Reproductive Labor

Drip, drip, drip.

Val sighed as she watched the last few drips of coffee fall from the office machine, filling the cup underneath. This miserable ritual was quickly becoming a kind of torture. Every day, as Val made coffee, she found herself turning over the same mantra in her head, over and over again:

This is beneath me.

Val had nothing against making coffee, but it wasn't part of her job description. She had a full day's worth of work ahead of her, and instead of making a strong start, she was wasting her time making coffee.

All because of her boss.

If it had been up to her, Val would have quit weeks ago. Unfortunately, it wasn't. Her last workplace had gone under suddenly, and with how expensive her rent was becoming, Val had been forced to take the first job she could get. It hadn't seemed like such a bad one. It paid OK, it was appropriate for her qualifications and level of experience, and best of all - she'd thought - she'd be working directly under Caterina Safra. After researching her new boss, Val had actually been excited to meet her. She'd thought it would be nice to work for a woman for a change. Better, a queer woman. Ms. Safra was notable for being one of the most senior trans women in any corporation in America, and Val was a lifelong butch lesbian. She was pretty sure both of them had endured plenty of unpleasantness throughout their respective careers. Maybe it would be something to bond over.

Or not.

From her very first day on the job, Ms. Safra seemed to have gone out of her way to treat Val like dirt. She insisted that she make her coffee every morning, handle her calls, bring her food, and even clean her office. It was demeaning and unfair, especially in light of all the other work Val had on her plate. She wanted to keep climbing her way up the corporate ladder, but instead she felt more like a secretary. At first, she'd figured it was simply a kind of hazing. A way to test Val and see if she was tough enough. Now, though, it had been going on for months, and Val had no idea what to do.

Thoughts of throwing the cup of boiling liquid in her boss's face were swirling around in her head as Val pushed open the door to her boss's office and plastered an insincere, professional smile on her face.

"Good morning, Ms. Safra," Val said, as she set the drink down on her boss's desk. "Here's your coffee. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll-"

"Wait," Ms. Safra interrupted. The sound of her displeasure sent a shiver down Val's spine, as the businesswoman leaned in to sniff the drink. She sighed. "Once again, it seems you've failed to follow my instructions, Val. Yesterday, it was too strong. Today, it's too weak. This is pathetic. How do you expect to work for me if you're too dumb even to make coffee? No wonder you're falling behind. Go and try again."

What?

Ms. Safra wanted Val to go back and make her another coffee? And she was demanding that in the same breath as criticizing Val for falling behind on her work, like the whole reason for that wasn't that she spent all day doing Ms. Safra's chores? Her outrage at the unfairness of it gave Val the shot of courage she needed.

The butch drew herself up as tall as she could, and balled her hands into fists to try and stop them from shaking. "No."

Ms. Safra looked at her sharply. She seemed amused. "No?"

"Ms. Safra, that's an inappropriate request." Val was struck by how Ms. Safra seemed to loom over her, even sitting down. Val had always been short; at 6'3", Ms. Safra was taller by more than a foot. "I'm not your personal assistant or your... your housewife! I was hired here to do a job, and I deserve the respect that goes with that position. I'll take this to HR if I have to."

"You will, will you?" Ms. Safra stared at Val intently for a moment. Val tried not to wither. "Very well. Val, why don't you go and make yourself a cup of coffee for a change? Then come back to me, and we can talk."

Val blinked. She'd been expected to get either yelled at or fired. "Um. OK."

She darted out the door and made another coffee as quickly as she could. Her mind was racing as she did. Was this some kind of twisted test? Had she passed? What was going on? Once she returned with her drink, Ms. Safra beckoned her to sit down.

"Close the door, please," she added. Once Val was settled, she asked: "So. You feel the way I've been treating you is unfair?"

"I do."

Val's heart was pounding. For one thing, sitting opposite Ms. Safra certainly was an experience. It drove home just how much taller the trans woman was. Ms. Safra was broad-shouldered too, and her suit was impeccably tailored to accentuate that, helping to make everyone around her feel small and insignificant. Beyond that, she was also the very picture of powerful, professional femininity. Her makeup was immaculate, her silky, black hair was tied up in a perfect bun, and her pencil skirt made her long legs look incredible.

Deep down, Val knew that if she hadn't been a complete bitch, Val would have been incredibly attracted to her. Maybe she still was.

Perhaps it was her curse, as a butch, to be a total sucker for hot femmes. As much as Ms. Safra alone, the contrast between her and Val had prompted a few embarrassing thoughts when they'd first met. It wasn't just short and tall; Val's dress sense was as butch as Ms. Safra's was feminine. She wore a simple white shirt and slacks, carefully chosen to look neat and handsome without being so closely fitting they made her look curvy. She kept her red hair short, in a curly little mop that she knew looked good on her. All in all, while Val sometimes wished she was a little taller and that her hips were a little less unbelievably wide, she was a fan of her own style.

And... maybe Ms. Safra was too? Val suddenly noticed that her boss was staring at her like a wolf staring at a juicy piece of meat, eyeing every part of her outfit and her body. What the hell did that mean?

"Well, you're right," Ms. Safra continued, after allowing Val to stew in her own anxiety for a moment. "I've been treating you very unfairly. But there's a reason for it."

"OK," Val replied. She was hoping that what her boss was telling her was a good sign. "What's the reason?"

Ms. Safra's thin smile shifted to a lopsided smirk. "It's very simple. I don't think a job like this is where you really belong."

Val frowned. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me," Ms. Safra said. "You don't belong in the office, Valentina. I think you'd be far more suited to something domestic. It's why I've been pushing you to do secretary work for me. I was hoping you'd take the hint. Clearly, I was giving you too much credit."

"W-what?" Val was speechless. She'd never been more insulted in her life. The use of her full name was even more dizzying. Val didn't hate having 'Valentina' on her ID, but it was too feminine for her to want to use it day-to-day. She'd made that perfectly clear on her very first day at the office. The way Ms. Safra used it made it feel like a calculated insult.

"Allow me to be blunt." Ms. Safra held up her hand and started counting Val's flaws on her fingers. "You're slow. You're careless. You're dumb. " Each of her barbed words went into Val like a knife. "The only reason I hired you at all is that I saw what you looked like in your interview. I could immediately tell what kind of body you were hiding under those clothes. I want you. Just not as an employee."

"I..." Val couldn't believe what she was hearing. The worst part was, Ms. Safra wasn't even yelling. Her ice-cold disdain cut all the deeper for it. Val knew one thing for sure, though: she was going straight to HR after this. "How can you-"

"You just need a firm hand," Ms. Safra continued, easily brushing Val aside. "Stupid girls like you always do. I mean, what kind of employee can't even follow basic instructions? It's embarrassing. I'll make sure you learn things that are a little more on your intellectual level: cooking, cleaning, and looking pretty. Not to mention breeding. That's the one thing you're perfect for."

"You're- what the fuck!" Val exclaimed. "That's it. I'm out of here."

"Sit down, Valentina," Ms. Safra warned sharply, as the butch moved to stand up. Val froze. "I can see that you're still in denial about the scale of your inadequacy. Allow me to demonstrate it for you. Look at this cup of coffee you made for me."

Coffee. That was what all this was about? Val decided to hear her out, because why the hell not? She was pretty sure there was nothing that wrong with the cup of coffee she'd made. If nothing else, maybe Ms. Safra would say even more things she could use as ammo in a lawsuit. Val nodded.

"Good." Ms. Safra pushed the cup of coffee a little way toward Val, inviting her to look. "I love coffee, Valentina. I pay very close attention to it. I love its taste, its texture. A cup of coffee like this might seem fine to you, but to me, it's completely worthless. If you pay attention too, I can show you how."

As directed, Val turned her attention to the cup of coffee. There was no reason for her not to.

"Coffee is thicker than water," Ms. Safra explained. "But just how thick depends on precisely how you make it. If you look closely, you can tell. Watch."

Ms. Safra picked up a teaspoon and used it to scoop up a spoonful of coffee from the cup Val had brewed. Then, she lifted it a couple of inches and tipped it slightly, allowing droplets of coffee to run over the side and drip steadily back into the cup.

Drip, drip, drip.

"Once you know the rhythm, you can always tell," Ms. Safra continued. "It's one of those things you simply never forget. Even someone like you."

Ms. Safra repeated the motion. Drip, drip, drip. Val brushed off the insult. She was too busy watching the coffee drip from the tip of her boss's spoon.

"You really do need to pay attention, though." As she spoke, before dripping more coffee, Ms. Safra touched her teaspoon to the rim of her coffee cup and moved it around the edge in gentle, circular motions, back and forth. The sliding of metal over ceramic produced a soothing, ringing sound. "Do you want to prove to me that you have the attention to detail you need for this job, Valentina? Then watch closer. Learn the rhythm that I'm showing you."

Val nodded without realizing it. She wanted to show Ms. Safra. This time, when Ms. Safra repeated the scooping motion, all of her attention was completely and utterly honed on the cup.

Drip, drip, drip.

"Yes, that's it," Ms. Safra said approvingly. Her voice was soothing too; it felt almost like an extension of the rhythmic dripping Val was so focused on. "People like you are no good at concentrating. Not without my help. When you truly concentrate on something, it becomes part of you. It consumes you. Distractions cease to exist. It becomes your whole world. You find yourself slipping into rhythm with it; your breathing, the way you move, the way you think. That's what it takes, Valentina."

She did it again. Drip, drip, drip.

Val was doing her best to concentrate. She wasn't sure if she was succeeding, or if her focus was slipping away altogether. The world around her was starting to fade away. She was no longer truly registering what Ms. Safra was saying. Her whole world was in that coffee cup. When Ms. Safra lifted the teaspoon, Val held her breath, anticipating the all-important rhythm her boss was teaching her. When the droplets of dark, rich liquid fell, it seemed only natural to breathe in and out in time with them.

Drip, drip, drip.

"You really do need to be careful, though," Ms. Safra purred. Out of the corner of her drooping eyes, Val could see that her boss was staring at her almost as hard as she was staring at the cup of coffee, carefully noting the way the butch lesbian was starting to sag and sway in her chair. "What happens when the rhythm starts to slow? You might find yourself slowing down with it."

She repeated the little dripping motion yet again, only this time, the trans woman tilted her teaspoon at a shallower angle. The droplets of coffee took that much longer to spill over the edge and drip back into the cup. For Val, time seemed to slow to a crawl.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

"You'll slow down along with it," Ms. Safra continued. "Just as you're doing for me now, Valentina. Breathing slower and slower. Thinking slower and slower. You can't help it. You barely even know what's happening to you. You came into my office thinking you were going to stand up to me, didn't you? But instead, you've stupidly followed every single one of my little suggestions. There's no more defiance left in your pretty little head, Valentina. You're just a dumb, drooling, brainless girl - and I'm going to make you mine."

"Mrrnn," Val gurgled. A deep, sunken part of her brain tried to rouse itself at the insults, but it was far too late. She had already slipped into a trance.

"You look so pathetic right now," Ms. Safra laughed. "Keep your attention on the coffee, idiot. I'm going to be speaking directly to your subconscious now, understand? And your subconscious is even stupider than you are. It'll believe everything I say, and it'll remember all of my words even once you wake up."

Val just nodded dully. She was beyond anything else.

Ms. Safra reached into her purse and retrieved something, then held it out above the cup of coffee for Val to see. It was a small pill. "I told you that you're not fit to work for me," Ms. Safra said. "All you're fit for is being a nice little housewife. I'm sure even you can manage that, Valentina. It'll make good use of one of the only true assets you seem to have: those wide, feminine, child-bearing hips you think you're hiding so well. This pill is something to help you with that." Ms. Safra's wicked, sadistic grin widened further. "It's a fertility drug."

Even through the thick fog of trance, hearing that made Val squirm a little.

"According to your recent physical, you should already be nice and fertile. But this will help speed things along." Ms. Safra's voice was thick with pleasure. She was reveling in Val's destruction. "It's a hormonal medication. I'm told it can make you very, very horny. But I have more for you than just this. Valentina, I want you to remember something besides the rhythm I showed you. I'm going to give you a trigger word."

Val nodded again. She was helpless.

"Just in case you're too stupid to know what that means, I'll explain," Ms. Safra continued. "A trigger word is like a little switch I can put into your brain when you're all brainless like this. And I can make it do whatever I want. In this case, the trigger word is going to make you incredibly, incredibly aware of just how aroused and fertile your body is. It's going to make you realize that, much much more than this job, what you care about is getting knocked up. Is becoming a submissive, domestic breeder for someone like me. You care about that more than anything else in the world. I think something nice and degrading will do." She paused and thought for a moment before grinning. "Valentina, your trigger word is 'breedbitch'."

Val shuddered.

"I can see you'll remember that. Good." Ms. Safra snapped her fingers, and the sharp sound brought Val back to full consciousness - but not before Ms. Safra dropped the fertility pill into the coffee Val had made for herself. "And don't forget your drink."

***

Twelve hours later, Val was the only one besides her boss left in the office. She hadn't been planning on staying so late, but she had work to do and she was woefully behind on it. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't seem to concentrate for even a single second.

She was way, way too horny.

'Horny' barely seemed like the right word for what Val was feeling, though. She'd been turned on before. This was ten times as intense, and accompanied by a kind of gnawing emptiness that made her too dizzy to focus and filled her head with all kinds of strange, lurid fantasies. Val couldn't understand why she kept thinking about getting knocked up, or why that thought always made her squeeze her legs together as a shock of pleasure ran through her body.

It was driving her crazy.

At first, it had been manageable. After a morning conversation with Ms. Safra she barely remembered, Val had decided she was just going to try and make it through the day before she made any big decisions. Since then, it had only been getting worse - especially whenever Ms. Safra came to hover near her. Val kept zoning out whenever her boss spoke to her, and somehow Ms. Safra's presence seemed to intensify the fantasies she was having. By the afternoon, Val had been tempted to simply go home so she could work out some of her frustrated urges. The only thing that stopped her was the conviction that none of her toys would help. She needed something real. Something deeper.

"Still here, Valentina?"

Val jumped. She hadn't noticed Ms. Safra appear behind her.

"I, uh-"

"Perhaps I should praise you for being so hardworking," Ms. Safra interrupted. "If you were actually working, anyway. Is something wrong?"

Val was far beyond being able to protest the way Ms. Safra was using her full name. The open scorn in her boss's voice was making her all the more aware of how she must look to Ms. Safra. Val was drenched in sweat and panting visibly, hunched over her desk, strands of hair clinging to her forehead. She looked like a mess. The embarrassment made her squirm all the more.

"Just look at you," Ms. Safra commented. "You don't belong here. You belong in my home, as my pretty little breedbitch."

"Wha-"

Val shuddered as the trigger word ran through her. Right away, any objections were forgotten, drowned in the wave of heat that rose in her body. She was filled with a craving deeper than just sex. Sweat started dripping from her brow, and she was aware that her cunt was just as wet.

"Yes?" Ms. Safra prompted. "Something to say? Or are you too busy thinking with your womb?"

That comment made Val twitch again. She couldn't think, let alone argue back. Too ashamed to look Ms. Safra in the eyes, she found her gaze drawn instead to the front of the trans woman's pencil skirt. Her pupils dilated when she realized that she could see the faint outline of Ms. Safra's bulge.

"Of course you are." Ms. Safra laughed. "It's all you're good for. Why don't you just say it?"

"Nn... nngghoo," Val drooled. Refusing Ms. Safra was hard. Her boss felt so much greater than her. So superior. Submission seemed natural.

"No?" Ms. Safra mocked. "Don't be stupid. You know you want this. After all, I've been using your trigger all day. Just say it, breedbitch."

Val bent double over her desk and moaned. Her arousal, her need, her submissiveness - It all redoubled. "Nnghghhh... what d-did you... you... you d-do to me?"

"I'm just helping you understand your place," her boss sneered. "Face it, Valentina. You can do more as my submissive breeder than you ever could on your own. Admit it. Listen to what your body is telling you."

The warped absurdity of Ms. Safra's words didn't even register with Val. She was lost in her own little world of heat and fever. Pride and dignity were the last things on Val's mind. She was ready to throw everything away for a single taste of what she was craving. She stopped thinking about how small, weak and pathetic she felt and looked. Compared to her, Ms. Safra was like a goddess. Who was Val to protest, if Ms. Safra wanted her as a domestic, pregnant fucktoy?

Val whimpered again. She couldn't stop thinking about it.

"Come on, breedbitch," Ms. Safra drawled. "I don't have all day."

The trigger hit Val with the force of a punch. Her body wouldn't be denied any longer. Val's hand slipped under her desk and she started rubbing frantically at the front of her pants. As Ms. Safra laughed, Val buried her face into her desk to try and hide her shame. The respite only lasted for a single moment before she felt Ms. Safra's hand in her hair, fingers forming a tight fist and wrenching her head to one side.