I sank further into the faded upholstery of the auditorium seat, trying my best to disappear. I don’t get it. How can she just stand up there, teaching like normal, like she didn’t walk in on some of the kinkiest, most hypnotizedest sex I’d ever had? And yet, that’s exactly what Dr. Santos was doing. To all the world this was just like any other lecture on any other Tuesday morning. But to me, it was an excruciating eternity confined in a purgatory of not-knowing. She had just run off, as soon as she recognized us. I kept waiting to hear from the school’s disciplinary committee, expecting to get some email like:

Dear Ms. Annette-Marie Haskins,

It has come to our attention that you are in-fact a sexual degenerate, whose depraved conduct besmurches the sterling reputation of our institute of higher learning. As such, you have left us no choice but to expel you, post haste, and notify everyone, especially your parents, of your scandalous escapades. 

Warmest Regards,

The Disciplinary Committee

But no email came, no phone call, no text message, no campus security showing up to my door, no nothing. Honestly, the waiting was only making my anxiety worse. I absently toyed with the pendant Caleb had given me. It was still a sweet gesture, even if I didn’t much care for how he presented it. We hadn’t talked too much since the garden incident. I was still mad at him. I wanted a sweet, hypnotic role play about a princess and knight, not about a princess being enslaved by a magic pendant. Even if it was hot. So hot. Being under his control, helpless to resist. Get a hold of yourself, girl! The point was that it wasn’t what we agreed on. That was supposed to be my fantasy. Just because obeying him turned me on so much, it didn’t mean I didn’t have my own wants and needs. I’m his girlfriend, not his slave, darn it. He did want me to call him Master . . . 

“Annie, are you ok?” Olivia whispered beside me, her oversized glasses shining in the darkness of the lecture hall. “You look really pale. Have you been sleeping enough?” 

A week ago, I didn’t even know Olivia was in this class, but now she sat with me every day. After we talked about boys, she had been following me around like a baby duckling. “Yeah, I’m okay. If anything, I’ve been sleeping too much lately,” I muttered. 

“Oh, ok. Are you still down to go out tonight? If you’re not, we, like, totally don’t have to. I can for sure wait. I’ve been single this long. At this point, I could wait for . . . who knows how long.” 

“No, no it’s okay. We can still go. It’ll help me take my mind off . . .things.” 

“Oh, good,” she said, visibly relieved. 

“Annie,” Dr. Santos called from the front of the room. “Do you have some insight about Dr. Wegner’s experiment that you’d like to share? I assume you do, since you’re talking in my class.” 

She’ll call me out for that and not for having sex? Wait, maybe this is her calling me out for having sex! I blanched. “No, ma’am. I mean, no Dr. Santos, of course not. Nothing to share here,” I stammered. 

Her face remained stoic, unreadable. “I see. Well then, would you care to summarize Dr. Wegner’s experiment for us?”

“Oh yes, let me see . . .” Shoot. I had been totally spacing out. “Actually, I’m not sure I understood it. Could you tell me again?” I could hear stupid snickers from stupid Melissa and her stupid friends. 

Where did they get off? Melissa looked so above it all, sitting in the back row with her lackeys. She never seemed nervous or self conscious. She just sat there with her flawless skin and her perfect figure, surrounded by friends. Why did things come so easily to people like her and Caitlyn, while I had to always work to put myself out there?

Uh-oh, Dr. Santos was smiling, that couldn’t be good. “I’ll do you one better. Since you clearly weren’t paying attention, you’ll be the perfect, unbiased subject to help me with a demonstration. Please join me down here.”

Subject!? Demonstration? Why did she say ‘subject’? Like a hypnosis subject? Was she about to hypnotize me in front of the whole class? She was a psychology professor, so maybe she knew how to do that. I wanted to say ‘no thank you,’ but knew I couldn’t. “Yes, of course,” I said as I quietly got up and started marching towards my certain doom. 

I plodded slowly down the stairs and towards the front of the dark lecture hall, terrible fantasies flooding my mind with every step. Maybe she would hypnotize me and make me cluck like a chicken, like in those videos I saw. Or maybe she’d make me go all stiff, and suspend me between two chairs. I was honestly so nervous, she could probably do that one without hypnosis. Or maybe she’d make me strip naked and tell the whole class what a dirty hypno-slut I was. Eak! Where did that thought come from? And why was it making me so hot?

Just then, I passed Caleb’s row. I hadn’t felt like sitting with him today, but still he shot me a warm, encouraging glance. Even in the dark, I could feel the gentle kindness of his eyes, and my anxiety started to recede. That was right, only someone you trusted could hypnotize you, and I certainly didn’t trust Dr. Santos right now. Only Caleb could hypnotize me. Maybe I was a dirty hypno-slut, but only for him, only when I wanted to be, dammit. I walked the rest of the way with my head a little higher. 

Dr. Santos pulled out a chair and gestured for me to take a seat, which I did. Then she reached behind the lectern, extracted a bell, like from a hotel desk and handed it to me. “Annie, do you know what this is for?” 

I stared down at my distorted reflection in the shiny metal. Was she going to tie it to some hypnotic trigger? Maybe she was going to make me strip every time I heard it ring, helplessly peeling back every layer of modesty and showing everyone just what a slut I’d become.

“Annie?”

Or maybe she would use it to make me into a poseable mannequin and make me strike a different pose every time it rings. 

“Annie?”

Or maybe she’d make me feel a pinch on my ass every time I heard the sound. 

A snapping pair of fingers broke my thought spiral. “Annie, pay attention.” 

“Oh, sorry,” I mumbled, eliciting another round of snickers from the audience of students. I felt like a withering flower under so many eyes. “I don’t know what the bell is for.” 

She pushed a button on the clicker in her hand, advancing the slide. A massive image of a polar bear filled the projector screen above our heads. “Does this make it clear?” 

I looked from the bear and back to my professor, then repeated the cycle again. I mean, it looked cute, but that was about it. “No?” I finally said in a quizzical squeak. More snickers. Great. 

“You really weren’t paying attention were you?” She said with a subtle shake of her head. “I’ll give you and the rest of the class a refresher. Dostoevsky once said, ‘Try to pose for yourself this task: not to think of a polar bear, and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute.’ This concept eventually led to what is today called Ironic Process Theory. In short, the more you try not to think about something, the more you end up thinking about it.”

“Ok. I’m still confused about the bell.” Snicker, Snicker. I hated my classmates. I knew for a fact half of them weren’t paying attention either. 

“I was getting to that. Since some members of our class seem to be putting Ironic Process Theory into practice by not thinking about coursework, I figured a small demonstration was in order. We’re going to recreate Daniel Wegner’s experiment, where he proved this phenomenon. It’s simple, all you have to do is speak your mind, stream of consciousness for five minutes. Try not to think about the white bear, and every time you do, ring the bell. Sound simple enough?”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.” 

“So you’re not gonna . . .” hypnotize me? I just barely managed to stop myself from saying. I could have sworn I felt a tinge of disappointment at that realization. 

“No, I’m not,” she said, quietly enough for just me to hear. Although I had a feeling we weren’t talking about hypnosis anymore, or we kind of were. She was saying she wouldn’t tell anyone about the weekend. I couldn’t believe it. All I had to do was ramble on for five minutes and not think about some bear? I could do that in my sleep.  

“Got it!” Dr. Santos started a timer on her smart watch. 

“Boy, five minutes doesn’t sound like long, until you have to talk the whole time,” I said jovially, getting some warmer laughs from the crowd this time. “Of course it can still go by fast when,” you’re hypnotized, and time loses all meaning, and you just kind of float on your boyfriend’s soothing voice. I bit my tongue in time to not say that, but I saw Dr. Santos’s cold eyes looking down at me, so I gave the bell a DING, eliciting more laughter. “Oops, thought about the bear,” I lied. 

Ok, so don’t think of a polar bear and don’t think about hypnosis. Maybe this would be harder than I thought. I cleared my throat. “As I was saying, time can be a funny thing. Sometimes it feels like class can go on forever, and other times you blink and . . .” wake up wondering what kinky ideas your boyfriend planted in your head. DING. “There’s that bear again.” DING. That time I actually thought of the bear. “How much time has passed?” 

“Ninety seconds.” 

“Gosh, that little?” You can do this, Annie. Just don’t think about the bear and don’t think about hypnosis. “You wouldn’t believe how hard it is not to think about something.” Like how nice it feels to obey Caleb, DING. “Once the idea is in your head, it just keeps coming up.” Just like a stubborn post-hypnotic suggestion that seems so innocent, but has you tearing his clothes off. DING. “Like that animal,” shoot actually thought of the bear again. DING. “Is just lurking in the back of your mind.” Always hungry, needy, waiting to be called on. DING. “You never know when it’ll come out.” and make you so hot and bothered and DING. “Sometimes it feels like it has a mind of its own,” A mind that’s under his control, powerless to resist, eager, obedient. DING.

“Alright, I think that’s enough. You’ve already set the record for most dings in any section of my class,” Dr. Santos said, placing a hand on my shoulder. More laughter. Kill me. 

“That was five minutes?” 

“It was substantially less, but I think I’ve made my point. Take your seat and try to pay more attention.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I mumbled. 

She leaned down to whisper in my ear. “You’re a very bright girl, Annie. Don’t let yourself get distracted.”

I had a feeling she wasn’t talking about polar bears anymore. For a second, I felt so embarrassed, I thought I wouldn’t be able to stand up, but I managed to ease one wobbly leg under me, and then the other. Even on the way back to my seat, I could feel the eyes of my classmates watching me, criticizing me, judging me. In that moment I longed for the release of a trance, just to block them out. 

The rest of the class passed in a blur, a blur that I paid careful attention to and took notes on, lest I be cold called again. Caleb and I found each other in the hallway after class. As soon as I stepped into the hall, Caleb pulled me into a big hug. Then he brought me aside into a secluded nook to talk. 

“Oh my God, Annie, I’m so sorry you had to do that.”

“Thanks,” I mumbled into his shoulder. “It wasn’t fun.”

“I saw her whispering to you. Was that about this weekend?”

“Yes, well, I mean, no, not technically, but I think yes.”

“I’m not following.”

That’s because you command and I follow. Shut up! Ding. Why is that voice in my head so insatiable? “She didn’t say anything exactly, but I got the feeling. She wasn’t going to tell anybody, but she saw“

“How can you be sure?”

“I’m not sure, but it’s just a feeling.”

Caleb paused, chewing his lip in thought. “OK, Annie. If you think so, I trust you.”

Reflexively, I opened my mouth to say that I trusted him too, but the words stuck in my throat. Instead, what came out was “About this weekend, I think we should talk about it.”

“It's OK, Annie. You don’t have to say anything. I'm really sorry. I pushed you way too far. If I hadn’t pushed for us to have sex in such a public place, none of this would have happened.”

“That’s not why I’m upset,” I said 

“So you are upset.” His eyes fell to the floor.

That look tore my heart out. I almost lost the resolve to finish what I was going to say, but I felt like I had come too far to stop now. “I mean, I asked to meet in the gardens, I knew there’d be a risk, that part thrilled me to be honest. Getting caught was as much my fault as yours. I'm upset because you changed the scenario I asked for. What we ended up doing was hot, don’t get me wrong, but it wasn’t what I wanted.”

“Oh.”

“I wanted a sweet story about a princess running away with a knight. I’m not opposed to you putting a magic spell on me.” Making me helpless to resist you, making me yours. Ding. Stop thinking about the polar bear, Annie! “But I’d rather do that another time. I just wanted it to be kind of sweet and innocent this time.”

“I see,” he said without looking up. “I guess, for me, it’s really the feeling of control that gets me into it, and I wasn’t sure there’d be enough of that in the original version. I just wanted it to be something I could get into too, so I tried to change it as little as I could.”

“You know, I would’ve changed it for you if you just asked. I’m sure we could’ve figured something out.”

“I thought you were alright with it, since you seem to accept the suggestions.”

I fingered the necklace as I thought. “Maybe the suggestions worked because they still appealed to me on some level. I was kind of waking up even before Dr. Santos, but I like the feeling of your control, so I kept slipping in and out. Is that a thing?”

Some signs of life return to his eyes. “That could totally be a thing! I haven’t thought of it that way, but it would make sense. And, you’re really getting a very good understanding of hypnosis.”

Just that faint bit of praise sent a tingle across my skin, but I had to stay focused. “Thanks, Caleb. But I think I may be getting too into hypnosis. I’ve been thinking about it so much lately. When Dr. Santos said she needed a subject, I was sure she was gonna hypnotize me and make me embarrass myself in front of the class. Even worse, the idea kind of turned me on!”

“Shit, that kind of turns me on too,” he muttered under his breath.

“Caleb!”

“Sorry, it was just a hot image.”

“That’s exactly my point. I think we should slow down, maybe try not to do any hypnosis stuff for, like, a couple weeks, just so I can get my head screwed on straight again, and we don’t get thrown out of school for doing it in the middle of class.”

He flashed a look like I had just drowned his puppy in front of him, but then managed to restore a mask of composure. “If that’s what you want…”

“Don’t get me wrong,” I said, setting a hand on his arm. “I love it when you hypnotize me. I’m kind of obsessed with it, actually. I just think it would be good to take a tiny break. Can you do that for me?” Seeing the sadness in his eyes sent a bolt of ice through my chest. Maybe he was going to say no. Maybe he only liked me when I was hypnotized. After all, that version of me was so much more confident, and sexier, and . . . 

“Of course, Annie. I won’t hypnotize you again until you ask me to,” he said, doing his best to muster a smile.

He was in pain. It was clear to see, but he was still trying, and that did uncoil some of the knot in my stomach. Still I had questions. I didn’t understand why I was SO into hypnosis now, or exactly how everything worked. I didn’t know if either of us could make it a couple weeks without it, least of all me. But Caleb agreed to try for me, and that made me happy. I wrapped my arms around him. “Thank you for understanding.”

“Of course, anything for you.”

****

The air outside of The Big Chug smelled like self-respect and stale beer. The self-respect came from me. Maybe it was silly to be proud of swearing off hypnosis for a couple weeks. After all, I didn’t even know about it a month ago. But still, I felt proud at having expressed my feelings, and glad that Caleb listened to me.

The stale beer, on the other hand, came from the other patrons. I had heard about The Big Chug, but never frequented the establishment myself. Rows of picnic tables filled the courtyard in front of the old house, and a winding metal staircase led up to the main bar on the second floor. The place earned its moniker from its signature, enormous beer cups. Even I had heard about them, and the famous hook-up culture. Funny how giving everyone oversized drinks led to more impulsive decisions. If we were going to find a guy for Olivia anywhere, this was probably the best shot.

I had worn my outfit from my second date with Caleb, the one with the cute tank top and the jean skirt. Maybe I would need to get more going out clothes if this became a regular thing. Still, I felt a nervous rumbling in the back of my mind. I had never done anything like this before. What if I messed it up or did something stupid? Then it hit me, I had one friend who I could ask about picking up guys. It may have been midnight her time, but if I knew Caitlyn, she would be awake. I took out my phone and fired a text off into space. 

Annie: you up?

Sure enough, the three dots bubbled up from the base of my screen almost immediately.

Caitlyn: Hey girl whassup?

Annie: Wanna catch up? I’ve got something I was hoping to ask you.

Caitlyn: yeh, one sec. Let me get outside.

A few moments later, my phone chimed, displaying a simple letter “C” for Caitlyn, the way I’d saved her in my contacts. I popped a wireless earbud in and slid to answer.

“¿Que Pasa?” Caitlyn said, voice carrying over a faintly thrumming beat.

“Are you at a bar right now?” I asked.

“No way. I’m at The Wet Deck. It’s a rooftop club. If you get here before 2 AM they waive the cover.”

I grimaced at just the thought of being out until 2 AM. “Well, hey as long as you’re having fun.”

“What about you, Chica? You’ve got some background noise yourself there.”

“Oh, well, I actually am at a bar, The Big Chug, in fact.”

“You're at a bar? You’re at the Big Chug? Who are you and what have you done with my friend?”

“Very funny,” I said with a roll of my eyes. “It’s not that unbelievable that I would go out without you.”

“Look, whoever you are, just send a list of your demands to the W hotel in Barcelona. I want my Annie home safe.”

“I’ll have you know I’m here to play wing woman, thank you very much. Not that I’ve exactly done that before,” I added quietly.

“Annie, that’s really great,” Caitlyn said, faux concern vanishing from her voice. “I’m really proud of you putting yourself out there more.” 

I fidgeted with a loose strand of my hair, all the praise making me uncomfortable. I had to change the topic. “I was actually hoping to get some advice. I don’t know much about picking up guys at bars or getting picked up by guys at bars or however it’s supposed to go. I want to do a good job for Olivia.”

“Ah, so you’ve come to me, the wise sage of drunken mistakes,” she said, with a slight slur to her voice.

“Sounds like you might be drunk right now.”

“Of course I am!” she yelled, making my shoulders flinch. “How else can I hone my art, but through diligent training and constant practice. In fact, I can see a mistake named Fernando that I may want to make later.”

“So the advice?”

“Oh, right, right,” she sputtered. “Honestly, it’s super easy. You basically just have to exist. So be sure she exists. Oh, and be breathing, remember to keep her breathing.”

“I don’t know,“ I said sheepishly. “It may not be that easy for Olivia. She’s maybe done this kind of stuff even less than I have.”

“I see, sounds like a tough one. In that case, she may have to break out the big guns; trying at all,” she said with a dramatic flair. 

Maybe this was a mistake. I loved Caitlyn, but sometimes she would forget that these things don’t come so easily to all of us.“But how, Caitlyn? How should she try?”

She sucked in a deep breath and then launched into a dissertation. “The first thing you want to do is stay at the bar. You want to make it as easy as possible for a stranger to nonchalantly walk up to you like he hasn’t been staring at you across the room all night.” The sound of clinking ice came over the line as she paused for a sip. “When a guy shows up, you want to act like he’s the most interesting thing in the world. All his jokes are funny, even if they’re not, in fact, especially if they’re not. That’s if you’re into him, of course. Otherwise tell him to get lost.”

“Right…” I said shakily. 

“And you want to keep your body language open and approachable. Make sure she doesn’t do that thing you do when you’re nervous, where you get all scrunched up and small.”

“Hey!” I didn’t do that, did I?

“Oh, this one goes without saying, but more skin equals more attention.”

“So she should giggle like a vapid bimbo and flash her boobs at everyone?”

“Yep, that should pretty much do the trick,” she said, totally missing my sarcasm. “Oh, and this is the most important thing of all,” she said, pausing for what I assumed was dramatic effect.

After a bit, I finally asked, “Which is?”

“Sorry, Fernando walked by again. Have fun! She shouldn’t feel like she has to go home with anyone. If she does find someone she likes then great, but if not, there’s always next time. Just remember to have a good time.”

“Thanks, Caitlyn. That last one’s actually pretty good advice.”

“It’s all good advice! Besides, I’m surprised you even need my help. Can’t you just hypnotize all the boys at the bar?” she teased.

“It doesn’t work like that,” I said as a familiar heat built in my stomach. At least I was pretty sure it didn’t.

“But it does work. It’s, like, a real thing?”

“Oh, it’s very real.” That heat started delving deeper, just like how I went deep for Caleb. God, it felt so good. I wished I could call and have him drop me right there. Ding, a phantom bell sounded in my head as I realized I’d been day dreaming about hypnosis again. 

“Annie, hola. ¿Estás despierta?”

“Yeah, yeah, sorry. I was just . . . um . . . daydreaming.”

“Wow you’ve got it bad,” she said with a chuckle.

“Am I that obvious?”

“Yeah, girl. I just mentioned hypnosis and you got all spacey.”

I started nervously playing with the ends of my hair again. “I can’t help it. I’ve just never felt so calm, and peaceful and wet.” I clapped my hands over my mouth. That last one was supposed to stay in a thought bubble.  

“Wow, he really did a number on you. Maybe he hypnotized you to love being hypnotized,” she said, laughing like it was a joke. 

It didn’t feel like a joke to me. 

That possibility had never occurred to me. Surely, Caleb wouldn’t do that, couldn’t do that. You couldn’t hypnotize someone to do something they didn’t want, so that should have been impossible. Right? Right? Unless he could hypnotize me to want to be hypnotized, so that he could hypnotize me to want to be hypnotized! If he could do that, he could make me do anything. And why was that thought turning me on so much? Maybe this weekend was supposed to be the culmination of his master plan where he finally turned me into his mindless slave. 

“Annie ¡Despierta, ya!”

“Sorry, sorry, sorry. You just got me worried with that.” 

I felt like I could hear her eyes narrowing. “He hasn’t tried to take advantage of you with all this hypno-mumbo-jumbo has he?” 

“No, no, of course not. I mean I honestly don’t really remember. Everything is kind of a blur while I’m under.” It just felt so nice to turn my brain off and let his words wash over me and Ding. It was happening again. 

“Well if you ever so much as suspect that he messed with you, you come to me and I’ll get his ass. I’ll be back on campus soon for graduation, so I’ll be able to clock him in person if I have to.” 

“Thanks, but that won’t be necessary. He would never put something in my head that I didn’t want there,” I said, trying my best to mask my mounting anxiety. “Wait, graduation?” That was right, the year was almost over, and Caleb and I hadn’t talked about what would come next for us at all. Well obviously he’ll just brainwash you to be his devoted slave and follow him around, my nagging doubts suggested. Would that even be so bad? My raging libido shot back. I tried my best to silence those voices, but I could still hear them chirping in the dark corners of my mind. 

“Yeah it’s crazy to think it’s almost over, which reminds me I should be making the most of the time I’ve still got here. If you don’t need me for anything else, I think I’ll see where my tall, dark, mistake has gotten off to.” 

I swallowed hard, trying to choke down my doubts. “Yeah you have fun. I’m gonna do the same.”

“You know I will. Good luck getting your new friend laid.” 

Then the line went dead, leaving me alone with my thoughts. I looked down at the necklace Caleb gave me. He wouldn’t do that to me, would he? Then I remembered when he tried to make me call him Master. Slowly, I slid the necklace off and slipped it into my pocket, just for a bit. 

***

After a brief eternity of doom spiraling, I went inside and found Olivia. She had picked out a nice, private booth in the corner, which she hopped up from as I approached. “Oh, my gosh, Annie, thanks for coming out,” she said as she hugged me. “Are you ok, you still look pale.” 

“Oh, yeah. I’m great.” The man I love is just slowly brainwashing me into being his sex toy, and I’m so fucked up that I’m really enjoying it. “Just great. But how are you?” 

“Nervous, good, but nervous,” she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Olivia had dressed in a long, loosely fitting black skirt, and a puffy burgundy blouse. Her trademark bracelets still hung from her wrists, jangling lightly as she moved. The clothes fit so loosely that they almost seemed to swallow her up, despite her generous pear shaped figure. 

“Great, well I’m going to get a drink. I think I could use one after the day I’ve had.” Maybe that would finally silence the endless debate raging across the stage of my thoughts. Being hypnotized would make it stop. That’s just what Caleb wants you to think.  

“Good idea. I’ll hold the table,”

Oh right, bar. “Actually, why don’t you come with me? We’ll be able to get a better look at the options from over there.” Olivia seemed hesitant, but agreed to abandon the safety of her outpost. 

I sidled up to the bar like a road-weary cowboy in a tank top. “I’ll take something strong.” 

The bartender gave me a quick once over and then nodded, grabbing one of the infamous Big Chug cups and filling it with liquid amber. I could barely wrap my hand around the oversized piece of plastic. I realized I’d have to drink some of it down, just to walk without spilling. I carefully tilted the cup to my lips, lifting it delicately with both hands. I recognized the awful, bitter taste the moment it touched my tongue. 

IPA 

Gross. I managed not to cough as the earthy taste assaulted me. I swallowed it down and stared suspiciously at the drink. If Caleb was really brainwashing me, he would have made me like this stuff. I took another tentative sip. Nope, still terrible. I couldn’t help but smile. Maybe I’d been worried for nothing. Or maybe that’s what he wants you to think. I mentally told my anxiety to shove it, and took another drink. Already a faint buzzing had started in my head, making the voices a little harder to hear. Maybe tonight would be a good night after all.