Free A Tangled Web (Dangerous Secrets) by Rose Francis

grabbed him again.
    ***
    The next morning, Kent woke up and felt like he had missed something.
    Then he remembered the dream. He tried recalling it because he felt there was something important in it—his mind was trying to tell him something. He’d heard something about dreams being answers to unformed questions.But what question did he not realize he had that this dream was answering? He could hardly even remember the basics of it—something about Kimberly and Damien being together and him wishing it was him instead, and then it was him. And then Damien kidnapped her baby...something like that.
    Why did he dream about Damien anyway? He hadn’t seen the guy around for a while and it’s not like he was a threat to his and Kimberly’s relationship.
    Kent got ready for work.
    ***
    Kent could hardly concentrate fully throughout the morning. He was anticipating his chat with Kimberly and all day it was bothering him. What was it she had to tell him? Was it related to the way she smiled at him at the hospital after her checkup? That smile she gave him last night? Did she just want to declare her feelings for him and want them to get back together for good? What?
    With a clear head, even after a not-so-good night’s rest, Kent’s mind went to work trying to figure out what he was missing.
    He began remembering little things that alerted him a bit but weren’t significant enough to stand out at the time: that sudden phone call in the night for example—there had to be more to it than she let on. He figured whatever she planned to tell him today, she had planned to tell him at that moment. And as she was already chickening out, she heard that skank in the background.
    Maybe it had to do with them getting back together after all, except it seemed weightier…those smiles—they seemed to hold a secret. But what secret could she have? Didn’t she tell him the one and only already? What could be bigger than that?
    His mind flashed back to when he asked her about her due date—she did not seem to want to say; in fact, it seemed she tried to stall, but why? Also, she didn’t seem like she was expecting any day now—she seemed quite comfortable, like she had more time. And when he asked her last night specifically about when she was due, she never really answered! What did she say? Oh yes, soon…
    Kent’s blood rushed.
    The dream was also about Damien though. What could that mean?
    Last thing he remembered was him just being a pest…although there was that one time he went too far…
    Kent decided to call Damien at work—he had to put his mind at rest somehow.
    He dialed Damien’s work number.
    “Hey, is Damien there?” Kent asked when the receptionist picked up.
    “I’m sorry, he’s not in today. He’s actually on vacation this week. And next week.”
    “Oh okay, thanks.”
    Kent didn’t know why, but that information chilled him to the bone.
    He started thinking about his dream again—he had to be more logical about it.
    Clearly it was his memories of him wanting to be with Kimberly and watching her and Damien as a happy couple, right? Reflecting his wish of wanting to be the one to start a family with her. But that couldn’t be it—dreams weren’t about things you already knew, not consciously anyway. They were mostly about feelings, wishes, desires, fears that lived beneath the surface, things suppressed, denied, kept on the back burner. Dreams brought these things to light, albeit in strange ways—ways that could confuse you even further, if you let it. Sometimes, it seemed they even gave a glimpse into the future.
    Kent wondered if there was another way he should think about it.
    He pushed aside the obvious. Okay, let’s try this again—let’s twist this as much as we can, he thought. He decided that one twisted possibility was that he was actually Damien in the dream, and Damien was him.
    Kent choked on his laugh because just as he was about to laugh at the ridiculousness of it, he realized it made