Stitch: The Lore of Sara Foxgrave.

Rubbing her eyes as she wakes, sitting in the corner of the hissing shipping vessel as it settled against the dock at Bath Iron Works, steam rising from its rust‑bitten hull like the ship itself was exhaling. Sara Foxgrave stepped off the gangway with her duffel slung over one shoulder, boots hitting the wet pavement with a dull thud. The rain was already coming down hard, soaking through her clothes in seconds.

She didn’t look back at the men on the ship — the ones who smelled like diesel and secrets, who didn’t ask her name, who didn’t care where she was going. She’d slept sitting up, eaten whatever they shoved her way, and kept her head down until the ship reached Maine.

Now she was here.

Bath, Maine. Cold. Grey. Smelling like river water, steel, and the kind of loneliness that clings to shipyards.

She pulled her hood up and started walking.

Bowdoinham wasn’t far on a map. But on foot, in a downpour, after everything? It felt like crossing a continent.

Her boots slapped against the wet pavement as she left the shipyard behind. The rain hammered down, relentless, soaking her hair, her clothes, her bones. She didn’t stop. She didn’t slow. She walked past the brick buildings, past the quiet neighborhoods, past the places she vaguely remembered from childhood.

Her mind drifted as she walked.

Birdi. Her Birdi. Her best friend. Her sister in every way except blood.

And Jeff — Birdi’s husband, the man who had stepped into the role of protector without ever asking for it. The man who had kept Sara’s secrets even when she didn’t know how to keep them herself.

They lived in her house. The Foxgrave house. Her family’s land. The place she had run from at 16 and never returned to.

She didn’t know if they still lived there. She didn’t know if they’d moved. She didn’t know if they’d given up on her.

But she hoped.

God, she hoped.

The rain intensified as she crossed the bridge out of Bath, the Kennebec River churning below her like it wanted to swallow the whole town. Her duffel strap dug into her shoulder, her legs burned, her breath fogged in the air.

She kept walking.

Her thoughts spiraled, looping back on themselves.

What if Birdi moved? What if Jeff died? What if the Foxgrave house is gone? What if they don’t want me back? What if I’m a ghost here?

She shook her head, rain dripping from her eyelashes.

She wasn’t a ghost. She wasn’t dead. She was here. She was walking. She was coming home.

Hours passed. The sky stayed dark. The forest thickened around her, pines leaning in close like they recognized her. The smell of wet earth rose heavy in the air, grounding her, pulling her forward.

Her boots squelched in the mud as she reached the Bowdoinham town line. She paused, staring at the familiar stretch of forest that bordered the town. The trees looked taller than she remembered. Older. Like they’d grown while she was gone, filling the space she left behind.

Her chest tightened.

She took a breath.

“Okay,” she whispered to herself. “Let’s see if Birdi’s still alive.”

She adjusted her duffel and started down the road toward Ridge Road, her boots crunching on gravel, her heart pounding with something she couldn’t name.

Fear. Hope. Memory. All tangled together like matted hair.

The rain didn’t let up. Her clothes clung to her skin. Her hair stuck to her face. Her fingers were numb.

But she kept walking.

The forest opened slightly as she reached the long dirt road leading to her property. The mailbox was still there — dented, rusted, leaning slightly to the left. The name on it was faded but still visible.

Foxgrave.

Sara reached the Foxgrave house, and the rain had turned into a full‑body assault. It hammered the hood of her jacket, soaked through her boots, and dripped down the back of her neck in cold, relentless rivulets. Her duffel felt like it weighed fifty pounds. Her legs felt like they were made of wet sand.

But the porch light was on.

Warm. Golden. Steady.

She stood at the edge of the driveway for a long moment, staring at the house through the sheets of rain. It looked exactly the same — the sagging porch roof, the mismatched shutters, the old maple tree leaning toward the garage like it wanted to whisper secrets.

Her house. Her family’s house. The Foxgrave house.

She swallowed hard.

She didn’t go to the front door. She didn’t knock. She didn’t want to wake anyone. She didn’t want questions. She didn’t want the shock, the crying, the explanations.

She wanted a bed. She wanted silence. She wanted to exist without being seen.

So she walked around the side of the house, boots sinking into the wet earth, and headed for the garage.

The side door stuck, swollen from humidity and age. She shoved her shoulder into it until it popped open with a groan. The familiar smell hit her immediately — motor oil, damp concrete, old wood, and the faint sweetness of cedar from the stacked firewood.

Her belly started to feel like jello.

She stepped inside, closing the door quietly behind her. The garage was dim, lit only by a single bulb near the workbench. Tools hung exactly where Jeff always kept them. A jacket she recognized — Birdi’s — hung on a hook near the stairs.

The stairs.

Her stairs.

The narrow wooden steps that led down to the basement room she’d claimed at 6 because she wanted space, privacy, quiet. Because she wanted to be close to the woods. Because she wanted to be alone. Away from her sisters. Away from her parents. And her parents preferred her down there as well, as she was out of there way.

She descended slowly, each step creaking under her weight.

The basement was cold. Still. Untouched.

Her room sat at the far end, the door slightly ajar like someone had checked on it recently. She pushed it open with her fingertips.

And froze.

Everything was exactly as she left it.

The posters on the wall. The messy stack of sketchbooks on the desk. The blanket she used to wrap herself in during storms. Her boots lined up by the bed. Her old hoodie draped over the chair. Her pillow — the one she used to bury her face in when she cried — still dented in the middle.

They hadn’t changed anything. They hadn’t cleaned it out. They hadn’t erased her.

Her throat tightened painfully. A fire rising in her throat like acid. And then the guilt set in.

She dropped her duffel on the floor and sat on the edge of the bed. The springs creaked the same way they used to. The blanket smelled faintly of cedar and dust. She pulled it around her shoulders, shoes still on, clothes still soaked.

She lay down.

The rain hammered the basement windows. The house creaked softly above her. Her heartbeat slowed. Her eyes burned.

She didn’t cry. She didn’t think. She didn’t speak.

She just slept.

For the first time in ten years, she slept in her own bed.

The smell of coffee woke her.

Not gently. Not pleasantly. It hit her like a memory — sharp, warm, familiar — and her eyes snapped open.

For a moment she didn’t know where she was. The basement ceiling looked too familiar. The blanket felt too soft. The quiet felt too safe.

Then she remembered.

Home. She was home.

Her stomach twisted.

She sat up slowly, muscles stiff from the long walk and the cold. And the last 10 years of barely surviving off the lands of where ever she traveled.  Her clothes were still damp. Her hair was a tangled mess. She looked like someone who had crawled out of the ocean.

She climbed the stairs, each step creaking loudly in the morning quiet.

Voices drifted from the kitchen — Birdi humming, Jeff talking softly, John flipping through a newspaper. The smell of bacon and coffee filled the air.

She stepped into the doorway.

Birdi turned.

And screamed.

The pot of coffee slipped from her hands and shattered on the floor, hot liquid splashing everywhere.

John froze mid‑sip. Jeff’s jaw dropped. The room went dead silent.

Birdi stared at her like she was seeing a ghost.

“Scoop?” she whispered.

Sara swallowed. “Hey, Birdi.”

Birdi’s face crumpled — shock, grief, anger, relief — all at once. She marched across the kitchen, grabbed Sara’s face in both hands, and slapped her.

Hard.

“You stupid—stupid—STUPID girl!” Birdi yelled, voice breaking. “You don’t disappear for ten years and then just WALK IN FOR BREAKFAST!”

Sara blinked, stunned.

Then Birdi pulled her into a crushing hug, sobbing into her shoulder.

Jeff stood up slowly, eyes wet. John set his coffee down, hands shaking.

Sara didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know how to exist in this moment.

So, she just stood there, Birdi clinging to her like she might vanish again.

And for the first time since before she left, Sara felt something warm bloom in her chest.

Home.

Birdi didn’t let go for a long time. Her arms locked around Sara like she was afraid the woman might dissolve into mist if she loosened her grip. When she finally pulled back, her face was blotchy, her eyes red, her breath shaking.

Then the anger hit again.

It came fast.

It came hot.

Then she slapped her.

Hard this time.

The sound cracked through the kitchen like a gunshot.

Sara’s head snapped to the side. She didn’t react. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t raise a hand. She just stood there, letting the sting bloom across her cheek.

Birdi slapped her again.

Harder.

“You…. stupid ass face,” Birdi choked out, voice shaking.

Sara swallowed, her throat on fire. Her lips pressed tight still feeling the sting of the 2 slaps

Jeff stood slowly, pushing his chair back. His face was pale, his eyes sharp.

“Where the hell have you been,” he asked, voice low. “And don’t you dare say ‘around.’”

John set his coffee down, hands trembling. He didn’t speak, but his stare was heavy, demanding.

Sara felt all three of them pressing in — Birdi’s grief, Jeff’s anger, John’s quiet disbelief. It was too much. Too close. Too familiar.

She took a breath.

“I joined the military,” she said.

Birdi blinked. “What?”

Sara kept her voice steady. Controlled. Practiced.

“I enlisted. After I left. I didn’t… I didn’t remember much at first. just flashes of faces. the house. the road.. I didn’t know who I was or where I belonged. The military took me in. Gave me structure. Gave me a name to use. I stayed with them until recently.”

Jeff’s jaw tightened. “You lost your memory.”

Sara nodded once. "More like fractured"

“For how long.”

“A while.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Sara looked down at her hands. “Long enough.” she pointed at herself.

Birdi stared at her, searching her face for cracks, for truth, for anything she could grab onto.

“You didn’t remember us,” Birdi whispered.

Sara forced herself to meet her eyes. “Not at first. mostly flashes of your face”

“And you never called,” Birdi said, voice breaking. “Not once.”

“I didn’t know what to say.”

“You could’ve said you were alive.”

Sara’s chest turned warm with guilt. “I didn’t know if I was.”

Jeff stepped closer, arms crossed. “You expect us to believe you just… forgot your entire life?”

Sara shrugged slightly. “Trauma does weird things.”

John exhaled sharply through his nose. “And now you remember.”

“Enough,” Sara said softly. “Enough to come home.”

Birdi wiped her face with her sleeve, anger melting into something softer, more fragile.

“Why now,” she asked. “Why today. Why in the middle of a storm.”

Sara hesitated.

She couldn’t tell them the truth — the forests, the searching, the remote places, the green eyes that haunted her sleep. She couldn’t tell them about the ayahuasca, the visions, the way her mind had cracked open like a rotten log.

She couldn’t tell them she came home because she was out of places to run.

So she lied.

“I got discharged,” she said. “And I just wanted to come home.”

Jeff’s expression shifted — suspicion fading into something like reluctant acceptance.

Birdi’s shoulders slumped. “You should’ve come home sooner.”

“I know.”

“You should’ve called.”

“I know.”

“You should’ve told us you were alive.”

“I know.”

Birdi’s voice cracked. “I thought you were dead. The fucking state declared you dead!”

Sara’s throat went dry. “I’m not.” she rasped half cry half whine

Birdi grabbed her again — not to slap her this time, but to pull her into a hug so fierce it nearly knocked the air out of her.

“You’re home,” Birdi whispered. “You’re home, you idiot.”

Sara closed her eyes.

She didn’t deserve this.
She didn’t deserve any of it.
But she let herself lean into Birdi’s warmth anyway.

Jeff stepped closer, placing a steady hand on her back. John looked away, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

Sara stood there, surrounded by the people she’d abandoned, wrapped in a lie she hoped would hold.

She felt something warm flicker in her chest.

Not peace.
Not safety.
Not forgiveness.

Just home.

A fragile, temporary home built on secrets.

How could she ever tell her the truth, what is the truth in the first place.

 Birdi didn’t stop fussing after the slaps. If anything, hitting Sara seemed to flip some internal breaker — the one that turned fear into anger and anger into caretaking.

She wiped her face, sniffed hard, and pointed at the kitchen table.

“Sit. You’re starving. I can see your ribs through your damn hoodie.”

Sara sat because arguing with Birdi was pointless. Jeff eased back into his chair, still watching her like she might evaporate. John hovered near the doorway, rubbing the back of his neck.

Birdi moved around the kitchen with frantic purpose. Eggs cracked. Bacon hissed. Pancake batter whipped into a frenzy. Toast popped up like it was afraid of her.

Within minutes, the kitchen smelled like every comfort food Sara had ever known.

Birdi glanced over her shoulder. “How much do you weigh?”

Sara blinked. “I don’t know.”

“You’re under a hundred,” Birdi said flatly. “Your wrists look like bird bones.”

Sara looked down. They did. Too thin. To sharp.

Birdi slammed a plate in front of her — eggs, bacon, toast, pancakes, fruit, and leftover cornbread. And her favorite, Corn beef hash.

“Eat,” Birdi ordered. “All of it.”

Sara picked up her fork.

John cleared his throat. “I should… uh…go pick up Katherine.”

Birdi froze mid‑stir. “Sara literally comes back from the dead and you’re going to go get Kathrine now? Why?”

John shrugged, trying to look casual. “She needs a ride. I’ll be home later.”

Jeff raised an eyebrow. “At eight in the morning?”

John didn’t answer. He just rolled his eyes

Sara didn’t look up, but she felt the tension shift. Katherine. The girl who hovered around the edges of town and their friend group. The one who dressed like Sara used to. The one who copied her hair, her boots, her jacket. The way she spoke,

The one who made Sara’s things go missing whenever she was around.

Sara didn’t have the energy to feel anything about it — just a flicker of irritation.

John grabbed his keys. “How was I supposed to know the dead would rise today, I’ll be back.”

Birdi didn’t say a word. She just watched him leave with a look that said she had opinions she wasn’t ready to voice.

The door shut.

Silence settled.

Jeff exhaled. “Well. That’s going to be a thing later.”

Birdi rolled her eyes. “Everything’s a thing with John and Kathrine. She's going to shit a chicken when she finds out Sara's home ”

Sara kept eating. She didn’t realize how hungry she was until her stomach hurt from the sudden intake of food. She slowed down, chewing carefully.

Birdi sat across from her, chin in her hands, staring.

“You’re too thin,” she said again. “Your face is different. Your shoulders are different. Your eyes are—”

“Different,” Jeff finished.

Sara swallowed. “It’s been a long ten years.”

Birdi’s expression softened. “We’ll fix it.”

Jeff leaned back. “We’ll fix a lot of things.”

 They talked — not about her, not yet — but about town gossip. Who got married. Who got divorced. Who crashed their truck into the river. Who rode their motorcycle naked through town high on whatever, who opened a bakery. Who was still feuding with the wild turkeys that have taken over half the woods in town.

Who got arrested for beating people with a whiffle bat behind the Dollar General trying to be a copy cat of Sara's serial whiffling from when she was11 after her parents died. Took the town years to figure out it was her.

Apparently, she’s a local legend at the secondary school and every couple years or so some kid tries to beat her record of 27 whiffle ball bat beatings within 3 weeks. Not one kid has broken the record and everyone has been caught.

Sara listened quietly, letting the normalcy wash over her. Laughing at the copy cat whiffle ball battings at Mt Ararat secondary school.

After a while, Jeff checked his watch. Finishing his coffee and looking at his wife apologetically

“I’ve got to get to work,” he said, standing. “But tonight, we’re all sitting down and figuring out how to bring you back from the dead.”

Sara stiffened. “I’m not dead.”

“You were,” Jeff said gently. “To us.”

He squeezed her shoulder, “Bowdoinham’s own Bruce Wayne. Wait till Birdi tells you how much money you have. You’re gonna have to change your name to Brucey if we cant get you declared un-dead” he smiled at his zombie joke and grabbed his jacket, and left.

The house felt quieter without him. Smaller. More intimate.

Birdi stood and started clearing plates. “Alright. You’re showering properly this time. Not that storm‑rinse you did last night.”

Sara nodded. “What does he mean by Bruce Wayne money” I said.

“Well. After you were decelerated dead by the state, they gave me everything, the land the house and apparently the hefty inheritance you got from that accident. Sara it was millions” she pauses her eyes wide while telling Sara the story. “SO !!! I invested a mad amount of it, and we are living off of interest” Birdi smiles devilishly

“And we were getting ready to break ground on a new house set back by the willow and the lake we used to camp at when we were kids” Birdi smiles excitedly speaking so fast Sara had a hard time keeping up and just watched her with a smile on her face.

“It’s going to be everything we ever dreamed of.’ She pauses and takes a deep breath,

“It was supposed be more like my memorial for you, but now, now we get to have our dream back together” Birdi started to cry but shook it from her eyes just as fast as she cooks.

Birdi handed her a towel and clothes — soft ones, smelling like cedar and detergent.

“ANY WAY we can talk more about that later you STINK SCOOP BAD! Go,” Birdi said. “And don’t rush. You need heat. And soap. lots of soap. all the soap.”

Sara walked down the hall, feeling the weight of the house around her. The familiarity. The strangeness. The way everything felt like it remembered her even if she didn’t remember herself.

She stepped into the bathroom and shut the door.

Steam filled the room as she turned on the shower. She peeled off her clothes, dropping them into the hamper. Her body felt heavier without them — bruised, scarred, exhausted.

She caught sight of herself in the mirror and froze.

Her tattoos — the military ones — were still there. But new ones layered over them: runes, symbols, sigils, marks she didn’t want to explain. Scars crossed her skin like pale lightning. Her ribs showed. Her shoulders were sharp. Her eyes looked wrong.

Her left eye — the real brown one — stared back at her. Her right eye, still covered by the brown contact, hid the strange split of color beneath: green across the top, blue on the bottom, the blue fading lighter every year it seemed, almost grey now. Without the contact, the mismatch was impossible to ignore.

She stepped into the shower and let the hot water hit her. It stung at first, burning against cold skin, but she didn’t move. She let it wash over her, let it melt the storm off her.

What seemed like only a few minutes turned into over an hour, and Sara was still washing the dirt out of her waist‑length ash‑brown, thick curly hair.

She didn’t hear Birdi come in.

She didn’t hear the door open.

She only heard Birdi’s sharp inhale.

“Sara?”

Sara froze like a deer in headlights.

She didn’t turn.

Birdi stood in the doorway, hand over her mouth, eyes wide. Sara’s back was bare — pale, scarred, marked by years of wandering. And her left leg — below the knee — was gone. Sara’s prosthetic leaned against the wall.

Birdi’s voice broke. “Oh my god… Scoop…”

Sara swallowed. “I didn’t want you to see yet.”

“What happened?” Birdi whispered.

Sara kept her eyes down. “My convoy got hit by a I.E.D in Afghanistan.”

It was a partial lie.

The truth — the snare trap, the fox form, the blood — stayed buried.

Birdi stepped closer, trembling. “Your tattoos… these aren’t just military.”

Sara’s stomach turned into knots. “Got bored.”

“And these scars—”

“Long story.”

“And why are you still wearing those brown contacts?” Birdi demanded.

Sara went stiff at the bathroom counter.

Birdi reached into a drawer and pulled out a dusty glasses case. She held it out. Sara took the case with shaking hands, not looking her in the eyes.

Her right eye — the one with the brown contact — had been getting lighter underneath. The blue half fading toward grey. She didn’t want Birdi to know. Not yet.

Birdi stepped closer again, reaching for her shoulder.

Sara panicked.

She grabbed the towel and wrapped it around herself, backing up fast.

“Bird, I’m fine,” she said quickly. “Really. Just… give me a minute.”

Birdi frowned. “Sara—”

“Please.”

Birdi hesitated, then nodded slowly. “Okay. I’ll be in the kitchen.”

She left.

Sara shut the door behind her, heart pounding. She opened the glasses case with trembling fingers.

Then she removed the brown contact from her right eye.

Her reflection stared back — mismatched eyes:

Right: green on top, blue turning pale grey on bottom.
Left: solid brown.

She swallowed hard.

A fragile, temporary home built on secrets.

But she was going to make it real.