Dream of secrets

Epic dream in which I got into the habit of breaking and entering expensive houses and lofts in a Noe Valley-like neighborhood. I wouldn't take anything in these invasions, only relaxed among the nice furnishings while the owners were out. But then it happened that in one such burglary I took a sleepy four-year-old, and went for a walk at night around the neighborhood. When it came time to return the child to its home, I couldn't remember which rich house it belonged to, so I simply guessed. I deposited the child in the house I guessed it came from, and got away.

All the while, I was volunteering at a non-profit group run by a conservative woman celebrity, a Palin type. When news of the putative kidnapping came out -- not sure whether I had guessed the wrong house, or whether the child simply told the story to its parents -- even though the culprit was not yet known, the FBI was on the case and I felt they would soon find me out. I felt it was my responsibility to go and warn my employer, so I went and told her about the breaking and entering but not about the kidnapping. And she didn't connect what I had told her to the news at all. At the end of the dream she was called away to other business but gave me a look like "We'll talk about this later."

It's almost like the first half of a Patricia Highsmith thriller -- the lonely, aimless man who has a secret life, with much of the tension around whether and how he will be found out. Of course, since all such stories by Highsmith were allegories of closeted homosexuality, I wonder if such a story would still fly today. I suppose it would -- people are still full of secrets.