The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

I arrived home from the movies at eleven forty-five and I’d earlier gotten mum’s key. When I went to stick it in the lock and let myself in, the porch light suddenly came on and flooded me with bright light. Then the door opened to reveal mum standing there in her dressing robe, smiling. She stepped back and opened the door to let me in. Needless to say, I was surprised.

Mum never waited up for me anymore. That was our standing arrangement. I was to be as quiet as I could be when coming home late so as not to disturb her sleep. She was always telling me that the older a person got, the less sleep they needed, but it didn’t apply to her. She loved her sleep and usually turned in around eight-thirty every night of the week. On Saturday nights, she would usually let her hair down and stay up until nine-thirty when she wanted to live dangerously.

She closed the door behind me to find me standing with my arms folded across my chest and a quizzical look on my face that said: “Am I seeing things or did you wait up for me?” She just smiled strangely at me, looking a little uncomfortable, so I said it as well.

‘Am I seeing things,’ I said, ‘or did you wait up for me?’

‘I knew you’d say that,’ she grinned, walking past me then to head toward the kitchen. Like a little puppy that had had many long years of obedience training, I followed. Besides, I knew what she was going to the kitchen for. She was going to make me my last coffee for the day. I sat down at the table and waited, glad to be home. I always was.

‘How was the movie?’ She asked, stirring the cup.

‘Fine,’ I answered. I’d eventually gone to the second show, although I nearly didn’t. It had taken me a long while of walking around town to finally settle down to where I might be able to concentrate on the show and enjoy it for what it was. But in the long run it turned out that I didn’t and I hadn’t. Nevertheless, I lied anyway, my reservation beyond the entrance to the Pearly Gates having long since been taken by another more deserving, I was sure, although trying to covertly hypnotize the Pearly Gates-keeper wasn’t beyond my spiritual morals, I knew that, too.

Mum brought over my coffee and sat down. Hers was in her other hand. I sipped and sighed, knowing she made me better coffee than I made myself. I think other people’s coffee made for you always tasted better, simply because you don’t have to go to the trouble of making it yourself, so, you enjoy it more, not having had to expend the time and effort in making it yourself. That way, it was really free. I sipped my free coffee again and sighed again. Lip-smacking good was my mum’s free coffee, I thought, then I waited, knowing she’d get around to saying something. She had that look on her face. I decided then that I’d save her remaining dignity.

‘I’m sorry, mum.’ I said, ‘but you shouldn’t have put me on the spot like that. It was all I could come up with on such short notice.’

Mum just chuckled and sipped her coffee.

‘Besides,’ I went on, ‘you’re the one that keeps telling me to put on a show. Well, I did, only this one was for free, that’s all.’

I sipped my coffee then and watched the strangest thing happen to my mother as she sipped her coffee and looked up at me from beneath her eyelids and over the rim of her cup and sipped. Then she lowered her cup and sighed, just like I did. Maybe that’s where I picked up the mannerism in the first place? I didn’t really know.

‘Yes,’ she repeated my words quietly, looking directly into my eyes with her own that were not blinking. ‘That one was for free.’

I smiled, then sipped and sighed once more, watching her doing the same, but her unblinking gaze never left mine throughout her sip and sigh. I wondered then if she was trying to hypnotize me and grinned.

‘But the next one won’t be,’ she said quietly, but very seriously.

For some inexplicable reason, I couldn’t get a smile going. I wanted to and I tried to, but the look in her eyes and on her face somehow killed it at birth. It wasn’t what she said, but the way in which she’d said it, almost like delivering a lethal promise or a threat. I actually felt a little uncomfortable and I never felt like that in her company. I took the coward’s way out and put it back on her.

‘Everything okay, mum?’ I asked, sipping my coffee and sighing again, but quietly. I didn’t want to miss her answer. As I sat waiting for it, I wondered when her eyes would become so dry that she’d have to blink. I became more curious about it as the seconds ticked by. Then she blinked. I almost cheered.

‘It will be,’ she replied with a slight grin. I say slight because I’d never quite seen that particular grin on my mother’s face before. There seemed to be some kind of yet-to-be-spoken-of intent behind it. Then she added, ‘once I get your hypnosis shows organized properly, that is.’ Then she dropped her gaze quickly from mine and sipped her coffee again.

I nearly choked on my sip that I’d been half way through and suddenly felt cheated somehow. I’d been looking forward to the sigh, too. It always signaled the end of something old and the beginning of something new-the next sip.

‘What?’ I managed, after coughing for a second or two. ‘What did you say?’

‘Steven,’ she said quite seriously, ‘you heard me clearly the first time and you know it. Stop playing dumb.’

‘Mum,’ I said. ‘have you been drinking?’

She chuckled, then sipped and sighed again while I waited to confirm if one of us needed to be certified as insane. I didn’t think it would be me. I’d had too good a night, so far. Then I remembered that my mother did not drink.

‘Steven,’ she said, holding my gaze evenly, ‘I have a confession to make.’

Now I really was beginning to feel uncomfortable. It was usually the other way round, and, I was sure it was supposed to always be that way. Mothers don’t usually confess things to their children-mine never had before, at any rate. I raised my eyebrows as my only answer. Words would not have expressed what I was feeling right then, but it wasn’t like a priest.

‘I never thought that hypnosis really worked,’ she admitted, then grinned sheepishly at me.

‘What?’ I exclaimed in surprise. ‘But you encouraged me and had faith in me,’ I said sincerely, ‘and I probably only succeeded because you always taught me that if I wanted to do it, I could!’

‘I know what I always tell you, Stevie,’ she said, ‘and it’s true, you can, and, you have, but far more successfully than I would have ever imagined. It wasn’t you that I didn’t believe in, it was hypnosis. At university, some of the psyche guys tried it with a bunch of us, but nothing ever happened, and they tried many times with all of us, as a group and by ourselves. In the end, they just gave up. We didn’t think that they believed it would work, either.’

‘That’s probably why it didn’t,’ I threw in, still a bit miffed.

‘Probably,’ mum agreed, ‘but still, even when you began learning it, I figured you’d eventually wake up to the fact that it wouldn’t work, somewhere along the line. You’re not just a pretty face, Steven, as I keep telling you.’

‘Did you think I was lying to you when I told you about your neighbor and the others?’ I said, not that I’d ever told her anything at all about them, except that I had been successful.

‘No.’ she answered. ‘To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to think. I only know that I have never believed in hypnosis.’

‘Jesus, Mum!’ I said, draining the last of my coffee.

‘Until tonight,’ she added as I placed my cup down on the table.

‘Really?’ I asked, wanting to be sure she wasn’t just placating me.

‘Yes, Stevie,’ she smiled warmly at me, ‘and not only do I now firmly believe in hypnosis, but I have even more faith in you and your abilities, as well as your future potential as a hypnotist and hypnosis therapist than I have ever felt before.’

My chest puffed out before I could stop it. Mum and I never actually had any heart to heart mother-to-son talks like this, where she built me up directly. It had always been subtle hints. Now it was direct, almost saying: “You’re good, son. I’m proud of you.” And then she almost repeated my thought.

‘I’m very proud of you, Steven,’ she said warmly, ‘and I thank you for demonstrating to me that hypnosis really does work, where many others had tried and failed.’

What could I say? I never could handle direct compliments very well, so I looked at my coffee cup instead, feeling strangely odd. I should’ve thanked her for that direct compliment, at least, but I didn’t. As I said, I felt strangely odd.

‘And you know what?’ She went on, a tremor of excitement clearly obvious in the tone of her voice, ‘I have never felt better about my life and myself than I do right now, and have done all night since you left.’

All I could do was smile.

‘I should be angry with you, in a way,’ she continued, ‘because not long after you left, all the girls went home. Suddenly, no one wanted to play bridge anymore, although I have to confess, I really didn’t feel like it much then, either.’

All I could do was smile, and, feel odd. The light hairs on my forearms were beginning to prickle. That had never been a good sign for me.

‘Your hypnosis tonight has somehow made me feel that I can accomplish so much more for myself than I’ve been doing,’ she said then, ‘instead of moping around here thinking about times past and being a liability to you and your life, making you feel you have to live here and look after me like the lonely widow.’

‘Mum!’ I began. ‘I’ve nev—!’ But she cut me off dead with a wave of her hand.

‘It doesn’t matter, Stevie,’ she said, ‘that’s what I’ve been thinking of late, since you’ve been back-not that I haven’t been more than happy to have you here. I have been, and more than you know, Baby.’

I was almost in tears, and, I still felt fucking odd.

‘But your hypnosis tonight has somehow changed the way I feel now,’ she continued, ‘and, I suspect it’s changed some, if not all of the girls, too. They couldn’t wait to get out of here. Usually, I have to throw them out, especially Serena.’

‘Who?’ I asked, feeling emotionally safe with that one single word.

‘Serena,’ she answered, ‘the dark-haired woman who was sitting next to me.’

I nodded, recalling the woman mum seemed to be talking seriously to as I’d been leaving.

‘The thing is, Stevie,’ she went on, ‘I want to have more out of my life, and I think your father would want me to, anyway, and I don’t feel guilty anymore now, thanks to your hypnosis tonight. In fact, I’m sure he’d approve of you and I both of getting as much happiness into our lives as we could manage’

I nodded, feeling the lump in my throat build from a very small one. Christ, I hated Lassie-come-fucking-home scenarios.

‘It’s okay, Baby,’ she said suddenly and I knew she’d noticed my eyes. She reached across and placed her warm hand over mine and pressed gently, ’

I lowered my head and stared into my coffee cup. Like I said, I hate Lassie-come-home movies, especially when I’m Timmie. Mum was quiet for a little while, giving time for my moment to pass. Then she squeezed my hand again, but more firmly.

‘Steven.’ She said, the excitement in her voice again, ‘I’ve been sitting here thinking about my life as it’s been, both with and without all you kids, and with and without your Dad. I’ve hardly moved from the table since you left, except to take a shower. And I’ve been thinking differently, too, about everything in my life, including you.’

I blinked into my coffee cup and raised the level inside by a very small amount, thinning the sugar content at the same time. I saw haze. I hated seeing haze. I had no fucking answer for haze. I never did have. I usually just ignored it and hoped it went away. That was what I was doing now, ignoring and hoping while I listened. She squeezed my hand again.

‘Baby,’ she went on as she squeezed. Definitely the wrong fucking word at that particular time, ‘I don’t need you here to look after me anymore. I really don’t.’

Then she squeezed my hand again. Fucking haze. Fucking Lassie-come-home scenarios. Fucking Timmies.

‘If it’s all right with you,’ she continued, ‘your old mum needs her space now, but you’re welcome anytime to visit anytime, you know that.’

I blinked and fought through the fucking haze anyway, no matter what she saw in my eyes, but I could hardly see anyway, so it didn’t really matter.

‘Space?’ I said astounded, knowing I was losing the plot a bit and that everything she was saying was right. ‘Space? You need your space? Christ! Like a teenager? You need your bloody space?’

‘Baby, I—,’ she began, squeezing my hand, but I’d had enough of fucking haze for one night.

‘You need your space? Jesus, Mum! I know you’ve got a life! We all have!’ I said emotionally, hating the word, “Haze,” more than ever, ‘But Dad isn’t just a memory yet! And he wouldn’t leave you alone right now. I have to look after you! He’d want me to! He’s expecting me to, I know, Mum, expecting me to! And I want to!’

‘Steven, she began quietly, but then she stopped when I looked down. She just squeezed my hand and the tears from my eyes with the one grip, but said nothing. I was talking directly to the coffee cup now. It would save getting the tablecloth messy.

‘Maybe I need to be here to have you look after me?’ I said quietly, gazing through the haze to the ripples in my coffee. ‘Maybe I’m the one that’s not ready to soldier off my own yet? Maybe I need you to look after me, instead of the other way round?’

Jesus, what a fucking movie, I thought to myself. Fucking dogs and Timmies and coffee and mums who want to be teenagers again. What have I done to her with hypnosis? I then wondered.

‘Get a grip, Steven,’ mum suddenly said like a mother and completely spoiling my rare moment of utter self-pity, ‘I’m not sending you to Siberia, just back to your flat. Come over every night of the week, if you like, and stay all weekend. Just allow me the weeknights to have for myself to try and organize myself. I haven’t been organized since your father died, you know that, always moping around, feeling lazy and trying to get interested in things I’m not really interested in.’

I listened and sobered up, slowly.

‘Steven,’ she went on, ‘your Dad’s gone. We both know and accept that because we have no choice now. But your hypnosis tonight has made me realize that my life’s not over yet, and neither is yours. Both our lives are only just beginning, just along a different direction without him. That’s all. And he’d be proud of us, I’m sure, that we’re both taking steps now and trying to bring some happiness back into our lives without him. Don’t you think, Baby? Don’t you really think he would?’

I did. I knew that. I did. I sighed, sounding a little shaky. Then I looked up and tried to smile. I failed and blinked instead. Fucking haze. Mum squeezed my hand.

‘It’s okay, Stevie,’ she said, and I knew somehow that it was, probably because she said it was. Mums were like that and always seemed to have that effect. Mine did, anyway. When they said, ‘Come here, Mummy kiss it better,” and I did and it was, it was always magic. She was always magic. I never knew where she got her magic from, only that it worked, and, it was working now. I nodded and looked up. The haze had gone, mostly.

‘Yes,’ I said quietly, after taking a deep breath, ‘He would, I know.’ Then I let out the breath. Sounded a bit shaky to me, but I didn’t care now. The moment had passed. Then reality set in.

‘I guess I was thinking of me having you,’ I said, ‘not the other way round.’

She squeezed my hand. ‘I think it was a bit of both, Baby,’ she said, ‘I know you better than you know yourself, and I think your father would be very proud of you right now.’

Fucking haze. Never any fucking warning. Never. I just looked down and nodded, hoping he was.

‘Another coffee?’ She said suddenly in a bright tone of voice.

I nodded and handed her my spoiled cup, then wiped my face, feeling silly. Then I recalled I hadn’t cried over dad’s death yet. I’d been too busy trying to be brave for everyone else in the family, especially mum. I’d looked after all the funeral arrangements and had spoken the epitaph at the service, which had nearly killed me. But I only took on that responsibility because I was the eldest and mum wasn’t capable at the time or I’m sure she would have done it just to spare me.

I breathed deeply again when she came back and sat down. Then I managed a weak smile, poor by any stretch of the imagination, but at least it was better than the fucking haze. She smiled back. My mum had the most wonderful smile right then. I swear she looked younger than her years, much younger.

Then I tried to recall whatever I’d told them all while I’d had them in trance. Jesus, I thought-what have I done. I sipped the fresh coffee, still wondering, determined not to spoil it, and so, held it away from directly beneath my face. Mum’s smile was gradually becoming infectious as I sat there sipping my coffee and looking comfortably into her eyes, for no other reason than I could definitely see the beginnings of a familiar cheeky grin forming at the corners of her mouth.

‘Stevie, I’m going to be your Manager.’ Mum then said out of the blue. ‘Apart from whatever therapy work you might want to do, or have the time to do, I’m going to arrange private hypnosis shows for you to do in people’s homes and I’m going to be your Manager.’ Then she added, ‘And, you’re going to be paid very well for them, too.’

I don’t know why I said it, but I did. I was probably so blown away by my mother turning hypnosis entrepreneur that I wasn’t thinking too much at all right then, but I said it, nevertheless.

‘You mean, we’re going to be paid very well for them,’ I corrected her quietly, feeling my face finally begin to relax into a sort of a smile.

‘That’s the boy that I’ve grown to know and love in times of trouble and strife!’ She said excitedly. ‘Now, you can leave it all to me, since I’m going to make the mess we’re going to get into together. All you’ll have to do is what you did tonight, or something similar. We can’t bore them to death with the same routine all the time. I expect they’ll come back for seconds and thirds once they see you in action.’

Mrs. Monty Python, my mum, extraordinaire. Then she chuckled at her own joke at twelve-thirty in the morning. I felt drained, but I managed a sincere smile, with just a tinge of excitement attached to it. But, I felt absolutely drained.

‘What you have to do is to come up with different ideas for the shows,’ she said, the excitement building in her voice, ‘and then I can—’

‘Mum,’ I said, interrupting her politely, ‘I have to get some sleep, really. Can we talk about this tomorrow?’

She squeezed the hand she’d been holding and smiled, but the cheeky excited grin remained in full force, as if she’d simply change tack now and start writing out a full fucking twelve month’s business plan before dawn while waiting for me to get out of bed so we could take up right where we left off.

‘Sure, Baby,’ she smiled, ‘you run along and get your beauty sleep. Can’t have our customers staring into baggy eyes while you try to hypnotize them. They’d just laugh at you.’

When she laughed from her belly at her own joke like that, I had to join her. I always did and I don’t know why. It wasn’t all that funny, but I did-a tension breaker, I think. Anyway, by the time we’d both finished laughing, the haze was back, but this time, it was a different haze, a good haze.

I said goodnight and hugged her then kissed her cheek. Then I went to bed, not really sure about anything, except that I’d done something to my mother using hypnosis. The last thought on my mind before I felt the Sandman coming to glue my eyes shut for a few hours was of dad, hoping he’d forgive me if she hocked the house to book the London Palladium and nobody showed up.

LG, I thought then, and immediately wondered if it was going to be. It had been, I knew that, but that was all I knew right then. Over the next few seconds then, I didn’t know anything much at all. I was asleep. Was L still G? Who knew? I was fucked.