The Twist of Fate

By Jonathan Cross7 min read1,645 words
Drama#twist#identity#psychological#drama#revelation

When David receives a mysterious phone call claiming his entire life is a lie, he must decide whether to investigate or protect the comfortable reality he's always known.

The Twist of Fate

David Morrison was brushing his teeth when his phone rang at 11:47 PM on a Tuesday. He almost didn't answer – unknown number, late hour, all the hallmarks of a spam call. But something made him pick up on the fourth ring.

"Is this David Morrison?" The voice was older, gravelly, careful.

"Who's asking?"

"My name is Frank Kellerman. I'm a private investigator, and I need to meet with you. It's about your parents."

David sat down heavily on his bed. His parents had died in a car accident when he was two years old. He'd been raised by his aunt and uncle, Linda and Robert Morrison, who had legally adopted him and given him their last name. It wasn't a secret, but it wasn't something he thought about much anymore.

"I think you have the wrong person, Mr. Kellerman. My parents died twenty-eight years ago."

"David, I know this is going to sound impossible, but I have reason to believe your parents are still alive."

The phone slipped from David's hand, clattering to the floor. When he picked it up, his voice was barely a whisper. "That's not possible."

"I have documents. Photographs. I need to show you something, but it has to be in person. Can you meet me tomorrow?"

David's mind raced. This had to be some kind of scam, some elaborate scheme to extort money from him. But the man's voice carried a weight of certainty that made David's chest tight.

"What kind of documents?"

"Birth certificates. Hospital records. A private adoption file that was sealed by court order." Frank paused. "David, I think you were kidnapped."


They met at a diner on the outskirts of town. Frank Kellerman was exactly what David had expected – rumpled suit, tired eyes, the kind of man who had seen too much and believed too little. He spread a manila folder across the sticky table between them.

"This is going to be hard to hear," Frank said. "I've been working this case for six months, hired by a couple named Patricia and Michael Blackwood."

David stared at the first photograph Frank slid across the table. It showed a man and woman in their twenties, holding a baby. The woman had David's eyes. The man had his nose, his chin, the same cowlick in his hair.

"They're your biological parents. You were taken from a hospital in Portland when you were six weeks old. The people who raised you – Linda and Robert Morrison – they aren't your aunt and uncle. They have no relation to you at all."

David's hands shook as he picked up the photo. "This is impossible. I have memories. Birth certificate. Medical records."

"All fabricated." Frank pulled out more documents. "Very well done, but fabricated. The Morrisons paid a lot of money to create a new identity for you. They've been living under assumed names too."

"Why?" David's voice cracked. "Why would they do this?"

Frank's expression was grim. "Linda Morrison – whose real name is Linda Garrett – she lost a baby. Stillborn. She had a complete psychological break, convinced herself that the baby was still alive, that he'd been taken from her. Robert went along with it at first, thinking it was temporary grief. But when she saw you in that hospital..."

Frank shook his head. "She wasn't thinking clearly. She saw a baby who looked like what she thought her son would have looked like, and she took you. Robert helped cover it up because he loved her and thought he could make it right somehow. They changed their names, moved across the country, created an entire backstory about being your relatives."

David stared at the documents spread before him. Hospital bracelets, discharge papers, police reports from thirty years ago about a missing infant. All with his baby picture, his birth weight, his actual birthday – which was three weeks earlier than he'd always believed.

"My real parents," he said slowly. "Are they... are they good people?"

"They never stopped looking for you. Patricia kept your nursery exactly the way it was for fifteen years. They hired private investigators, spent their life savings, never gave up hope. When DNA databases became more sophisticated, they uploaded their profiles everywhere, hoping for a match."

"And they found one?"

"Three months ago. You donated blood during that office drive at your company, remember? The database cross-referenced it with missing persons cases." Frank leaned forward. "David, they're desperate to meet you. But they want you to know that they understand this is your choice. They don't want to disrupt your life if you don't want them to."

David thought about Linda and Robert, the people he'd called Mom and Dad for twenty-eight years. They'd been loving parents, if somewhat overprotective. They'd never traveled far, never let him play contact sports, always seemed nervous when he was away from home too long. He'd attributed it to losing his "brother" – their explanation for why they'd adopted him in the first place.

Now he understood why they'd always looked at him with a mixture of love and fear. They'd been waiting for this day, wondering when their carefully constructed lie would finally collapse.

"I need to confront them," David said.

"Are you sure? Once you open this door, you can't close it again."

David looked at the photograph of his biological parents again. The woman – Patricia – was crying in the picture, but her face was radiant with joy. He'd never seen anyone look at him like that, like he was a miracle they'd been praying for.

"They stole my life," he said quietly. "My real parents have been grieving for thirty years because of what Linda and Robert did. They deserve to know I'm alive."


David drove to the Morrison house in a daze. He'd called in sick to work, unable to imagine sitting through meetings and pretending normalcy while his entire identity crumbled around him.

Linda – he couldn't think of her as Mom anymore – was in the kitchen making dinner when he walked in. She looked up with the same warm smile she'd given him for as long as he could remember.

"You're early! I'm making your favorite – pot roast with those little potatoes you like."

"We need to talk."

Something in his tone made her freeze. The wooden spoon in her hand dripped gravy onto the floor.

"David? What's wrong?"

"I met with a private investigator today. Frank Kellerman." David watched her face carefully. "He told me some very interesting things about my birth parents."

Linda's face went white. The spoon clattered to the floor.

"Robert!" she called, her voice high and panicked. "Robert, come down here!"

Robert appeared in the doorway, took one look at Linda's face, and seemed to age ten years in an instant.

"You know," he said simply. It wasn't a question.

"I know everything." David pulled out the photographs and documents. "I know about Patricia and Michael Blackwood. I know about the stillborn baby. I know about Portland General Hospital and what you did there thirty years ago."

Linda sank into a chair, her hand pressed to her mouth. "David, please, let me explain—"

"Explain what? How you kidnapped me? How you've been lying to me my entire life? How my real parents have been suffering for three decades because of what you did?"

"It wasn't supposed to be like this," Linda whispered. "I was so broken, David. When I lost Jeremy – our baby – I couldn't think straight. And when I saw you in that hospital, you looked so much like him. You had his eyes, his little fists. I thought... I thought God was giving me my baby back."

"I wasn't your baby."

"You became my baby," Robert said quietly. "Linda, what she did was wrong. I know that. But David, we loved you. We raised you. We gave you everything we had."

"Everything except the truth. Everything except my real family."

Linda stood up suddenly, desperation in her eyes. "You are our real family! David, we've been your parents for twenty-eight years. We changed your diapers, taught you to walk, helped you with homework, cheered at your graduation. Doesn't that count for something?"

David looked at these people who had shaped every day of his life, and felt his anger cracking into something more complicated. They had loved him. That part was real, even if everything else was built on lies.

"It counts," he said finally. "But it doesn't erase what you took from me. Or from them."


Two weeks later, David stood outside a modest house in Portland, holding a bouquet of flowers he wasn't sure anyone would want. Frank had arranged the meeting, but now that the moment was here, David felt like he was about to jump off a cliff.

The door opened before he could knock.

The woman in the doorway was older now, her hair gray instead of the brown in the photograph, lines around her eyes that spoke of years of worry. But she looked at him the same way she had in that picture – like he was a miracle.

"David?" she whispered.

"Patricia?"

She nodded, tears already streaming down her face. Behind her, a man appeared – Michael, older and grayer too, but unmistakably the same face from the photograph.

"Oh my god," Patricia breathed. "Oh my god, you're real. You're here."

They stood there for a moment, three strangers who were also family, unsure how to bridge thirty years of absence.

"I brought flowers," David said awkwardly, holding up the bouquet.

Patricia laughed through her tears. "You brought flowers." She looked at Michael. "He brought flowers."

And then she hugged him, and David understood for the first time in his life what it felt like to be exactly where he belonged.