Author's Note: This story is a work of fiction, and as such it takes considerable liberties with how hypnosis works. In the real world, do not under any circumstances try to hypnotize someone while behind the wheel of an automobile, even if it's at a standstill.

Amanda Remington woke up at seven AM, as she had Before. That was how she thought of the years leading up to March of 2020; as Before. Before the pandemic, before the baby, and before her life had become ... whatever it was now.

Amanda trudged into the baby's room. Her legs were leaden. Every since Arielle had come along, she couldn't ever seem to find any energy. She was so worn down that she'd gotten tested for the coronavirus three times since the birth, but all had come back negative.

Stella was in the baby's room already, sitting in the rocking chair, gently swinging it forward and back. Arielle was in her arms, sound asleep.

"Wow," Amanda stage-whispered. "She slept through?"

"Not exactly," Stella said. Her voice was quiet, barely above a whisper, so as not to wake the baby. "But I was ready for her at three-thirty."

"You're so good with her," Amanda murmured. Watching Stella's face, her eyes moving forward and back, was causing her eyes to change focus in a way that--

(notice how your eyes change as you watch that hand)

--was vaguely familiar. And felt really nice.

"That's my duty," Stella said. "And do you know what your duty is?"

"My duty," Amanda echoed. The eyes moved forward and back, forward and back.

"Your duty is to take care of yourself," Stella said. "You look so tired. You need more rest."

"Rest," Amanda said. But then she blinked, her eyes somewhat less glassy when they re-opened. "No, wait, I have to work today."

"Work?" Stella's voice kept that sing-song, lullaby tone.

"There's a shoot," Amanda said. "Our first one in New York since Before."

"The shoot has a director." Stella's eyes never stopped rocking. "You can blow it off and get more rest."

Amanda felt a reflexive urge to repeat the word rest, but then she blinked her eyes again. "No, it's a leadership thing. People need to know someone is in charge. I have to be there, be the captain of the ship ... or whatever." She sighed; that felt like the longest sentence she had spoken in years.

"Debra is a terrific leader," Stella's voice lulled and lulled and lulled. "Debra can be there."

Amanda felt the words in her head, like a bungee cord pulling her back toward her bed. But bungee cords have a lot of give. "No, Debra can't make it," she managed to say. "She called me yesterday."

"The vaccine isn't available to you yet," Stella cooed. "The train is too dangerous."

"Yeah," Amanda said with a smile. Agreeing with Stella felt so nice. "That's why Debra sent me a driver."

"All right," Stella said. "You should get ready for your drive. Everything is fine."

"Fine," Amanda echoed. She turned and left the room. She did not notice the other woman's mouth, how the lips pursed together until they formed a line.

When the first blast of hot water hit her face in the shower, the thought occurred to Amanda, why didn't I pick up the baby?

But it was okay. The baby was safe with Stella. She believed that on a level much deeper than she was aware of.

---

Fully showered and dressed, looking at herself in the mirror, Amanda felt like something had changed.

She knew what it was, of course: she was wearing her business suit, instead of sweatpants or yoga pants or pajamas or maternity clothes or whatever else she had worn around the house during the last year. But it was weird, how much different the suit made her feel. It made her feel clean, healthy. It made her feel like Before. And yet she'd hated wearing the suit, Before. It felt a lot better now.

She walked into the kitchen. Stella was at the table, feeding Arielle from a bottle. Amanda walked over and tickled the baby under her chin, as she gurgled.

"Careful," Stella said gently. "She could choke."

"Well, maybe I should hold her," Amanda said.

Stella looked up. "Nice suit! I don't think I've yet seen you dressed up for business."

"Yeah, I guess we had been locked down for a while already when you started," Amanda said. "Makes me feel like new again."

"Yes, you look rested," Stella said.

"Rest," Amanda echoed. Then she cocked her head, her face clearly showing the thought she was not quite having: why did I just say that? After a couple of seconds she blinked the curiosity away.

"Uh, yeah," Amanda said, still not quite aware of the non sequitur. "I feel pretty good. Stella? The baby?"

"Oh, of course!" Stella inclined her chin toward the chair nearest her. "You sit there, I need to get up anyway."

Amanda moved to the chair as Stella began to rise. There was a moment where they were perfectly in balance, Stella halfway to her feet, Amanda half-sitting. The moment when Amanda's balance was at its least.

In that moment, Stella moved.

She lunged forward, showing more balance than would have been visually apparent, the baby still snug in the crook of one arm. With the other arm she pushed down, forcefully, on Amanda's left shoulder as she barked, "Sleep!"

At this time last year, Amanda might have found a moment to think, hey, why is she telling me to sleep? But a lot had changed between Amanda's ears since then. She dropped like a stone, arms flopping against the chair arms, chin coming to rest on her breastbone. She'd been mid-breath when it happened, and the air came out of her in a heavy sigh.

"Way down, deeper and deeper relaxed," Stella said, rocking Amanda's body gently with the hand that was still on her left shoulder. "Everything's just fine, isn't it?"

She was saying the words for Amanda's benefit, but Stella was looking at Arielle, whose big blue eyes -- her father's eyes -- googled with curiosity. She hadn't made a sound.

"Yeah," Amanda mumbled.

"That's right, resting comfortably in your suit," Stella said. "You want to talk about how the suit makes you feel, don't you?"

"Yeah," Amanda mumbled again.

Stella paused for a second; she hadn't planned this trance, and she wanted to get the suggestions right. In the brief silence of that pause, the doorbell rang.

"Someone's at the door," Amanda said drowsily. Her eyebrows twitched, but the eyelids remained closed.

Stella thought fast. "Yes, that's right," she said. "Your driver is here. As I go to meet your driver, you'll count from one to three. On three you will emerge and let go." This was a trigger phrase she had planted early on, causing Amanda to forget the particulars of the trance upon waking.

Still with Arielle in the crook of her arm, Stella rose and walked to the door. Behind her, Amanda did not count out loud: she had not needed to do that for many months.

Stella opened the door to a woman in a grey pant-suit over white T-shirt. The woman's hair was reddish-brown, shoulder length. Her eyes were a bright, piercing blue, and the lack of crow's feet suggested she was in her mid-twenties. She was wearing a black face mask with white lettering reading BUT HER EMAILS.

"Hello, I'm Katherine Alexander," the redhead said. "Call me Kat. Everyone does."

---

Kat sized up the woman in the doorway. She knew what Amanda Remington looked like, thanks to Debra, so she figured this to be the doula, Stella Halliwell.

She was a couple inches shorter than Kat, with long hair in that netherworld between brown and blonde. She was almost frighteningly slender; Kat assumed she had been a dancer or gymnast in her youth. Her age was impossible to judge from her face, but the hand which was keeping the baby balanced in the crook of her arm had seen a lot of wear and tear. Kat assumed she was in her mid-thirties.

"I'm Stella Halliwell," the woman said. She extended a hand.

Kat did not think this woman was aggressive enough to try a trance on the first meeting like this, but she was not going to risk it. "No offense intended," she said, trying to sound as deferential as she could. "But I stopped shaking hands, you know, with the virus."

"Oh, of course," Stella said.

There was a slightly awkward pause, as the two women sized each other up. Kat broke it by saying, "And this is ... Arielle?"

"Yes." Stella smiled, looking down at the baby. "I'm responsible for her day-to-day."

"I'm sure her mother really appreciates it," Kat said, saying mother in a tone of voice which was intended to gently nudge the other woman. Let's get the show on the road here.

"Yes, well, before I let you in, can I see your record of a negative test?"

Kat said, "I showed it to Debra yesterday. The test was two days ago."

"Yes, and now I'd like to see it," Stella said. "I mean, I'm sure you're negative or else I would not have the baby here. But I want to be as careful as I can. It's my house too."

Kat cocked her head just the right amount, saying is it? without actually having to speak the words. Stella met her gaze evenly, and after an internal two-count Kat took her phone out of a suit pocket and held it out, screen facing toward Stella, showing the text message from the hospital which had done her test.

"Very well," Stella said, stepping back into the house. "Come on in."

Kat entered. The house was par for the course for White Plains: nice, spacious, but unspectacular. Considering the amount that Debra was willing to pay on this job, Kat had expected more. She assumed the kid was about to be spoiled as hell.

"Here, in the kitchen," Stella called. Kat followed her voice and saw Amanda Remington in person for the first time.

Kat's first thought was, how recently did she wake up? Because while she resembled the woman from her Facebook photos, it was only just. Amanda looked dazed, out of it. Kat herself was not a morning person, and she thought that the best way to describe how she felt when her alarm went off every day would be to take a picture of Amanda at this very moment. At some point Amanda had been coloring her hair, turning it from a mousy sort of brown to a more reddish-brown, like Kat's own hair. But it seemed that the pandemic had wreaked havoc with that plan, and her hair was now a mess, partly dyed but mostly not.

"You're ..." Amanda checked her phone. Probably Debra had texted her the name. "Katherine?"

"Call me Kat. Everyone does."

"Well, you should get going," Stella said. "I've got everything under control around here."

It had occurred to Kat that, if the other woman was going to flee the house with the baby, this would be a possible time to do it. Debra was in a rental car at the mouth of the cul-de-sac a block away, to prevent such a thing from happening. But Stella did not, to anyone's knowledge, have her own car; even if she called a Uber or something, there were lots of security cameras in the neighborhood to see her leave; plus, if taking the baby and running was the plan, wouldn't she have done it by now?

Normally Kat would say something like, Yeah, let's go, but here she bit her tongue. The driver would be deferential to the client, and Stella was not the client. Kat glanced at Amanda, but the other woman did not immediately notice. Amanda gazed off towards a corner of the room; not at any other adult in the room, nor at the baby.

"Amanda?" Stella's voice was soft, lulling. Not the voice that Kat would use to get the attention of someone who was zoning out. "You should get going."

Amanda turned toward the door, looking straight through Kat as she began walking. "Get going," she murmured.

Shit, Kat thought. Waking suggestions. And she's confident enough to give them right in front of a total stranger. This might be tougher than I expected.

In the driveway, Amanda paused, cocking her head and blinking. Kat would have bet any amount of money that, half out of it as she was, Amanda was expecting her family car in the driveway instead of the Mercedes hybrid which stood there.

"Nice car," Amanda managed.

"Thanks," Kat chirped, as she went to open the passenger-side rear door. "It's essential for a good business plan, to beat out Uber and Lyft. Gotta splurge on a real nice car."

Debra had arranged for the car. Before the pandemic, the company had done a photo shoot for the Mercedes dealership down in Tribeca, and she'd called in a favor. If you get in an accident, she'd told Kat, make sure it's the other guy's fault.

"I imagine so," Amanda murmured as she got into the car.

As Kat crossed around the back of the car to the driver's seat, she checked the McDonald's app. The nearest location had no line in the drive-through lane.

Kat frowned. That would never do.

---

K&M Consulting had an account with one of the office-space-renting companies in New York City, an outfit similar to WeWork but with a business plan somewhat more responsible than "light a billion dollars on fire." Somehow they had not gone out of business during the pandemic, and for her next meeting with Debra, Marisa called them immediately.

Marisa scheduled a location in Battery Park, on the fifth floor of a non-descript office building. She had been told the building just re-opened a few weeks ago; one of the tenants upstairs was involved with the medical industry somehow, and thus filled with vaccinated essential workers who had returned to the office. The floor that Marisa was on appeared to be empty except for her.

The room was just about the size of her and Kat's bedroom, with a minimalistic IKEA desk and two chairs. Marisa pushed the desk up against the wall, and arranged the chairs more than six feet apart in the middle of the room. She drew the shade down over the spectacular view of the Hudson River; wouldn't do to have Debra distracted by the glittering office buildings of Jersey City in the distance.

Debra arrived on time at ten A.M.; Marisa had already been sitting in one of the chairs for fifteen minutes, fidgeting and telling herself that Kat would text when she had news.

They exchanged pleasantries and negative tests for the virus, as Debra sat in the other chair. Finally there was an awkward pause in the conversation, as they looked at what little of each other's faces they could see.

"Are you willing to take off the mask?" Marisa said quietly. "It's easier for both of us to do this if we can see our entire faces."

"I suppose so," Debra said. "I mean, if there was even one other person on this floor..."

"I know," Marisa said, nodding. "This is the first in-person meeting I've had since the lockdown started."

They took off their masks slowly, each watching the other as she did, a pair of Old West gunslingers disarming in order to sit down and have a beer together. When the masks were off, Marisa said only, "So."

"So," Debra said.

Marisa took a deep breath. "So I think Stella did something to interfere with your memory."

Debra said, "Interfere? She didn't just make me forget?"

"Well, forget is a tricky word," Marisa said carefully. She and Kat had had a lot of discussion about the right way to handle this conversation, and she did not want to slip up. "People don't always like to be told to forget things. And our subconscious mind never really forgets anything anyway. So she probably didn't tell you to forget; she suggested some ideas to you that would make it tougher to remember."

Debra frowned. "That sounds like the same thing."

Marisa said, "Yeah, I suppose you have to study hypnosis to really know the difference. Anyway, in order to understand what Stella wants, we need to know where you found her, which is a memory that we think she is interfering with."

"And you're going to hypnotize me to find that memory," Debra said.

"I'm going to do an exercise to get you engaged with that memory," Marisa said. "You might go into a trance, you might not. The trance might feel the same as it did with Stella, or it might not. The subconscious mind is funny that way."

"Well, okay," Debra said. "If it will help my sister and her little girl, do whatever you gotta do."

"Okay, just sit in whatever way is most comfortable for you," Marisa said. Debra pulled her legs up under herself, until she was sitting cross-legged in the office chair. The chair was not roomy enough that most human beings would be able to pull such a thing off, but Marisa assumed that Debra had needed to sit like this, in chairs like this, at many points during her modeling career.

Marisa paused for a moment, mentally reviewing what she was going to do. She'd practiced techniques like this during the pandemic many times, but those had all been with Kat; she had no idea how a stranger would respond. Debra broke the silence by saying, "What do I do with my hands?"

Marisa looked down at the other woman's lap, where she was fidgeting, folding her fingers nervously. "Nothing," Marisa said with a smile. "You don't have to do anything at all. Just let your hands be there, in whatever way feels right."

Debra breathed in, and exhaled harshly, as though violently forcing herself to relax. Marisa continued grinning. The exaggerated way that nervous people calmed themselves down was funny to her, now that she'd seen it often enough.

"Kat, my partner, says that talking to the subconscious is a team effort," Marisa said, as she looked directly into Debra's eyes. "I don't do this alone, and you don't do this alone. We're just going together, to explore that part of your mind which holds the memory you want."

"Okay," Debra said. Her voice was quieter, more even. It always helps when they feel like an equal participant, Kat liked to say.

"I might touch you on the hands, arms, or shoulders, during this process," Marisa said. "Just to help you center yourself and relax. Do I have your permission to do that?"

"Yes," Debra said, still holding Marisa's gaze.

"So, this might seem like a funny question," Marisa said, keeping her own voice quiet and even, "but, have you ever seen a completely empty room? In an apartment, a house, wherever?"

"Sure," Debra said. "We moved when I was a kid, but the truck with the furniture got delayed by a flat tire." Her lips curved into a half-smile, at the memory. "We had to buy sleeping bags and crash on the floor."

"So, I'd like you to close your eyes down," Marisa said. Debra did so immediately. "Close those eyes down and picture a completely empty room. It can be that room where you slept in the sleeping bags, or a different one. Any room that you like, as long as it is completely empty."

Debra's eyelids fluttered, as she imagined the room Marisa had described. Marisa remembered how quickly Kat had been able to drop Debra, on that first call. Maybe it hadn't had anything to do with Kat's technique at all.

"This is the House of Debra," Marisa said. "We're going to visit the other rooms soon. But you know that whenever you need to go within yourself, this is the room to start in. Picture Debra in this room."

Debra's eyebrows twitched, then twitched again. Not everyone steps away from themselves so easy, Kat had said.

"Can you see Debra in this room?" Marisa said.

"Yes," Debra said. Her voice was already a Trance Voice, slow and sluggish.

Wow, Marisa thought. She looks way down already. "The Debra you see is Everyday Debra," Marisa said, putting just enough emphasis on the word everyday that it seemed like a proper name. "Everyday Debra rides the subway and knows when she has to go shopping for groceries. Everyday Debra can handle most issues. But as we explore this house, Everyday Debra has to stay behind. Do you understand?"

Debra's head had begun to bob forward as soon as Marisa had started speaking. By the time Debra whispered in response, "Yes," it had sunk halfway down to her chest.

"When I touch the right shoulder," Marisa said, "Everyday Debra will lie down and sleep. Everyday Debra can lie down and sleep right now."

Marisa placed her hand on Debra's right shoulder. She had intended to push down slightly, the way Kat would do, and murmur the word down as she did so, the way Kat would do. Kat liked to do this for especially intense play, and Marisa's pussy tingled just a little at the thought of it. But Debra left no need for that; as soon as Marisa touched her, her torso turned to jelly. Marisa had to lunge forward and catch the other shoulder just to prevent Debra from flopping face-first out of the chair and onto the floor.

"That's right," Marisa said, as she tried to keep the other woman upright. "All the way to sleep and ready to explore the house."

With gentle suggestions, she guided Debra's body into a more or less upright position that would prevent Debra's neck or back from getting sore. Then, as she returned to her chair, she turned her suggestions to the house. There was a long hallway; at the opening of a couple doors, Marisa found that they were filled with pandemic-era memories. She led Debra down a flight of stairs, counting the steps from 10 to 1, and found some very simple childhood memories on the first floor; a favorite birthday in the living room and a particularly memorable Thanksgiving in the kitchen.

But then, unsuggested by Marisa, Debra murmured, "There's a door in the kitchen."

"That's interesting," Marisa said, striving hard (and in her mind, failing) to keep her voice offhand. "What's behind that door?"

"Basement," Debra said thickly. Her brow twitched again, and her right hand twitched for the first time.

"The basement is where the hidden memories are," Marisa said. "Are you ready to go into the basement and find them?"

"Door's ... locked," Debra managed to say.

Marisa frowned. Of course it's fucking locked. It was starting to look like a good thing she had rented the office space by the day.

---

The only drawback of a car this nice, Kat had said dryly. My coffee budget only allows for McDonald's.

There was a time when Amanda might have cocked an eye or said something sarcastic at that, but she was clearly still suggestible from whatever Stella had done before Kat had arrived. She just said mmm-hmm and looked out the window.

Kat had gone a mile out of their way to find a McDonald's with a busy drive-through. But it was busy indeed: the line wrapped around the building and almost into the street.

"I'm sorry about this," Kat forced herself to say for the third time. She was not the sort of person who apologized often (or at all), but she assumed her driver persona would have to be.

"It's fine," Amanda said vaguely from the backseat. "I'm in no rush."

Kat, looking at her charge through the rearview mirror, cocked an eyebrow. The car was at a standstill; in more ways than one, it was time to go to work. "You're not? I thought this was, you know, an important shoot."

"I suppose," Amanda sighed. She was looking out the window, but there wasn't much to see. Just a parking lot and a gas station beyond it. "Just doesn't feel that way."

Kat hesitated. Timing was important with a trance like this. "Want to talk about it? Just you and me and the seatbelts."

"Uh..." The look on Amanda's face was quite familiar to Kat. It was similar to the look that cult members had when you let them know that you were listening. It had been a long time since someone had listened to Amanda Remington, rather than her being hypnotically coerced into doing all the listening.

Amanda's lethargic face changed, as she looked at Kat in the rearview mirror. She seemed to be noticing Kat for the first time. "I like that mask, Kat."

"Thanks. My birthday was close to the election, it was a good gift."

That was a lie; Kat had bought the mask herself the same day as the second call with Debra. In general Kat and Marisa avoided political messages in their work; cult members tended to respond badly to any mentions of politics, even politics that they might have agreed with prior to joining their cults. But this was not a cult, and Debra had said that Amanda had been quite politically active back in 2016. Kat wanted to jog the memories of that time, and do it with humor.

Amanda said, "My job just seems so ... unimportant now. Maybe I was being silly, thinking that it was important back then."

She had no idea how common a refrain that had been for Kat, during the pandemic. Everyone she talked to was either an overworked doctor, or thought their jobs were kind of silly back then, compared to now.

"It's not like driving a car is all that," Kat said, shrugging. "If it puts a roof overhead and for food on the table for the people you love, that's what matters."

The emphasis on the words people you love was so subtle that probably only another hypnotist would have noticed it. Amanda blinked at the phrase. "Did you ever..." Amanda paused, and blinked again. "Did you ever give a ride to someone important? A doctor or scientist or someone in government?"

Kat shrugged again. "Not that I knew of," she said. "But it depends on how you define 'important.' Your little girl thinks you're important."

"I dunno," Amanda murmured. This time, she did not physically respond to the embedded suggestion, but then she said something that she probably would not have said to a total stranger: "She cries less with Stella than me."

Definitely tougher than I expected, Kat thought. It looked like Stella had already anticipated Amanda's inner voice expressing most of the push-back Kat was trying, and had silenced it. Her overall plan seemed to be right out of most cult playbooks, though: undermine the mark's sense of self-worth.

"So what job am I taking you to?" Kat already knew, of course; Debra had told her. She figured that was a good question to lead with.

Amanda took so long to answer that, in the meantime, the line inched forward a little. "A modeling shoot."

"So you're a model?"

Amanda blushed, at Kat's strategic flattery. "No, that's my sister. Or she used to be. These days we run the agency that organizes the shoots."

"Oh, so you got behind the scenes," Kat said, nodding approvingly. "Seize the means of production, I dig it."

"I guess," Amanda murmured. Then, abruptly, she blushed and looked down. "God, my hair looks terrible. We had been talking about doing shoots again for weeks, and I didn't even get my color fixed."

Kat laughed, a real, natural laugh. This was a surprisingly common refrain these days as well. "This is a pandemic, honey," she said. "Everyone looks terrible. My uncle was in the Navy, kept a close shave and a tight haircut every day of his life, and now he looks like Santa Claus."

"It's different for guys, though." Amanda was fiddling in her purse, before eventually pulling out a makeup mirror.

"Trust me," Kat said. "It isn't. I bet one of your models even has a zit today."

Amanda smiled, and Kat felt a rush of validation that her humor strategy was working. "I mean, look at that girl in the mirror," she said. "Like you're meeting her for the first time."

Amanda did not move to fix her makeup, and she did not move to put the hand-held mirror away. She continued to look at it. Watching the backseat in the rearview mirror, Kat saw reflected light flash across her eyes.

Kat counted at least six cars between her and the order box, and smiled. All the time in the world, she thought.

---

Marisa rubbed her brow. A droplet of sweat rolled down her back, despite the climate-controlled office. She asked for the third time, "And who gave you the key, Debra?"

"Dunno." Debra was a trouper, Marisa had to give her that. She'd been slumped backward in the chair, her legs crossed, for more than an hour at this point. If she was feeling uncomfortable in any way, she did not show it, and her voice was the same sluggish monotone that it had been at the start of the trance.

But the door to the basement of her mind was still locked, and there did not seem to be any metaphorical key. Marisa was reaching the limits of her training, and she wished Kat, with her hypnosis certification and more experience working with clients in a therapeutic fashion, were here. But Kat had to do the driving because Marisa, who had lived by the subway ever since arriving in New York for music school, could not drive.

"This is the House of Debra," Marisa said. Keeping her voice soft and without strain was requiring more and more effort. "Only you can lock that door, which means only you can have the key. Isn't that right?"

There were all sorts of logical reasons that argument could fail; in the real world, it's easy to lose a key or have it stolen. But Debra was not in the real world, nor capable of very much logical thinking. "Yes," she murmured.

Marisa had covered this ground before, which was another reason that Debra was agreeing with her right now. But at this point she needed a new approach. Debra did not know where the key was or when she had looked the door; Marisa's previous attempts had confirmed that.

Maybe the lock can be picked? "Study the lock, Debra," she said. "Tell me everything about it."

Debra's eyes moved under the closed eyelids. "Brass," she murmured. "Looks old. Like our first house."

Marisa considered this. When she tried new avenues of play with Kat, they liked to explore how it appeared to multiple different senses. "Debra, it might help you to explore that lock. Tell me how it feels. Touch the lock, Debra."

Without warning, Debra inhaled sharply. Her neck arched, pressing her head back against the cushion. Her eyelids squeezed together tightly. Her hands clenched the chair's armrests. "Oh my god," she gasped.

"Debra?" Marisa reminded herself to stay calm. Kat liked to say that, no matter what happened, you had to act like you meant for it to happen. "What are you feeling, Debra?"

"Jared's inside me," Debra said. Her hips began moving; almost immediately Marisa recognized it as copulation.

"Who is Jared?"

"My last boyfriend." Debra's breathing was becoming more and more ragged. Marisa started to understand what had happened here.

"Your orgasm is the key, Debra," Marisa said, keeping her voice low and firm. "When he finishes, the door will open."

Debra groaned, a pained sound that made Marisa realize why she had been so willing to hide this memory. "Hurts," she gasped. Tears began to stream from under her closed eyelids.

Marisa did not think anything except, I have to get this over with. She said, "Debra, allow him to finish now," and punctuated this statement with a clap of her hands.

Debra cried out, her hips bucking. She was gasping, or sobbing, or perhaps both. After a few seconds she sighed heavily, and toppled forward. Unlike before, Marisa was too far away, and could not get to her in time to stop Debra from flopping onto the floor.

When Marisa arrived next to Debra, the raven-haired woman was breathing more evenly. Her eyes were still closed, the eyelids fluttering, and Marisa realized she was still in trance. "Where are you, Debra?"

"Basement." The other woman's voice wavered, but did not break. "I think I ... fell down the stairs?"

Move fast, Marisa said. Who knows how much more she can take. "There's a television in the basement, Debra," she said. "There's a very special television in the basement. When you turn it on, you'll be able to watch any of their memories you've hidden away in this basement. Do you understand?"

"Uh huh."

"When you turn on the television, you'll be able to see your first meeting with Stella. Turn on the television right now."

Debra sighed heavily. Marisa asked her, "What do you see, Debra?", but received no answer. Marisa asked the question a second time, but received no answer. Five or ten seconds after Marisa asked the second time, Debra took a deep breath in, and opened her eyes.

"I remember," she said.

---

Debra drank deeply from a bottled water that Marisa had supplied for her. Her eyes were dry as she told the story, though occasionally her voice did waver.

"Jared and I dated for about a year," Debra said. "He could be really caring most of the time, but in bed, he was different. He was rough. At first I tried to tell myself that it was just his kink, that it was okay because I was having orgasms, but ... it was painful, you know?"

Marisa nodded sympathetically, as she took notes.

"I tried to tell him that I was not okay, but he would just get defensive, deny everything. So I ended it. And then Stella ... used my memories of that sex against me." She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue.

"How did you meet her?"

"Sean heard about her at work," Debra said. "I mean, not at work, even they were locked down at that time. But one of his co-workers told him about a natural-birthing clinic in Battery Park, and mentioned her by name."

"Did you meet her in person?"

"Yes, there was a private room at the clinic, we both had to show proof of a negative test," Debra said. "I remember seeing her resume, and her negative test -- I remembered that even before I hired you. But the rest of my memories of that meeting are still fuzzy. All I remember clearly is that she did most of the talking. I feel sure that she hypnotized me the first time there."

"I once read that a person is never more suggestible than right after orgasm," Marisa said. She hadn't actually read it, Kat had told her, but it amounted to the same thing. "She caused you to recall the orgasms with Jared, and you would have liked to hide those memories. So she helped you do that, but also hid away some key facts about herself along with them."

"Is that illegal?" Debra said. "Because I sure would like to see her ass in prison right now."

"It's a gray area," Marisa said. "The fact that you were not the pregnant one, means there is an argument that it was outside of her work duties, that it was assault. But she might come back and say that she needed to give you a demonstration, to show her skill level."

"A demonstration in which I re-lived a painful orgasm?"

"Her job is tied to sex and the reproductive system," Marisa said. "If she has a good lawyer..."

Debra flung the balled-up tissue in anger. Since tissue is not aerodynamic, it did not go flying across the room in the style of a Hollywood movie. It rather weakly fluttered to the ground. "Shit," Debra muttered.

"Sorry," Marisa said. "The justice system is often not well prepared for the problems Kat and I deal with."

"So what--" Debra visibly regained her self-possession. Marisa sympathized; during the pandemic, she often had to cool off stressed-out callers by reminding them that shouting almost never helps. "What do we do?"

"We wait," Marisa said. "Kat will have an idea of what comes next."

---

The pocket mirror slipped out of Amanda's fingers and fell onto the floor of the Mercedes with a soft thump.

Kat looked in the rearview mirror. Amanda's eyes where half-open, fixed on the place where the mirror had been in her hand. She breathed slow and even.

They were on the Henry Hudson parkway, headed toward the George Washington Bridge where they would cross into Queens, where the studio was located. Amanda had been in trance since the drive-through lane at McDonald's, but Kat had to be careful with her suggestions and put most of her focus on driving. It had been mostly deeper and deeper or you're doing so well.

Kat could not just suggest for Amanda to throw Stella out. She had to stay in the lane of the conversation they had been having; to do otherwise might wake Amanda up, even as conditioned by Stella as she had been. "After looking in that mirror long enough," Kat said, "I can notice the changes in my life. Can you notice the changes in your life?"

"Uh huh," Amanda said slowly. That did not necessarily mean anything useful for Kat; she might be thinking of the pandemic, or the baby, or that her big toe was feeling sore. But it was a good start.

"And what change do you notice?" Kat said. The car crawled past the scene of an accident that had caused a minor traffic jam. Kat flicked her eyes back and forth between the road ahead and the blank face in her rearview mirror.

"Ssssssss," Amanda said. Kat was reminded of her first apartment in New York, with its hissing radiator. Amanda took a breath, and managed, "Sssuit."

Even though she must have seen sweatpants-related jokes on Twitter about five times a day for the last year, Kat still had to think about that one for a minute. Such was the distraction of doing this while driving. "Ah," she said at last, "It's been so long since you wore that suit, hasn't it?"

"Uh huh."

"That looks like a power suit to me," Kat said. "Is that your power suit?"

"Uh huh."

Seeing her opening, Kat pushed forward. "And when you wear that suit, you have all the power, don't you?"

"Uh huh."

So far, so good. "And when was the last time you felt that power?"

Amanda broke the pattern, saying, "I..." she took a deep breath in, and let it out like a sigh. "I dunno."

Kat saw her off-ramp approaching, where she would cross Upper Manhattan, and briefly re-enter the Bronx before passing into Queens, where the studio was located. "Think back to when you last wore the power suit."

The ramp was on the right, curving 270 degrees into a tunnel, until Kat would be on a road heading off to the left. As Kat leaned into the curve, she saw Amanda's body in the rearview mirror, swaying. Soon Amanda's torso was pointed at an angle, like the minute hand of a clock indicating ten minutes after the hour. Her back was erect, same as it might be if she were sitting up. Kat thought that, if not for the seat belt, Amanda might be lying horizontal across the backseat, her eyes still open and staring at nothing.

Wow, Kat thought. Marisa doesn't even do that. She was so amazed that she nearly forgot where she was going with the suggestions.

The car's proximity detector pinged, politely reminding Kat that she was, in fact, on course to have an accident. Kat started and pressed the brake as she said, "See yourself, the last time you were wearing the power suit. Can you see it?"

"Y-yes." Amanda let out another heavy breath, like a sigh. Kat noted the difference between her previously saying uh huh and now finding the word yes. She wondered if Amanda was about to spontaneously wake herself up.

Kat brought the car out of the ramp, curving across two lanes to get in the lane she would need for Queens. She noted Amanda's body swaying back to its original position, her face still. Eight months or so, Kat thought. Stuck at home with her hypnotist every day. Stella might have tranced her more times that I have hypnotized anyone, even Marisa.

"When was the last time you wore the power suit?" Kat said.

"Gucci shoot," Amanda said, her voice sluggish. "Two days ... before lockdown."

"Find that power, Amanda," Kat said. "You're wearing the suit again. Find your power."

"I can't."

Shit, Kat thought, her dismay very close to what Marisa would soon be feeling, across Manhattan. And things were going so well. "Take a deep breath in, and as you let it out, find the memory of that power."

Amanda exhaled, and said, "It's not there."

"It's your suit," Kat said, trying to keep urgency out of her voice. The Bronx exit was coming up soon, at which point there would be too many stoplights and too many other cars for her to continue. "It's your power. Find the memory off that power."

"It's not there," Amanda said again, but then she murmured, "I gave it to her."

Gotcha, Kat thought. "We're going to your photo shoot, Amanda," Kat said in a low, calming voice. "Everyone is there for you. You run this show. You've got this."

"I've got this," Amanda said in a dreaming voice.

"When I honk my horn, you'll count to three in your mind, waking yourself up with every number. On three you'll be awake, alert and ready to run your show."

Kat tapped the horn, drawing horns from two other nearby cars that indignantly believed she was honking at them over some perceived slight. Three seconds later, Amanda spoke up from the backseat. "Everything okay up there?"

"Oh, yeah," Kat said. "Some guy just had his turn signal on for no reason. Everything okay with you?"

"Yeah," Amanda said. Kat studied her in the rearview; she seemed to show no signs of remembering the trance.

"Ready to go kill it at your shoot?"

"Honey," Amanda said, with more animation and energy in her voice than Kat had heard all day, "I have been waiting more than a year to put on this suit. You would not fucking believe how ready I am."

Kat smiled, but she was already planning the next trance in her head.

---

"'I gave it to her'?" Marisa cocked an eyebrow at Kat, across the dinner table. "You're sure that's what she said?"

"Of course I'm sure," Kat replied. "It's not like the car radio was on or anything."

"You tranced her in the car?" Marisa folded her arms, ignoring the dinner she had cooked for the two of them.

Kat was not ignoring the dinner. There had been no craft service at the set due to cost-cutting and COIVD concerns, and she felt like she could devour a full-grown grizzly bear. "Where else?" she said around mouthfuls of potato curry. "The car is the only place where she's got plenty of down time and I can give instructions. I mean I did the induction in a drive-through lane, and I made sure I was fully awake before we got on the road."

"Did you even try to think of another place?"

"Can't do it at the house; Stella is always around," Kat said. "Can't do it on the set; I don't have a chance to slow her down."

"I swear," Marisa complained, "you are your own worst enemy sometimes. I know hypnosis requires confidence, but there is such a thing as too much confidence, y'know."

"But I got something useful," Kat countered, "didn't I? I saw the way your eyebrows went up over there. You got something similar out of Debra, right?"

Marisa kept trying to give Kat the you are your own worst enemy look, but eventually made an exasperated sound and began attacking her curry with her fork. "Yeah, I did," she said. "Stella used a sexual memory to get in Debra's head, take away the key memories of their first meeting and trance."

"Probably did the same with Amanda," Kat said. "Her husband is working all day, and even when he gets home her hormones are all over the place. She probably hadn't gotten some since before she got pregnant."

"Gotten some?" Marisa cocked an eyebrow. "You undercover at a fraternity also?"

"You know what I mean," Kat said. "Stella's memory sex was the only sex she's had for a while."

"Probably," Marisa conceded. "But I still don't see what the plan is. Stella undermines her confidence, makes her doubt her abilities as a mother ... to what end?"

"Gotta be something illegal," Kat said. "That's the only reason she would mess with the sister's memories."

"You're still hung up on that Hand That Rocks The Cradle thing, aren't you?"

"It fits, right? Something illegal that first requires her to undermine the mom psychologically?"

"But Stella's done that. You said yourself, at this point the mom's a better subject than I am. Stella could have taken the baby and run weeks ago, if that's what she wanted to do. Amanda would need a lot of work with a hypnotherapist to even remember what happened."

"Yeah, you're right," Kat said, around a mouthful of curry. "There's something else. Something we don't know yet."

They ate in silence for some time, mentally chewing on the idea of something else while physically chewing on their food. As they were finishing up, Marisa cleared her throat. "So, um ... what exactly does Stella do?"

"Well, if she was trained by an Ericksonian, she's really good at suggestive language," Kat said. "Or, based on what I heard, suggestive touches. Like I said yesterday, Erickson could trance someone just by shaking their hand at a party and saying the right things."

"Can you..." Marisa blushed. She knew she should be used to hypno-play with Kat by now, but she still always blushed when she asked about trying something new. "Show me?"

Kat grinned. "Let's do the dishes first. You're not going to want to, after."

One of the minor but persistent annoyances of the pandemic was the condition of their hands. Washing hands with fanatical frequency, for 30 seconds at a time, could actually punish one's skin to quite a degree. After washing the dishes, Marisa washed her hands with normal soap, and then reached for the pump-handle bottle of moisturizer they kept near the sink.

Kat caught her hand before it got there. "No, let me."

Marisa tingled. Kat had started to change her voice already. "Okay."

Kat began applying the lotion, but more gently than Marisa was used to, and with one hand. Marisa started to glance down at what her lover was doing, but Kat gently placed her fingers under Marisa’s chin, tipping her head back up until they were looking each other in the eyes.

Marisa expected Kat to say look into my eyes or something similar, but Kat said nothing. There was just the light touch of fingers on the back of Marisa’s hand, over and over.

”Aren’t you gonna …” Marisa’s voice was sluggish. It sounded like a trance voice, but she wasn’t in trance yet. Was she? “Say something?”

Kat did not respond right away. Marisa could not remember a time when Kat had done this silently; the vocal aspect of hypnosis was, in many ways, what turned her on. Finally she said, “Your hand is probably going to start feeling warm and tingly soon.”

Marisa could feel it, that sensation of running warm water over one’s hands after some time in freezing weather without gloves. “Yeah,” she mumbled.

”You like when I do that, don’t you?”

Marisa’s mouth curved slightly, into a dreamy grin. The warm/numb feeling was in her pussy now, light and arousing. “Yeah.”

Kat held up a necklace on a gold chain. It was a Russian Orthodox style crucifix. Marisa vaguely recognized it as her own; she was not particularly religious, but it had been a gift from her mother. “Then how did I take your necklace off?”

Marisa blinked slowly. The cross caught the room lights and gleamed as real gold does. She forgot that she had been asked a question, but that was just as well, because she could not have formed an answer. Her pussy warmed and tingled.

Kat snapped her fingers. The dry popping sound hit Marisa like a starter’s pistol, announcing that she could go again. Marisa started, blinking her eyes rapidly.

”Wide awake, babe,” Kat said. “How are you feeling?"

Marisa answered without thinking. "I'm deeply hypnotized," she said, then blinked. "Wait, you did the thing already?"

"You forget so easily, babe," Kat said. She was smiling like the cat who got the canary. "Like always."

“Whoa,” Marisa said. She put a hand on the kitchen island to steady herself. “That was so fast…”

”Yeah, that’s what people said after meeting Erickson, too,” Kat said. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm deeply hypnotized," Marisa said. She wasn't even using her Trance Voice; she just said the words casually, the way most people might answer that question with, Fine. Then she blushed, knowing what she had said and how she hadn't been able to stop it.

”Stella can…” Marisa shook her head, trying to get the question straight in her mind. “…do that to a total stranger?”

”Well, maybe not a total stranger,” Kat said. “Erickson’s trick worked because everyone knew he was a master hypnotist. Stella’s approach probably worked a lot better after she established herself as someone they could trust with the baby.”

”So what do we do about that?”

“We’ve gotta retrace Stella’s steps. I mean I can drop Amanda every time I drive her, but she’s just starting to get back to work. Debra and I are going to run out of excuses for me to drive her in a hurry.”

”What about the husband?”

Kat shrugged. “He drives himself, and he keeps hours that I can’t be there.”

”No, I mean, what do you think she’s doing to him?”

Kat pulled Marisa in for a long kiss. When they separated, she grinned wickedly. “I can do my best to show you, but first I need to know, how are you feeling?”

TO BE CONTINUED