The Seamstress Who Couldn't: Story Telling Week 2

Jane Dear was a seamstress known all throughout Chicago for being able to go to different locations and fix any item of clothing that needed to be fixed and make it look brand new.  She helped everyone from the most famous, including Oprah herself, to the people with minimum wage pay checks.  She was willing to work with anyone. Business was business after all, and she was not one to turn down any business she could get.

One morning she was woken up early to the ringing of her cell phone.

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"Hello?" She answered groggily, trying to piece together her schedule in her mind on the off chance she had forgotten an early appointment.

"Yes, is this Jane Dear, fashion repair?" a curt, gruff voice shot back at her.

"Yes it is.  Is there something I can help you with?" Jane was now jumping out of bed and grabbing her planner and a pen to write down whatever was about to be said.

"Come downstairs.  I have a car waiting for you.  My wife needs you to fix her dress as soon as you can.  I have breakfast waiting for you."

"You have what?"  Jane peeked outside of her window on to the street below and saw a black town car glinting with the barely risen sun glinting off of the top of it.  "I will be right down. "  As she hurried to get dressed, she felt slightly uneasy about the fact that someone was waiting at her home to take her somewhere,  And all for the sake of a dress.  But after all, business was business and she was not one to turn down business.  Besides, who know when it was going to help down the road.  Whoever this guy was, he seemed important and she could always have that knowledge tucked away in her back pocket.

She climbed into the car and saw an assortment of different of fruits, pastries and other breakfast type foods waiting in containers in the car for her.  The uneasy feeling she had about the appointment caused her to not be very hungry.  She did take a cup of coffee and nibbled at a scone while the car cruised along the highway to their destination.  When they finally arrived at the modest looking house in the suburbs, she stepped out cautiously and headed towards the door.

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Once inside, there was a woman sitting in the living room knitting what looked like a blanket while a pink layered dress was hanging from a stand in the middle of the room.  

As soon as Jane entered the room, the woman stood up and handed her a sewing kit.  

"Now use this sewing kit to help finish each layer as there are holes and tears.  You will also be here all day, we will provided food and other services you may need, but check every couple of hours on the work you have already done.  This dress can be a little tricky."  Jane was curious as to why the woman said that, but did not spend too much time thinking about it.  She had gotten a lot of weird requests in the past and this one was no different.  So Jane sat down and got to work.  Fixing a hole here, stitching up a tear there and before she knew it an hour had past.  

"I better go check my work."  Jane thought.  She went back to look at the previous stitches she had made and they were not there!  No matter how hard she stared at the fabric, she could find no previous stitch work.  She couldn't figure out what had happened, but decided to not spend too much time on it.  She still had a lot of work to do.  Jane continued along stitching and fixing wherever it was needed. Before too long, another hour had passed.  She went back to check her work and saw that the stitches she had made in the last hour, while tiny and very hard to notice, were just no longer there!  Jane wondered what could be so special about that sewing kit the woman wanted her to use.  Jane had brought her own kit but the woman had insisted that Jane use hers.  Jane looked around cautiously, wanting to try something but not wanting to get into trouble for it.  

Everyone else had left the room for the moment, so Jane decided to fix a small hole she had in her shirt.  In her hurry to finish getting ready on time, she had grabbed a plain v-neck and a pair of jeans. While the jeans were new and looked professional, the v-neck was a shirt that she had had for as long as she could remember.  It had quite a few holes in the bottom of it.  There was one particular hole that she always tried to fix but never seemed to find the time to.  Now she took the needle and some thread and fixed the hole.  As she stared at the hole nothing seemed to change.  So, she continued on with her work.  But about fifteen minutes later, she felt a warm, tingling sensation at the spot where the now fixed hole was.  She looked down and saw the stitches disappearing into the fabric of the shirt itself!  As she continued to watch the one spot on her shirt, she felt her body somehow become better!  She felt more graceful, more beautiful, and more confident in every single way!  She couldn't comprehend why she felt like this.  

Jane finished the rest of the work in record time.  She could not believe what was happening!  As soon as she finished, she started to head toward the door.  The man who had picked her up at her apartment suddenly appeared next to the door, and appeared to study her with a frown wrinkling his forehead. 

"Wait a minute, Jane." He said in the same curt voice he had used that morning.  "You didn't happen to use the needle and thread provided for you for some other item of clothing besides the dress did you?"

"I did, sir.  I used it to fix a small hole on my shirt.  It was getting in my way and I did not think it would be a big deal.  I am very sorry sir."  

"How dare you!  You have used magic that you should have never known about!" And with that, he wrapped her on the hand and showed her too the car.  Jane was confused as to why he did that and sat in the car on the way back wondering what happened and eventually dozing off to sleep.  When she was awakened, she looked in horror at her hands.  They had become gnarled and un-useable.  She was barely able to open the car door!  And with that Jane was never able to lift a needle or a pair of scissors again.

Author's Note:

I used the story Fairy Ointment as the inspiration for this story.  The story is about a woman who takes care of the elderly and the young if they are sick.  One night she awakened by a call from a man to help his wife care for the baby.  When they get to the house, the wife asks the woman to take care of the perfectly healthy baby. The wife says to put a special ointment on the baby's eyes every hour.  The woman does as she is told and then tries it for herself on one of her eyes.  It turns out the ointment allows the person to see the fairy world.  The next day the woman sees the man from the night before at the market.  She speaks to him and he becomes angry because he realized she used the fairy ointment when she was not supposed.  In reaction, he then makes the one eye blind.