"Excuse me," Sarah snapped, long hours of frustration adding a sharpness to her voice that she didn't fully intend but wasn't exactly shy about embracing either, "but could you take your stinky feet off the goddamn table and stick them back in your shoes? Some of us are trying to study here." She didn't even look over at whoever it was that apparently decided to ignore the unspoken 'one person to a table' rule three days before finals; she just glared down at her notes and hoped they'd take the hint and go the hell away.

They didn't. "Oh come on, what did I just say?" Sarah wailed, but the tail end of the sentence dried up in her throat as she looked up and saw one of the janitors staring back at her with a hangdog expression on his haggard, exhausted face. She could immediately tell he'd been on his feet for hours already, probably since before Sarah even got to campus, and this might very well have been his first chance to rest all day. And here she was being a petulant, entitled shit about her personal space.

"I--I'm sorry, forget I said anything," she stammered, talking with her hands as she waved off her earlier statements in a sudden burst of guilt and anxiety. "You, I, they're fine, honestly, they don't even really smell that bad, I was just--sorry, it's been a long day, um... Carlos." She felt even worse about having to look at the Latino man's name tag to identify him--Sarah had been going to school here for almost nine months, she'd seen him practically every day mopping floors or carrying trash or cleaning toilets and even exchanged a bit of banter with him most mornings about the voluminous textbooks she carried everywhere, and she'd never even thought to ask him his name. Her mom would be so disappointed in her.

Her mom.... Sarah stared fiercely back down at her notes, determined to force at least enough knowledge into her brain to squeak by with a passing grade. Freshman year might have been a disaster for her, but she was hoping to prevent it from at least becoming an unsalvageable one. Meg Starkey always told her daughter that women could do whatever they put their minds to, and Sarah didn't want to prove her mother wrong by losing her hard-won scholarship after only two semesters.

She almost lost her shit again when Carlos began to talk to her, but reminded herself that it wasn't his fault she was forced to cram for all her exams at the last minute. "It's no problem, really, miss," he said, smoothly and fluently despite his thick Honduran accent. "I've seen this time of year before, I know the students are all a bit on edge. Too many late nights and too much coffee." He smiled at her, the laugh lines at the corners of his eyes wrinkling in a way that made Sarah suddenly wish she'd known her father. He wasn't even all that old, she realized, maybe only thirty-six or thirty-seven. Just weathered by hard manual labor, a look she saw every time her mother came home from work at the end of a long day.

But Sarah had too much work in front of her to spend any time on social bonding. She just muttered, "For sure," and took a great big gulp from the thermos she brought down from her dorm room before getting back to poring over her notes. Meg Starkey wasn't about to let her daughter buy Starbucks when she could brew her own for a tenth the cost.

But once the flavor of the coffee had dissipated, Sarah was once again left with the odor of Carlos's feet in her nostrils. She wasn't just trying to protect his feelings when she said they didn't really smell that bad--once she got used to it, it was really just sweat mixed with a clinging aroma of shoe leather, the kind of thing you'd find on anyone who'd been wearing steel-toed boots for a full day while doing manual labor. It was hella strong, though, enough to make Sarah's head swim and her eyes water, and it definitely distracted her from her studies. She kept glancing over at his socks, noticing the hole just behind the big toe where his bare brown sole was exposed, thinking back to her days of patching up holes just like it in her mom's socks so they could go a few months more before buying a new pair.

The impromptu urge to offer to mend the hole bubbled up in Sarah's brain, but she was already feeling flustered and stressed out and overtired and so what came out was just a blurted, "Can you take off your socks for me?" Thankfully, although Carlos did raise an eyebrow at the bizarre request, it was with a twinkle in his eye and a smile on his face and he immediately obliged her. Sarah was greeted with a wafting scent of sweat and leather as the movement released even more of his aroma from the cotton that had absorbed so much of it over the course of the day.

Once he'd fulfilled her request, Carlos sat back in his chair, even giving his toes a little wiggle to help the air conditioning get in between them. "You seem a little more on edge than most," he said, once again seemingly unaware of how badly he was distracting her at such a crucial academic juncture. "Having trouble with your studies? Don't be ashamed, it happens to a lot of young girls during their first year. They're so eager to prove how smart and tough they are that they bite off more than they can chew, wind up drowning in work and going under. It can be very stressful."

Sarah bit back a harsh rejoinder and a desperate sob at the same time, her throat closing up as she tried to find a response that didn't involve dumping her entire life story onto a perfect stranger. "I, um, I'm taking a lot of classes, yes. I want to major in Gender Studies, there's a... a lot of coursework." Just thinking about it made Sarah feel dizzy and overwhelmed... or maybe that was the lack of sleep hitting her. Or maybe it was just the heady scent of Carlos's bare feet making her feel like she was about to slump sideways on the couch in a dead faint.

The older man let out a snort of laughter. "Well, there's your problem!" he said, the laugh lines once again creasing on his face. "I keep saying to you, girl, Gender Studies isn't going to get you anywhere. You need something more practical. I got a BA in Chicano-Latino Studies at UC Irvine, and what did it get me? A mop and a bucket, that's what. You need someone older and wiser to guide you through all this, sweetie." Sarah bristled at that--it was the same condescension she got from her mother every time they talked on the phone, layered with an extra dose of male chauvinism, and if there was one thing she hated it was being talked down to. But the anger burned out before she could so much as say a word, leaving her more exhausted than ever.

"Say, are you doing okay?" Carlos asked, as Sarah's eyes rolled back in her head for a moment in an effort to keep from closing entirely. "You look kind of sleepy. Maybe you should just take a little catnap, get your head back in the game before you do any more studying. I'll be here for a while, I can keep an eye on your stuff." Sarah opened her mouth to answer, but another wave of exhaustion slammed into her and she found herself staring vacantly at Carlos's wiggling toes. Perhaps she was feeling sleepy. Perhaps she did need to... to....

"Lie down and sleep, pretty girl," Carlos murmured, his tones warm and gentle and infinitely comforting. "I'll take care of you." That sounded so inexpressibly lovely that Sarah found her body sagging over sideways almost before she knew it, flopping out onto the couch in boneless lethargy and letting her eyelids flutter shut. The last thing she thought she saw, right before sleep took her, was Carlos moving his feet so they were right under her nose... but that was too absurd to be anything but the beginnings of a dream.

*    *    *    *    *

Sarah thought she'd picked a more secluded spot for her next all-day cram session, but it felt like she'd only just gotten started when Carlos came up and took the seat across from her. "Morning little sweetheart!" he exclaimed cheerfully, settling back as though he had all the time in the world to chit-chat with some blushing young freshman about her day. "You look like you got a little more sleep last night--did you take my advice and actually go to bed on time, instead of trying to cram a bunch of nonsense into your drowsy brain?"

Sarah's blush intensified, and she stared furiously down at her notes as she mumbled, "Um, uh, yeah, something like that." She'd actually had some very vivid and disturbing dreams the night before, tangled dreams about Carlos and his feet that she only remembered fleeting images and deeply inappropriate emotions from, and she was still trying to sort out exactly what they meant. Assuming they meant anything, which they probably didn't because they were almost certainly just the kind of weird anxiety dreams you got two days before the biggest set of exams in your whole life, tests that would almost certainly decide your entire academic future and the course of your whole life and--

She looked over at the table. "You, um, you didn't put your feet up," she murmured, almost as confused by her own confusion as by Carlos's behavior. There wasn't anything that said he had to take his shoes off and cool his sweaty feet right there in front of her, and in fact he probably assumed he was being a gentleman by keeping them flat on the floor. But she was... well, obviously she didn't miss the aroma of his feet, because that would be weird, but she didn't want him thinking he couldn't relax around her just because she was a student and he was part of the staff. That wasn't how her mother raised her.

But it made it even more awkward when he fixed her with a level stare and said, "No, I haven't. Do you want me to?" Something about it made her feel a little bit small inside, like she'd accidentally challenged a teacher's authority and he was pulling rank on her to remind her who was in charge in the classroom. And just like all the times that happened at school, Sarah found herself uncomfortably eager to earn the approval of an authority figure. Especially a male authority figure. Especially an older male authority figure. Sarah knew she was the kind of young woman people on social media described as having 'daddy issues', but knowing it didn't help any when she was squirming in her seat and going beet red with embarrassment.

"Um... I mean, uhhh... you can," she muttered, gesturing to a spot on the table she was only just beginning to realize she'd left open for him. "It's fine, I... I don't mind the smell." She stared down at the bare wood, unable to meet his gaze, and something inside her melted into quiet relief when she heard the quiet sound of fabric against leather and Carlos's bare feet occupied the empty space. It relieved the social pressure to know that he felt comfortable enough to unwind and relax around her, that... that had to be it. A vivid flash of dream memory came back to Sarah, of toes tracing across her pale belly down to the delta between her thighs, but she dismissed it with a shake of the head.

"A lot of women don't," Carlos said conversationally, and it took Sarah a moment to realize he was making a reference to her off-hand comment from a moment ago. "Some of them even like it, in fact. I remember reading an article about it, how they think sweat contains pheromones that are attractive to women at certain times in their hormonal cycle. When they're receptive to sex, that kind of thing." Sarah's blush deepened until her face practically burned with it, and she fixed her gaze ever more intently on Carlos's feet to avoid looking at his eyes. The dream came back to her again, and this time she let herself remember the way his big toe slid down into the cleft between her labia and pushed.

"I, um, I... I use one of those period trackers," she murmured loosely, aware that she was oversharing but not quite able to stop the words from tumbling past her slack and nerveless lips. "It, uh, it says I started ovulating, um... two days ago, I think? Maybe it's, um, maybe it makes the smell a little... easier to handle." Sarah realized she was leaning in a little closer, staring unblinkingly at the wiggling toes as she took deep, steady breaths of his scent. It felt almost like vertigo, like she was standing on the lip of a steep slope and perspective kept telling her she was about to fall all the way down to the very bottom. She shook her head again to clear it, but that only made her even dizzier.

"I'm sure it does, sweetie," Carlos murmured, stretching his legs to put his toes even closer to her face. "I'm sure it's very easy on you right now, isn't it, baby girl?" Something about his tone felt familiar to Sarah, like she'd heard him talking in that exact same calm, soothing voice, but... but no. That was just a dream. That was the dream she had during her catnap in the student lounge yesterday, the one before last night's much more intense and sexual dream, and neither one of them were real and neither one of them meant anything. Sarah was at school to focus on her studies, not to get horny for sweaty older men. She couldn't--she didn't--

"Umhmmm," she mumbled, letting her head droop forward to fit Carlos's big toe in her open mouth. She felt a surge of arousal, coupled with an equally powerful surge of embarrassment, but both seemed to be entirely outside of her conscious control; it was as if she was awake and asleep at the same time, dreaming about the things she was actually doing, and she was only lucky she'd found this cozy little out-of-the-way spot to do her studying or otherwise everyone would have seen her sucking on the janitor's feet like this. She was so glad she learned about this alcove. Probably most of the students didn't even know it existed.

Sarah felt like there was further to follow that train of thought, but just then the toe in her mouth wiggled and Sarah found herself bobbing up and down on it like a porn star sucking a big hard cock, slurping and drooling and occasionally popping her lips up and off to clean up the mess with her tongue. The whole time she breathed through her nostrils, taking in that heady aroma that made her head swim harder and harder with every heaving gasp, and when Carlos said to her, "There's a good girl," Sarah felt a pounding throb of arousal down in her clit that made her whimper with its intensity.

"I think you want to sleep now," Carlos murmured to her, and Sarah felt her eyelids drooping down in a wave of pleasant exhaustion that went from the crown of her head all the way down to the tips of her toes. "I think you want to relax and listen to some advice from someone older and wiser, and maybe when you wake up you'll find that it's a little bit easier to focus on what you need to do. And what you want to do. Doesn't that sound so nice, pretty girl?"

Sarah nodded, her wavy blonde hair falling forward into her face as she let the motion carry her into more and more frantic sucking on the older man's toes. She couldn't help feeling a sense of primal contentment at having her mouth filled like this, some near-memory from before she even developed the words to describe her emotions bubbling up to the surface and making her so happy to drift away into muzzy bliss while she satisfied her oral fixation. She heard herself grunt in mindless agreement, but it felt like it came from a long way away and before she knew it, she wasn't really thinking at all anymore.

*    *    *    *    *

Sarah overslept the next day, caught in recurring dreams of licking and sucking Carlos's feet in the middle of the student lounge with everybody watching, and when she finally staggered out of her room looking for a place to sit she couldn't find one at all. She was just beginning to get frantic when Carlos noticed her and came over, polite and friendly and almost ostentatiously professional as he said, "Need somewhere to study, miss? I think I can help you out if you'll just follow me."

Sarah couldn't imagine refusing him any more than she could imagine simply levitating the other students out of the way and taking their seat, and so she walked obediently behind him with her gaze on his shoes and her mind on the bare feet inside them until they reached a small room with a sign on the door that read, 'EMPLOYEES ONLY'. They went inside, and the moment they were alone together in the small employee lounge Sarah felt a rush of pleasant lethargy flowing through her like she'd just been shot with a tranquilizer dart. Her eyelids drooped, her stare went glassy and unfocused, and her hands began to move automatically to strip out of her uncomfortably tight and restrictive clothing.

"That's my good girl," Carlos purred, slipping off his shoes and socks and settling down onto a chair. "Now, I think it's time we got a few things straight, don't you, little missy?" He wiggled his toes, and Sarah's eyes settled onto the motion with a thousand-yard stare that immediately silenced any tiny voice of defiance she might have had and left her drooling with anticipation as she sank into the seat opposite him and sighed with blank, obedient bliss.

"First," Carlos intoned, pushing his foot up to Sarah's face and letting a tiny grin curl one corner of his lips as he watched her obediently begin to suck on as much of it as she could fit into her mouth. "I think you've been a very silly little girl, letting yourself get overwhelmed and distracted like this. You need a big smart man to help keep you focused, Sarah, don't you? To help you stay on track and do what needs to be done." Sarah grunted mindlessly in agreement, her conscious mind now completely consumed with the taste and scent of Carlos's feet. Everything else slipped into the back of her head, uncritically accepted by her deep self.

"Second, I don't think we need any more of this Gender Studies nonsense," Carlos continued, resting his other foot against Sarah's pussy with his big toe pressing lightly between her slick labia. "If you want to succeed in this world, you need something practical, and besides... we both know what gender roles you're interested in, aren't we, baby doll?" Sarah's affirmative grunt became a whimpering yelp of ecstasy as Carlos slid his toe into her cunt and found her swollen, throbbing clit. "That's right, babe. You just want to be a good little girl for a big strong man."

Sarah felt herself clench around him at that, an embarrassing admission from her body just how much she enjoyed the submissive role but one she couldn't deny. She began to grind against his big toe, sucking even harder as her mind slipped deeper into thoughtless trance to avoid having to confront the revelations she was discovering about herself. It made it easier if she decided she didn't have a choice anymore. She felt better knowing she was a helpless, hypnotized slut controlled by her Master's feet.

"And third... I think we need to make sure you keep that scholarship. For your mom's sake, if nothing else." Sarah didn't remember telling him about her mom, but she was beginning to learn that it was very easy to forget things when Carlos wanted her to. "So I'm going to read to you for a while, from...." He fumbled for her backpack, dragging it over by the straps, and brought out a textbook. "From 'Key Concepts in Gender Studies'. And you're going to soak up every word with that deep and drowsy brain of yours until it's all memorized and you can pass that course. And after tomorrow you can forget it all again and just remember how nice it is to be a horny little slut for me, right? Right. Now. Let's begin."

Sarah slipped deeper after that, her focus tightening until only the toe in her mouth and the relentless pleasure mattered. She vaguely noticed herself kicking off her sneakers and putting her own feet up into Carlos's lap so he could take off her socks and massage the soles of her feet, but even that felt like a waking dream that soon melted into a ticklish sensation intermingling with the warm, wet throb of ecstasy between her thighs. By the time he began kissing them, Sarah didn't even recall hearing Carlos's voice anymore. But she knew she was absorbing everything he said to her.

*    *    *    *    *

Sarah aced her finals the next day, scraping by with an overall grade in the course that just barely allowed her to maintain her scholarship. She called her mother that evening, letting her know she'd gotten a summer job opportunity that would give her some spending cash and make the next fall a little bit easier on both of them but it would keep her away for a while. And when classes let out and the dorms emptied for the summer, she went back with Carlos to his little apartment and sucked her mind away on his toe while she blankly, obediently patched up the holes in his socks.

THE END