"You can see it, held just above the height of your normal eye line. You can feel it along the tips of your fingers, the thin, metallic chain grasped softly, the weight of the object distinctly light rather than heavy, a weight you'd know anywhere as it's held in front of you."

Oliver, arriving much later than he wanted to, found only chairs in the back of Lee Allure's class were vacant. He'd planned to sit and properly be apart of the class, but walking in to a trance demonstration in-progress, he found himself leaning against a wall instead, mind racing to guess the context that led up to a demonstration subject staring slightly above eye-level at something that should've been dangling from his fingertips, but only resided in his own mind.

"You might ask yourself as you stare at it, which part of you seems to be engaged the most. Would it be your sense of touch, finding yourself able to describe the feeling of the metal chain, as you hold it in your hands? Or your arm, effortlessly holding the object in front of you, only aware of it as I mention it now. Could it be your sense of hearing, listening intently to only a select few things, the sound of my voice, the faint ticking, each getting more and more pronounced based on your desire to want to listen to them, letting go of any other sounds the longer you stare? And as you stare, notice how all of the watch seems more and more blurry with every new pass, the shape comes into focus briefly, so you can perhaps see the design, or a pattern of lines, or a spiral, and any one of those may grab you so intently that whatever you see when it's in focus becomes too fascinating to look away from. Maybe the light in the room hits it juuuuust right, so that flashes of light keep hitting your eyes, blinding your ability to think about anything else."

Oliver found himself leaning against the wall a little more for support as his neck had craned forward at some point to see what the man was seeing. He noticed how even at a distance, Lee's words had filled in enough blanks in even his mind to begin to imagine all the details presented to his mind. He had to wonder if he'd been here for the entire trance, would he look as awe-stricken as the man sitting next to Lee was. It would've been quite a high to come down from, as was evident on his face when she ended the illusion and woke him up. Oliver couldn't place blame; Lee always had that effect on him, leaving him to cling to any trance she weaved around him.

It was funny to wonder if the class just really liked that demonstration, or if they were in on trying to wake him up, either way, fairly loud applause woke him more to reality like Lee's suggestion of wakefulness should have. It was hard for some minds when the voice that could induce trance tells someone to wake up for it; something else Oliver was guilty of too at some point.

He wanted to kick himself for missing one of his most anticipated classes, for the interesting topic of "Making Suggestions Stronger," and due to how big a fan he was of the teacher. As things wound down, and she took a few questions while others shuffled out of the classroom, he sat and waited for everyone else to have a chance to talk to Lee.

"I hope you can accept my apology of missing a lot of your class. Really wanted to see all of it, especially with what I'd walked into," Oliver told Lee with honesty and a small sense of guilt."

She smiled at him like she always did, as if trying to put his guilt aside.

"No need to apologize; it's not like you were slated to be up here with me and were late. Glad you could catch some of it."

"Had I known there was a possibility that I could've been up here like that guy was, nothing would've kept me from being there."

"Maybe you should use that motivation from now on, to get anywhere important. You might be rewarded in some special way, maybe a soft whisper in your head telling you 'good job.'"

Lee joked with him, but the trigger from one of her older files registered a little in him. "You make a compelling argument," he joked.

"It's not really an argument if there was nothing to argue, just my suggestion and your acceptance. Nothing else needed," she stated in that suggestive, matter-of-factly way he loved.

"You make a c-" Oliver stopped himself before repeating what seemed an invalid phrasing just then. "compelling statement."

"That's better," she laughed as they walked out of the class together.

***

"Did anyone say their class notes be available online sometime later?" Oliver asked Lee after a small dinner with friends from the Beguiled con.

"Probably later on, I figured one or two people would be taking them, though I think I noticed you taking some pointers quite to heart standing up and watching the demo."

"It was quite the education for sure, but I'd like to be able to consciously remember some of those lessons. My subconscious can't be the only part of me having fun."

"Every part of you is having fun when you're in trance, even if you're unaware. Being unaware is sometimes the most fun thing to be," she chuckled. "And besides, I'm pretty sure I've utilized the class's lesson in at least one or two past Skype sessions."

"Yeah, and it'd be nice if I could remember those sometimes," Oliver joked again, staring out at the rain that was looking to turn itself a storm soon. Lee noticed him looking out at the sky and the downpour, smiling.

"Oh, that's right, I forgot you mentioned that you like storms."

"You actually remember that?"

"Of course. I like storms too. A nice, natural phenomenon to take notice of. Though I'm not at all fond of snow, like a certain crazy someone."

"Hey, I live in the Midwest. At least one person living in a snowy area should like it."

"Considering all the shoveling you have to do, I guess I'd hope so."

"If it makes you feel any better, I much prefer rain too. You're description of it sounds similar to mine."

"Just as detailed?"

"Maybe? I don't know, it depends on the storm."

"Could it depend on how you see the storm?"

"Uhhh...probably."

"Think of it this way, remember what you saw in the class with the guy holding up the pocket watch him mind made for him?"

"Yeah."

"What if it was you in that chair, and I pointed your chair outside at the rainstorm?"

"That would be pretty....nice."

"Is it nice enough that I have your permission to show you what I mean?"

Confusion quickly morphed to a brightened exuberance as if Lee snapped her fingers to make it so, picking up on the permission Lee was asking about.

"You surely have it, though as much as I trust you, you didn't need to."

"Well, as you should've heard at every class this weekend, it doesn't get more important than with the idea of consenting. But also, you did say you wanted to be aware, consciously and subconsciously."

Oliver neared a dumb smile as his chair moved to face a window, and let the outside weather set the stage Lee was about to direct.

"My class was about the idea of giving suggestions a stronger foothold in the mind for a greater effect, for any number of helpful reasons. One could be to explore new levels of trance from an already established baseline, or it could be for helping those who say they don't have one, those who say they have never successfully tranced. It's a strange statement considering that everyone goes into trance more often than they might think, characterizing it as something completely different from what they see in the movies. Instant, blank expressions, stock-still expressions, vacant or even whited out eyes, all from just a few kitschy phrases of 'you are getting sleepy,' 'you are being hypnotized,' 'look into my eyes,' 'notice this thing, here,' 'keep staring.' And if I present you with something as natural as a rainstorm, odds are your attention would naturally find its way there, and remain there. No words of mine would be necessary to keep you there, direct suggestions telling you to look out at the rain would be so redundant, your mind would be steps ahead of any observation you'd be told to make. It's already your pocket watch, your crystal, your focal point of choice."

"It's not as if the direct way wouldn't be effective; for most people they can work to a greater or lesser degree, and is probably the most anticipated way for someone to expect trance, telling you to make your focal point a storm, which is its own collection of focal points that your mind is processing all at once. I could tell you to focus in on just one, between the rain, the wind, the ever-changing shapes of the clouds, things that could already have your mind on overload if you like the elements that make a storm a storm. But similar to being made to just focus in on one thing, often you might miss an opportunity to follow a different path that leads you to the same place, making you appreciate not only the journey, bu the destination as well, for the unexpected pleasure of discovering a new way to get there."

"It could make you  wonder, would a hypnotist that sticks strictly to direct suggestions, or a mind so used to strictly receiving direct suggestions ever expect to ask you to use your own memory, to go back to a time when you first found out that you enjoyed storms? Perhaps you were young, ever in the years of self-discovery, maybe for the first time paying attention to a storm you could see coming on the horizon. Others you know might show disinterest, or fear, but not you. Looking at it coming from indoors, perhaps you were the only one to take a step forward, one after the other, until you found yourself at a window, your front-row seat to not only a storm, but your feelings that started to analyze what you were looking at, and crystallize a conclusion that had your inner voice speaking with certainty - 'I like this. I like storms like this.' I can imagine the slow build-up of excitement in you as you witnessed a storm brewing. Your eyes were probably wide with interest, your smiling expression juxtaposed to the gloomy condition outside. Maybe you sat in a chair that day to watch it, or knelt in-front of the window and rested crossed arms on a window sill as you watched everything transpire." 

"The excitement must've been palpable knowing this wasn't the first storm you'd ever seen, but it was the first time you realized it was something you liked. You knew everything that was coming, and breathed calmly, normally, deep in anticipation for what you expected. Faint drops of rain falling to the ground happened errantly at first to your eyes, as if at random, until the frequency of their falling increases, droplets splashing, making pattering noises against the house and the things outside. More and more drops come flooding down until empty air is filled with millions, billions of rain drops crashing onto the ground, a consistent, insistent noise that fills your interested mind, opening you up to what else the storm has to offer, like the distant rumbling of a storm in the background. You can't tell where it's coming from, but you can feel it everywhere, the soft booming of power that holds your attention keenly between the rain and the clouds. Maybe you notice that the wind starts to pick up in the middle of storm, and how it wisps around everything, changing the way the water falls from straight down to off to a diagonal direction off to one side, the rain's path bending to the wind as if instructed to, told to, and the rain simply obeys the whims of the wind, amongst more reactions of thunder rumbling around, rumbling into you, softly by the time it reaches the core of you."

"You could watch that storm in its entirety, possibly aware, quite possibly not caring if you were aware of how mesmerizing all of it was to you, and if someone were to use a storm as a focal point, you may not have expected using a memory of one to draw you into a trance state so easily. But it could happen; it did happen. It must please you so deeply to know there's another way to get you to that deep sleep that you love, so it would please you even more to know that there are several ways. Depending on your preference, you might find it so easy to find yourself in the middle of a storm you enjoy, engaging your senses, everything about you even stronger than before."

"If you were on a beach on the day of a storm, you would probably notice the wind brushing over most of your limbs, dressed warm for the weather, enough exposed skin to feel the wind come over the small hairs on your chest, your arms, your legs, closing your eyes momentarily to enjoy the strengthening breeze, opening them to see clouds above moving at a faster pace, gathering off in the distance, greying slowly until it nears a coal-greyish coloring. You can see it heading in your direction. It doesn't worry you because you know this storm will be mild, yet still potent to someone that enjoys storms. The corners of your lips curve and curl into a knowing smile, having a sense of knowing what's coming. You can smell the water vapor in the air, another distinct indicator, a distinct reason to breathe just a little deeper, and deeper after the last, confirming with every deep breath how soon the rain will come. The breeze gets just a little stronger, not harsh, but strong enough to brush through the looseness of your clothes. You feel the first drop of moisture fall from the sky and right onto your forehead. You close your eyes and smile, feeling your wet forehead, and the remaining droplet surprisingly warm, traveling down over your face, in-between your eyebrows and eyes, down either side of your nose, coming down to the edge of your mouth, slipping inside for you to taste, swallow, and revel in the natural flavor the storm offers you."

"You can hear more droplets falling, hitting the sand, hitting other parts of your body, across the tops of your feet as your toes scrunch into the warm sand, rolling across your shoulders and arms, wetting your hair and clothes, feeling like you've stepped into a warm shower with steadily increasing water pressure. More rain follows, dampening in individual drops, rushing over you if the drops collide and become bigger drops of rain. Each drop of any size feels as pleasant as a word you enjoy, a word of positivity, something complementary, something that fills you with pleasure, something from someone you trust that you enjoy. The more the warm rain falls the more consistent those warm words flow over you, turning into small sentences, then sentences, paragraphs, pages of words. Like ink crossing a blank page, you become written, re-written, over written by warm, compelling words you trust that you don't ever want to stop, carried along by the wind that tells the rain how it will fall, as if spoken in a tone, hypnotic that bends the rain and the written to its direction. You can hear it all around you, feel it around and deep inside of you, speaking words you did not know you needed to hear so badly, so wantonly, showered with praise and suggestion that warms and cradles you like nothing else. This feeling is so precious, so delicate, so much like luck smiling down onto you that you might worry that the slightest jolt of any kind will interrupt it. The storm is a delicate balance, but a balance of power, one that lets itself decide what those under it will feel. And if a flash of light off in the distance in the clouds were to occur amongst the warm rain and winds, it would happen as quick as the sound of a finger snapping,  *Snap* followed by a deep rumble, an aftershock in the air that shows it has an effect. *Snap* it could happen again and not only would you find it not jolting you of your enjoyment of this storm, but taking deeper into that pleasure. Repeated *Snaps* happen off in the distance, sounding off in the air, reverberating into you like the soft words of the rain do, empowering the resolve of those warm words, making each word that comes before a *Snap* and after a *Snap* mean more to you, and have more significance, more importance. *Snap* the rumble reaches down into the depths of you, felt in the little crevices of muscle and skin, carrying warm wet words through you until they become a part of you. *Snap* *Snap* *Snap* the more you hear, the more open you are to it, to all of it. *Snap* *Snap* *Snap* the more it opens you up, the more you wish it to open you up, the more it will open you up. *Snap* *Snap *Snap* the more open you are, the more you want to obey and embody the words, the more you are allowed to obey those words. *Snap* the more the words fall and flow through you, *Snap* the more it feels as natural as the rain falling, *Snap* the more it feels so natural to be a part of this process, where words rain down upon you, and you find yourself happily beholden to them, in a flash, in a *Snap*.

"For a storm-lover as avid as you are now, I would wager that this is something you would like to experience again some time, a torrent of words leading indirectly to a tempest of trance. Let that one particular word, tempest, stick into your mind for a moment, hitting you like a combined four or five droplets converging and splashing over your forehead. 'Tempest,' defined as a powerful storm, defined when my voice, and only my voice says it to you, specifically and only to you, as an invitation to slip back into this natural trance state where my words liquify and rain down on you, peaceful, warm, pleasantly bound to them, given emphasis with every gently rumbling *Snap.* If I happen to say it when anyone else is present or listening, it will not affect you in this way, merely sparking a memory of enjoying being tranced by me, giving you a reason to consider having a trance the next time you are able. And during a future session, you will be allowed to express your love of my trance, the tempest of trance I've created for you."

"Wonderful. I think you've gotten more than notes could supply for the class I did, and when you wake, you will be allowed to remember everything that happened, everything I've said to you in trance, when your mind wants to know. You won't feel the need to chastise yourself for not remembering on-command like you have in the past. You will be grateful that it's there, patiently waiting to know everything that happened, and not forgetting who helped you enjoy a little tempest before the end of the con. Find yourself wide awake on the count of 10. 1. 2. 3, starting to come up from that state. 4. 5. 6, becoming more aware of your body, your limbs, your muscles, starting to feel more energy coursing through them. 7. 8, letting your eyes open. 9. And 10, wide awake, feeling great!"

It took a few counts to ten to wake Oliver up, Lee grinning at how he was pulling latching harder on to this trance experience like never before. He stared at a smiling Lee, wondering if she knew that he'd had his most profound trance yet. He had to laugh.

"I don't know how or why you'd expect me to forget who gave a tempest. Holy shit that was amazing Lee!" He gushed as Lee took his compliments in stride with more smiles, letting him know he's always a fun subject to take under, even if he's a little disobedient when told to come out of it.