Jane had been visiting other people's dreams for as long as she could remember.
It started when she was a child, waking up in her bed, exhausted, with memories that weren't hers. A beach she'd never visited. A face she'd never seen. A kiss she'd never received. For years, she thought she was going crazy. It was only in college, when she found a therapist who specialised in "unusual cognitive phenomena," that she understood: she was a dream weaver. She could enter the dreams of others. And with practice, she could shape them.
She built a career out of it. Officially, she was a "sleep therapist" with a specialty in trauma processing. Her clients came to her with nightmares they couldn't escape, memories that haunted their sleeping hours. Jane would enter their dreams, gently reshape the narratives, give them tools to face their fears. By morning, they woke lighter, freer, healed in ways waking therapy couldn't reach.
It was meaningful work. She was proud of it. But it left her own dream life empty.
She didn't dream anymore, not her own dreams. Her nights were spent in the minds of others, navigating their landscapes, solving their problems. When she finally slept without visiting, she was too exhausted to dream. Her own subconscious had learned to be silent.
Then she met Dave.
He came to her through a referral, a friend of a friend who'd heard she could help with "sleep issues." In his intake form, he'd written simply: I can't stop dreaming about someone I've never met. It's affecting my waking life. Please help.
Jane scheduled him for a session.
The first time she entered his dream, she understood immediately why he couldn't let go.
She found herself in a garden at twilight. The light was violet and gold, soft as velvet, spilling over flowers that didn't exist in any world she knew. They glowed faintly, their petals translucent, their scent a complex thing she couldn't name but wanted to breathe forever. A fountain played in the distance, its water catching the light and scattering it like diamonds.
And there, beside the fountain, was a woman.
She was beautiful in a way that hurt to look at, not because she was flawless, but because she was so utterly, devastatingly real. Her hair was dark and fell in waves to her waist. Her body was curved and soft and strong all at once. She wore a dress the colour of moonlight, and she was laughing at something, her head thrown back, her throat exposed.
Jane knew, with the certainty of dream logic, that this was Dave's dream woman. The one he couldn't forget. The one who haunted him.
She should have started the work. Should have gently introduced doubt, softened the attachment, helped him see this woman as a fantasy rather than a loss. That was her job.
Instead, she watched.
The woman turned, and for a terrifying moment, Jane thought she was looking directly at her. But no, she was looking at Dave, who stood on the other side of the fountain. His dream self was younger, freer, unburdened by the weight of wanting. He crossed to her, took her in his arms, and kissed her.
Jane should have looked away. Should have retreated, respected the privacy of his subconscious. But she couldn't move. She watched them kiss, watched his hands find her waist, watched her body arch into his. She felt the echo of their pleasure, a side effect of being in someone else's dream—and it made her knees weak.
When they began to undress each other, Jane finally forced herself to withdraw.
She woke in her own bed, gasping, her body aching with want. It had been so long since she'd felt desire like that. So long since she'd been touched, even in dreams. She lay in the dark, her hand between her legs, and replayed what she'd seen until she came with a cry she had to muffle in her pillow.
The next session, she told herself, she would do her job.
The next session, she stayed longer.
Dave's dream that night was a bedroom. A vast, beautiful space with windows open to a starry sky, curtains billowing in a warm breeze. The woman was there, waiting for him. Waiting for Dave.
Jane watched from the shadows as he entered, as she crossed to him, as their bodies met. She watched them undress each other with the ease of long familiarity. She watched Dave lay her on the bed, watched his mouth trace her body, watched her arch and cry out under his attention.
And she watched, when they finally joined, when Dave moved inside her with a rhythm that seemed older than language, when they both reached climax together in a tangle of limbs and breath, she watched, and she felt.
The echo of their pleasure flooded her. She felt what Dave felt, the heat, the tightness, the overwhelming sweetness of release. And she felt, faintly, what the woman felt too, the fullness, the building tension, the shattering completion.
When she withdrew, she was shaking.
The third session, she didn't even pretend.
She entered Dave's dream and found herself alone. No Dave. No woman. Just the garden, empty and waiting.
She walked through it, confused, until she heard her name.
"Jane."
She turned. The woman was there, standing by the fountain. But something was different. Her eyes, they weren't dreamy and unfocused. They were sharp. Knowing.
"You can see me," Jane said. It wasn't a question.
"I can see you. I've always been able to see you." The woman smiled. "I'm not just his fantasy, Jane. I'm his subconscious. And I know exactly who you are."
Jane's heart hammered. This had never happened before. None of her clients' subconscious had ever addressed her directly.
"Why didn't you say something?"
"Because I wanted to see what you would do. What you wanted." The woman moved closer, her moonlight dress trailing through flowers. "And I've seen. You want him. Not just to watch. To have."
"I'm his therapist. I can't—"
"You're a woman who hasn't been touched in years. Who spends her nights in other people's dreams because her own are empty. Who watched me make love to him and went home and touched yourself, imagining it was you."
Jane's face burned. "How do you know that?"
"I'm his subconscious. I know everything he senses, everything he feels. And when you were in his dream, feeling his pleasure, he felt you too. Faintly. A presence. A warmth. He doesn't know what it is, but I do."
This was impossible. Against every rule of dream weaving she'd ever learned.
"What do you want?" Jane asked.
The woman smiled again, slower this time. "I want to give you what you've been watching. What you've been wanting." She reached out and took Jane's hand. "Stay. Tonight, don't watch. Participate."
Jane should have said no. Should have withdrawn, ended the session, referred Dave to someone else. Instead, she let herself be led to the bedroom.
The dream shifted as they walked. The bedroom became something new—not Dave's fantasy, but a collaboration. The curtains were Jane's favourite colour. The bed was draped in fabric she'd always loved. The light was soft and golden, the way she liked it.
"You're shaping it," Jane breathed.
"I'm helping. But mostly, you are. This is your dream now too."
And then Dave was there.
He looked different—more himself, less the idealised version. He looked at Jane with recognition, with wonder.
"I've felt you," he said. "In my dreams. A warmth. A presence. I didn't know what it was, but I didn't want it to leave."
"That was me," Jane whispered. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—"
"Don't apologise." He crossed to her, took her face in his hands. "I've been dreaming of a woman I can never have. And all along, the woman I could have was watching. Wanting. Waiting."
He kissed her.
It was different from watching. Infinitely different. His mouth was warm and real and present, and she felt everything, not as an echo, but as her own sensation. His hands on her waist. His breath in her mouth. The soft sounds he made as the kiss deepened.
The woman was there too, her hands on Jane's back, her lips on Jane's neck. Two of them, touching her, wanting her. She was surrounded, held, desired.
They undressed her together, slowly, reverently. Every inch of skin they revealed was kissed, touched, worshipped. By the time she was naked, she was trembling with need.
Dave laid her on the bed, and the woman stretched out beside her, their bodies pressed together. Silk and skin, breath and warmth. Jane had never felt so completely seen.
When Dave entered her, it was with a slowness that made her weep. He watched her face as he moved, reading her pleasure, adjusting to give her more. And the woman watched too, her hand in Jane's, her lips on Jane's shoulder, sharing every sensation.
Jane came with a cry that seemed to go on forever, her body arching, her hands gripping them both. And in that moment, she felt something new, not just her own pleasure, but theirs. Dave's release, hot and deep. The woman's satisfaction, warm and complete. They were connected, all three of them, in a way that transcended the boundaries of dream and reality.
Afterward, they lay tangled together in the impossible bed, the curtains billowing, the stars watching.
"You could stay," Dave said quietly. "In here. With us."
"I can't. I have a life. A job. Responsibilities."
"Those are just words. Here, you have us. You have this."
The temptation was overwhelming. To stay in this beautiful dream, with this man and this woman, wanted and satisfied and never alone. To never wake to her empty apartment, her solitary bed, her long nights of watching instead of living.
But she wasn't his subconscious. She wasn't a dream. She was real, and real came with consequences.
"I can't stay," she said. "But I don't want to leave you, either."
Dave looked at her, and in his dream eyes, she saw something she hadn't expected: understanding. "Then don't leave. Come back. Not as a therapist, as you. Let me dream of you, instead of her."
Jane looked at the woman, who smiled and nodded. "He's right. It's time for new dreams."
When Jane woke, it was morning. Sunlight streamed through her windows. Her body ached in the most pleasant way.
She called Dave that afternoon and canceled their remaining sessions. She also asked him to dinner.
He said yes.
That night, in her apartment, with no dreams between them, they made love for real. It was different from the dream, messier, more awkward, more human. But it was also more precious, because it was real. Because they chose it, awake and aware, with no magic to smooth the way.
Months later, lying in his arms in her bed, she told him everything. About her gift, her work, the dreams she'd watched. About his subconscious, and the woman, and the night she'd almost stayed.
He listened without judgment, holding her close.
"So you preferred dreams to reality," he said. "For a while."
"For a while. But then I found a reality worth preferring."
He kissed her forehead. "I'm glad."
She still weaves dreams. Still helps clients find peace in their sleeping hours. But now, when she comes home, she has her own dreams to look forward to, not the ones she enters, but the ones she lives. The ones she shares with him, in the quiet hours between waking and sleep, when reality is enough.
Sometimes, late at night, she still visits his dreams. Not as a therapist, but as a lover. They meet in the garden, in the bedroom, in landscapes they build together. They make love in ways waking bodies can't, explore fantasies that would be impossible in daylight.
But always, they wake together. Always, they choose reality.
Because Jane learned something important, that night in his dream: fantasies are beautiful, but they're not enough. The real gift isn't escaping into dreams. It's finding someone worth waking up for.
