asleep. Checking my clock, I'd been out for just over an hour. I continued lying there, observing my stream of conscious thoughts.
Well this has been one hell of a ride. Masking. Am I masking? Am I neurodivergent? When do I burn out? My head…it still hurts. It's like a ton of bricks. What the hell. Ugh. I just want to lie here forever; it's too comfortable. Therapy is going well. My therapist is cool because he gets me; we vibe. I don't regret taking on less work shifts; it's saving my sanity. Wait a minute. The Grinning Stitcher. My younger self and inner child. Masking. Visions. Pain. Is The Grinning Stitcher alluding to masking? Forced smile. Eyes of begging. No way. Is it?
I opened my eyes, almost forcefully, at this newfound connection. Taking a few deep breaths, I pondered more. Is this what ‘help me’ means? Strangely in that moment, a feeling of peace rushed over me, as if all of the unease and discomfort banished in the wind outside. “Well that's something”, I thought. I then headed to the kitchen to grab some leftovers for dinner and settled on the dining table, playing background rock music from my phone to avoid complete silence.
In the depths of my unconscious, processing these revelations, images morphed in my head. It was the cafe near my house, likened to the nightmare I had months ago with The Grinning Stitcher. I was heading towards it on the sidewalk across the road, noticing it was open and filled with customers. I crossed the road and headed to be seated at the last remaining outdoor table. Everything seemed normal this time, unlike the last.
As I was waiting for my iced matcha latte and eggs on toast to arrive, I looked around. It was an overcast day without rain, and traffic was quiet around here. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a figure in camouflage attire from across the road. At first, I attributed it to someone who loves camo clothes as much as I do. As I looked closer, I noticed the young person heading towards my direction, eyes seeming to lock on mine. I awkwardly took my phone out of my pocket to look occupied, the camo person still at the back of my mind.
I was startled when I heard the empty chair on my table being pulled out, to see the young person in camo sitting opposite me. I immediately froze, staring at the unforgettable face of The Grinning Stitcher. “What the hell?” I thought. After a few moments, I looked around to see if anyone around me noticed him, but no one seemed to. I turned back to the entity before me, and picked up something I hadn't noticed before.
The stitches on his mouth are ever so slightly faded like the colour disappearing from clothes with repeated washes. I heard him utter, “I'm not the enemy” as he continued locking eyes on my face. I simultaneously felt confused and uncomfortable. Attempting to channel Eden's ‘using fear as fuel’ mentality, I asked, “Who are you?”. The boy smiled and it seemed genuine. “I'm you”, he said. I was rudely returned to reality, the dream fading into another realm, with sounds of thunderstorm looming. It was morning, but felt otherwise due to the gloomy weather. “DAMMIT. I WANTED MORE ANSWERS” crossed my mind.
Fast forward eight months, I reflect on the path I walked. After undergoing an ASD assessment with a psychologist, I was diagnosed with autism, which frankly, explained a lot. The sensitivity to noise and lights. The fatigue felt in chaotic environments. The way I thought and communicated, and so much more. As for The Grinning Stitcher? Turns out he was in fact a younger version of me guiding me towards living a more authentic and unmasked life.
I never knew how much I’d been masking until therapy smacked me in the face with reality. The Grinning Stitcher kept appearing as my unconscious mind's method of redirecting me; to scream at me to stop being in denial and confront the uncomfortable truth. I used the fragments of fear I felt to befriend him instead of running away. Eden was right. There is power in leveraging fear as fuel, and to confront the horror head on.
Throughout this time, I’d noticed the stitches around the boy’s mouth not only fade, but unravel itself, as if it was reverse sewing. It was weird, but I now understand its significance. It symbolises me reconnecting with my inner child and gut instincts through allowing it a voice to be heard. That’s what ‘help me’ meant. He was telling me to help myself through unmasking. The physical symptoms were my body’s way of expressing pain and trauma due to psychological suppression. It is now minimal, and I am becoming a free bird, just like Eden.
Two months later, I decided to turn my experiences into a fictional horror story. Hell, I’m a horror enthusiast and I’ve consumed loads of horror content. Horror movies are a hit-or-miss for me because some lack substance and depth, which numbs my brain to boredom. So, why not write a story out of the nightmare I lived? It’s a great plotline. Who knows, it could lead me down undiscovered paths not only within myself, but in life.
END OF PART IV. THIS IS THE FINALE OF THE STORY.
Missed the beginning? Start the story here.
AFTERWORD
The idea for this story stems from my lived experiences of being autistic and my personal journey in unravelling mysterious experiences. I’m also a horror enthusiast and wished to explore creative writing after consuming countless horror movies and podcast episodes, in addition to playing horror games. The following are some of what I’ve been through in real-life:
Medically unexplained physical symptoms.
Unsure of why I kept feeling fatigued in sensory overloading environments.
I used to be terrified of horror and now I love it.
Live actor horror escape room (I played a room called ‘The Basement’ and there was a psychopath).
Burnout from work.
Fearing unknown experiences and perceiving it to be the enemy.
ASD assessment and diagnosis.
Seeing a therapist for mental health concerns and ASD.
This is how I developed the story. I also wished to represent neurodivergent masking in a literal manner, so created The Grinning Stitcher entity with the forced smile (i.e., pretending everything is okay all the time and fitting in). While some aspects of the story are fictional and improvised, the crux of the storyline is based on personal experience. I hope you enjoyed it.