“Lauren!”

Turning away from her colleague at the sound of her name being called, Lauren smiled broadly. “Glen! What are you doing here? Don’t often see you up Boston way...”

“I got the train in to see the new Doctor Strange,” Glen grinned. “Thought I’d pop by NatWest and say hi. How’re you doing?”

It had been a month since their session, and two weeks since their theatre group’s performance. Lauren had seemed very upbeat the last time Glen had seen her, presumably due to the effects of the ‘underthink’ trigger he’d given her. He wondered if her positivity had lasted - secretly hoping it hadn’t, so he’d have an excuse to hypnotise her again.

He was privately delighted when she sighed, her face falling. “Honestly, I’m not so great. The trigger wore off a couple of weeks ago, and things have been getting on top of me again...”

Glen frowned, feigning concern. “Oh no, poor you! Why didn’t you give me a call? I could’ve used it again.”

She blew air out of her cheeks exasperatedly. “I guess I just hoped I’d be able to power through. And, well...” She stepped closer and lowered her voice. “Honestly? People have been a bit worried about me. The suggestion worked really well for me, and made me really happy - but my colleagues, and my friends and my family, they’d be trying to get my attention and fail, because I’d be so focused on a task and not even know they were talking to me. They started thinking I was on drugs or something - I explained that I’d been hypnotised to help with my concentration, but they still seemed freaked out about it...”

Glen nodded thoughtfully. “That’s quite the problem. My bad, I guess - I didn’t foresee the potential issues. What about your boyfriend, has he noticed anything off?”

Lauren snorted. “If anything, he’s the one who’s been off.” A bank customer bustled past them. “Hey, you know what, let’s go somewhere more private,” she suggested.

Glen followed her to the back of the bank, to a room with a plaque on the door that read ‘Manager’. “Promotion?” he asked.

“Nah, the actual manager’s still sick, so she’s letting me use the office because I’m basically running things.” They entered the room, and Lauren closed and locked the door behind her. Slipping off her smart navy blue blazer and hanging it on a hook on the door, she sat down behind the desk, while Glen took a seat in front of it.

“OK, so I’ll tell you the story from the beginning,” she continued. “One morning a couple of days after our hypnosis session, I opened this drawer I never use, in my chest of drawers. By accident - I was going for the one next to it, which has my socks and tights in it, but I guess I missed. I expected it to be empty, but you know what it was full of?”

“No, what?”

“Knickers.” They stared at each other for a long moment, before she spoke again. “A whole drawer full of knickers! How the hell did they even get there? I asked Tom if he knew where they’d come from, and he looked at me like I’d gone insane. He said they were mine. I mean, how ridiculous is that? I don’t wear pants. I never have! We argued about it for a bit, but then I had to go to work. Anyway, I got rid of them all, but he keeps telling me they were mine. He seems convinced I wear pants, for some reason! Isn’t that mental?”

“Just absurd,” Glen agreed, shaking his head. “I don’t know why he would try to convince you of something like that!”

“Right?! I mean, he’s never done anything, like, gaslight-y in the past... not that I’ve noticed, anyway. Why would he start with something so fucking daft?”

“Take it from me, the male mind is a very strange thing,” Glen chuckled.

Lauren smiled weakly in response.

“You do seem pretty down, mate,” he said, acting worried. “I know the trigger had some... problems, but d’you want me to hypnotise you again, chill you out a bit? Maybe I could tweak the trigger so there are fewer issues...”

She bit her lip, considering this. “Well... yeah, OK then! I mean, the problems were all caused by other people, to be honest - the hypnosis was awesome, I loved it, and the trigger worked so well and helped me so much! As long as you do fix it, then there’s no reason we can’t try again.”

“Great!” He glanced at the clock. “Do you have time to do it now? I’ve got a good forty minutes ’til the film...”

“Yeah, I can do it now. I’m due a lunch break anyway!” She adjusted her position in her chair, trying to get more comfortable. “Do you have your pendant?”

“Oh yeah, always. Let me just get it out.” He began to reach into his jacket pocket, but as she watched expectantly, he smiled mischievously and said, “Lights out.”

Lauren’s eyes rolled up in her head, and she let out a soft whimper as she slumped forwards, her forehead coming to rest on her desk.

Glen’s smile grew broader. “Good girl. Sit up straight and look at me, still so empty and blank.”

“Yes, Master,” Lauren mumbled, as she straightened up and opened her eyes, staring vacantly at Glen. Her mindless gaze followed him as he stood up and walked around the desk towards her.

“Now Lauren, when I do this while you’re in trance” - he rapped his knuckles on her forehead three times, just as he had in their first session - “I want you to say, ‘nobody’s home’. Because right now your head is an empty house, unoccupied, with all the lights turned out. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Master.”

He knocked on her head again.

“Nobody’s home,” she droned.

“Very good! How do you feel?”

“Like an empty toy.”

“Perfect.” Noticing her handbag on the desk, he smirked. “Pick up your bag, and empty it onto the floor.”

“Yes, Master.” Moving smoothly and staring blankly, like a robot, she seized the handbag, unzipped it, and turned it upside down. The contents cascaded out onto the floor below the desk - her phone, its charger, her purse, a book, a sandwich in a Tupperware box, and a packet of mints.

“Give me the mints.”

“Yes, Master.” Stooping down while still remaining seated, she picked up the packet, and then reached up and handed it to him.

He immediately flung the mints across the office, and they landed with a thud by the door. “Go and get them.”

“Yes, Master.” Lauren got up and crossed the room, bending down and picking them up. Sitting down in her desk chair, Glen admired her firm, round arse, accentuated by her navy skirt. He’d hoped to catch a flash of pussy through her tights, but the skirt was too long.

Lauren walked back over and held out the mints. Taking them, Glen began to unwrap the packet. “Put everything else back in your bag,” he ordered, standing up.

“Yes, Master.” As she cleared away her belongings, Glen walked back around the desk and emptied the mints onto the floor, scattering them across the carpet. Turning to see Lauren had finished packing everything back into her handbag and was now standing behind her desk and staring into space, he sat back down opposite her. Noticing a small piece of blank card on the desk, he picked it up, and found a pen nearby. He started writing on it.

“From now on, Lauren, you won’t be concerned about how the effects of the ‘underthink’ trigger make other people think of you,” he told her as he wrote. “In fact, you’ll decide that if anyone gets unnerved, worried or annoyed, then that’s their problem. After all, the trigger’s helping you, and that’s what’s important. But you are going to take a precaution to make sure people know what’s going on with you.” He held up the card. “You’re going to put this on your lanyard” - he gestured to the ID badge that hung around her neck - “so that people can read it and know you’re under the influence of a trigger. This will seem like a fantastic idea to you, and you’ll wear your lanyard with this showing for as long as the ‘underthink’ trigger is working on you. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Master.” She didn’t look at him as she spoke, still gazing vacantly at the wall.

“However, from now on, you will be aware of people trying to talk to you and engage with you while you complete a task. You’ll find it easy to respond to them with some variation of the phrase, ‘Sorry, I can’t talk right now, I’m doing something else’. After that, you will go back to being fully focused on what you were doing. I’m also going to give you a new trigger, Lauren. This trigger is ‘refocus’. When I - and only I - say ‘refocus’, you stop whatever you’re doing and listen to me. I will then give you a new job to do, and you will do it without question or hesitation.

“Do you understand all of that?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Very good! How do you feel?”

“Like an empty toy.”

Glen couldn’t help but run his hand over his crotch as he watched his gorgeous friend stare mindlessly into space and drone those words. “Awakening on the count of three... One, two, three.”

Her eyes widening, Lauren blinked hard and shook her head. “Whoa,” she sighed. “I forgot how full-on that was!” Looking around, she grinned, confused. “Why am I standing up?”

“I told you to,” Glen said. “I was testing the depth of your trance, to see if you’d be able to get up without waking. It worked.”

Moaning delightedly, she sat down heavily. “I mean, I guess it did! I feel fuckin’ great. You’ve really gotta do that more often!”

He smiled. “I absolutely will, if that’s what you want! Now, I’ve written a little something for you, so other people don’t get confused or alarmed when you’re under the influence of the trigger.” He held out the card.

Shrugging, she reached out to take it. “I mean, I’m not that bothered by what other people think, but sure...” She read the card quickly, smiling. “Oh, that’s perfect! Yeah, this should help clear anything up. No-one’ll bother me while I’m wearing this.”

“Hopefully not!” Glen chuckled, watching as Lauren slotted the card into her lanyard. It read:

HI, I’M LAUREN!

I’VE BEEN HYPNOTISED SO I CAN FOCUS BETTER

THIS MEANS I MIGHT NOT HEAR YOU SPEAK TO ME, OR NOTICE YOU AT ALL

I’M NOT BEING RUDE, MY MIND IS JUST LASER-FOCUSED ON ONE TASK

ONCE THAT TASK IS DONE, TRY ME AGAIN!

THANKS FOR UNDERSTANDING :)

“Great,” Glen grinned. “And now that you’ve got that, are you OK with me using the trigger?”

“Absolutely!” she beamed. “Go for it.”

“Underthink.”

He watched gleefully as her lively facial expression shifted and softened into a more placid, blank face.

“Feeling good, Lauren?”

“Yeah,” she replied dreamily. “I feel great! God, I’ve missed this...”

“Oh, by the way, I’ve noticed that someone’s dropped a load of mints over here,” he said, suppressing a laugh. “You should crawl around on the floor, pick them up, and put them in the bin, one at a time.”

Lauren nodded and got to her feet, not for a second wondering who could have dropped the mints on the floor of her (borrowed) office, or why she should clear them up in such an inefficient manner. Circling her desk, she rolled up her skirt around her hips for ease of movement, and then got down on all fours and picked up one of the mints. Needing both hands to crawl around, she put the mint in her mouth for safekeeping.

As she began to make her way to the very back of the office, where the bin was situated, Glen got up and followed her, reaching down and groping her bum. Reaching the bin, she leaned over it and opened her mouth, letting the mint drop inside. She then turned and headed back towards the front of the office, followed closely by the hypnotist.

This went on for several minutes, as Lauren continued picking up the mints - there were roughly a dozen in total - and putting them in her mouth, carrying them across the room for disposal. All the while, Glen fondled her arse and rubbed her cunt through her tights, even administering two or three hearty slaps to her butt cheeks. She didn’t react to any of it.

Finally, with all the mints deposited in the bin, Lauren got to her feet, straightened her skirt, and returned to her chair, by which time Glen was sitting in front of the desk again. She smiled at him. “All sorted!”

“Good job!” he congratulated her, making her beam with a sense of pride that was completely disproportionate to the nature of the task. “Now, do you have something you need to get on with - some paperwork or something?”

“Oh, I have a stack of forms to complete actually,” Lauren remarked. “I was going to leave it ’til later...”

“No, go ahead, please! It’d be good if I could see for myself how well you can focus on your job, and whether I can do anything to distract you!”

She chuckled. “Alright, then!” And with that, she turned her full attention to a pile of papers in a tray on the left-hand side of her desk. Picking up the pen Glen had used earlier, she began ticking and filling out boxes on the first form.

After waiting for a few moments, Glen leaned forwards. “So Lauren, what are you up to later?”

“Sorry, I can’t talk right now,” she replied, without looking up. “I’m busy.”

He grinned. “You don’t mind if I come over there and fuck your arse, do you?”

This time she didn’t reply at all, remaining completely focused on the paperwork as if he hadn’t even spoken.

Rubbing his hands together with enthusiasm, he got up and came around the desk once again. Reaching for her chest, he groped her tits, one after the other, through her white shirt. Undoing a couple of the buttons, he slid his hand inside and under her bra, caressing a boob and pinching the nipple.

Lauren’s breathing quickened, but she didn’t consciously notice. Nor did she react when Glen took hold of her by her armpits and pulled her to her feet. She simply leaned over her desk and continued diligently completing the forms.

He rolled her skirt up again and pulled down her tights, exposing her bare arse. Bent forwards almost at a right angle as she was, her legs were spread for greater comfort and stability, and as a result her hole was fully visible and accessible. Unbuttoning his jeans, he pulled out his cock and stepped forwards, pushing it inside her.

Though her mind remained fixated on her task, unable to think of anything but the form she was looking at and what to write on it, Lauren unknowingly let out a gasp, and then a series of low moans as Glen fucked her from behind. She completed the form and picked up another from the pile, sliding it in front of her face and starting to fill it out, utterly oblivious to Glen’s left hand on her shoulder, his right hand on her waist, and his shaft thrusting relentlessly inside her arsehole.

Suppressing his own lustful noises to avoid drawing unwanted attention from outside the office, Glen soon came inside Lauren and pulled out of her, trailing little dribbles of cum down her crack. Tucking himself away, he put her tights and skirt back to their normal configuration and returned to his seat.

“Refocus,” he said, and Lauren instantly stopped writing mid-sentence and straightened up, staring blankly at him. “Talk to me.”

“OK,” she said faintly, a dazed smile spread across her face.

“So, did you notice me doing anything while you were filling out your forms?” he asked.

“Uh, nope! Didn’t notice at all.” She grinned. “This suggestion is so awesome! I can’t thank you enough...”

“Oh, that’s alright,” he replied, smiling broadly. “Always happy to help a friend!”

“Ooh, do you want paying the same way as last time? I have enough cash on me right now...”

He considered, checking the time. “Well, my film’s gonna start soon, so I won’t have time for the blowjob right now. But how about this - you can pay me now, and then come and collect me from the cinema later? Then you can suck me off in your car - and maybe drive me to the train station too, if that’s OK with you?”

“Sure,” she said cheerily, “that sounds good to me!”

Turning to focus on her handbag, she dutifully got out her purse and brought out a hundred pounds, handing it over to him. She then led him to her office door, unlocking it.

“What did you do, by the way?” she asked, as she opened the door and let him back out to the bank floor. “When I was filling out the forms, what did you do to try and get my attention?”

He grinned mischievously. “Oh, nothing much. Just... gave you a poke.”