Brenda looked around the room at the other people in the circle, wondering if they'd felt the same as her the first time they'd come to one of these meetings. There weren't many of them--just four plus "Heidi K", the woman in charge of the group--but even admitting her problem to just five people made her blush hotly with shame.
Only the expression on their faces kept her from running. She looked at them and saw not just sympathy, but understanding. They knew how she felt; they knew what kind of chaos her life had become. Maybe they'd felt just as nervous as her when they'd attended their first meeting, maybe they'd also gotten sweaty palms and butterflies in their stomach, but they'd stuck it out and come back. If they could do it, she could do it.
Brenda stood up. She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself, but the memory of taking deep breaths to calm herself had too many associations that made her nervous all over again. The others in the group smiled encouragingly at her, and Heidi said, "It's all right, Brenda. Nobody's here to judge you."
Brenda nodded. "Hi," she said. "My name's Brenda, and I'm addicted to hypnosis."
"Hi, Brenda," the rest of the group chorused.
After saying that first part, the rest started to come a bit easier. "I guess I really started to get interested in hypnosis as a kid," she said. "Not just hypnosis, mind control in general. I was a big comic book fan when I was little," and she saw the two guys both nod their heads in sympathy, "and there were some stories in there...I was too young to really understand what I was feeling, but it made me feel funny in a way that I couldn't describe. I'd read about evil supervillains controlling the minds of beautiful women, and I wondered why they'd always just use them to rob a bank or try to kill the hero instead of..." She shrugged. "I didn't know what 'instead of' was, back when I was eleven, but I knew there was something."
That got a few chuckles from the group, but they didn't interrupt her story. "And then when I was a teenager, I started reading vampire stories." That got everyone nodding, even Heidi. "Most girls my age were fantasizing about the New Kids on the Block--me, I had my first orgasm masturbating while reading Bram Stoker's 'Dracula'." She felt the blush creeping all the way up her face to her forehead, but Brenda knew she had to be honest with somebody if she was ever going to beat this thing.
"And for a long time, it was just like that--a fantasy I had. I'd imagine a sinister man with dark eyes, eyes that swallowed me up and made me go all...blank and empty..." She saw it on their faces, that little twitch as they tried to control their own arousal at the thought. Some people hid it better than others. Lois, the girl with the glasses, visibly pressed her knees together and sat up ramrod straight in her chair. "I had fantasies about vampires--that was when I first realized I was bisexual, when I read 'Carmilla'. But it was all just make-believe, just harmless, and it stayed that way for a long time."
Even with what she'd already admitted, the next bit was difficult for Brenda. She swallowed hard, and said, "Then I discovered the Internet. I mean, I knew it existed before that, obviously, but...I found some websites, stuff about hypnosis. I found some forums, and I..." She let out a long, trembling breath. "I found out that there was such a thing as real erotic hypnosis. There were people out there who could really hypnotize you, just like in all the stories I'd read...and written...and it really turned them on too, just like it did me. Like it does me."
Just remembering it right now turned her on, even if fear and shame conspired to mute the feeling a little. "I found my first hypnosis mp3 about six years ago. It was by a man calling himself 'The Operator', it was supposed to bring you to orgasm. I...I listened to it without even checking to see if there were any hidden suggestions. I just couldn't help myself; it was all my fantasies come to life right there, a guy hypnotizing me and making me cum with just his voice, and it was right there in front of me. It worked, too." Her gaze grew slightly distant as she remembered just how intense that orgasm had been, the silky-smooth voice coaxing her hands to rub her clit, the way that his words had seemed to caress her nipples as though he had invisible hands...she broke away from the memory with an effort.
"I remember noticing that there were other suggestions in there, ones that reduced my resistance and increased my susceptibility to hypnosis. I told myself they didn't work, that I just liked getting off on the fantasy. I listened to it three more times that day, and at least once a day after that." She saw Sasha, the dark-haired girl, seeming to gaze off into the distance herself, and wondered if she'd heard the same recordings and if she was remembering them right now.
"After a while, he started putting up other recordings, and I listened to those, too. By then, I wasn't even really remembering what he was suggesting to me. I just remembered that it felt good. But after a few months, I started getting these really strong urges to email him and thank him for the files. I fought it for a few days, out of shyness and a little bit of worrying about talking to strangers over the Internet, but...I gave in. I didn't know it until later, but that was one of the post-hyps he'd put in his files."
She remembered typing the email, signing off with the phrase, 'With spiral submissions, Brenda.' She had thought it was her own idea, just a quirky little signature, but it was actually her subconscious telling the Operator that she'd emailed him as a result of a post-hypnotic suggestion instead of doing it of her own volition.
"Within a few days of that, we were chatting regularly. We even talked on the phone sometimes. It was..." She remembered everything she could, but it was mostly just flashes--kneeling on the floor with a hands-free headset on so she could pinch her nipples with both hands while she sank deeper for him, ASCII designs that instantly sent her into trance, phone calls at work from a seeming stranger who asked if she'd forgotten her panties and the blushing realization that she actually had... "It was intense. I don't know how much of it was the hypnosis and how much of it was just the power of having all those fantasies realized, but I loved to give myself to him." She didn't have to tell everyone just how many orgasms she'd had during those months. She could tell they'd all been there.
