The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

It happened in Tallinn, in the Old Country, and it was a long time ago, he said, but he still remembered her words exactly.

“I don’t know, Karsten,” she said. “It’s not that I don’t like you, but—”

He—Karsten Talv—had just stared at her, dumbfounded. “What, then?”

“— you frighten me sometimes. I don’t know if I can trust you. I hardly know you.”

He reflected on this. Prima facie, it seemed to indicate that this young woman, ‘Katya’, was not willing to allow him to give her what she wanted, or at least not immediately. She had even described him, before, flushed with anger, as ‘messing with her mind’. But what he offered, he thought, was a precious gift: simplicity, clarity, and fulfilment. He’d learned by now that no matter how good one’s intentions might be—and his towards her were amongst the best—there was always a degree of unpredictability involved in dealing with others.

The restaurant was soothingly quiet and tastefully lit. Glasses clinked and people murmured in their twos and fours and the occasional group of six. At the next table, he observed from the corner of his eye a handsome couple of a similar age, holding hands across the white linen. The woman was a redhead. Karsten’s peripheral vision was excellent, and from the dilation of the redhead’s pupils and the swell of her nipples beneath her blouse, he perceived that she was aroused. His hearing was excellent too, and while ‘Katya’ had been speaking to him, with one ear he’d registered the redhead’s words of invitation to her partner, what she would do with him later, and what he would do to her.

He found it mundane, and wished he could help the redhead to express herself better. Perhaps another time.

Back to ‘Katya’. From what she had said, there seemed to be a question of trust, or more accurately the demonstration of trust, or more accurately still, he guessed, although this was doubly woolly territory, the perception of trust. This was something he didn’t wholly comprehend. Did she actually have ‘perceptions’, per se? He wasn’t sure, and had no way of really telling.

And it was true: ‘Katya’ did hardly know him, or (assuming for a moment she was independently aware) she was not at all aware of that part of him which would have been most important and insightful to know.

But none of this altered the key lemma. Clearly she wanted him, quite passionately—or presented as if she did—and there were specific things she needed in order to achieve her potential, and he could help, and that was surely that. He foresaw her beautiful blue eyes widening in realisation, and then the placid acceptance of the self-evident truth of this once he had explained it to her again.

Karsten wondered yet again whether ‘Katya’, the redhead, the other people in the restaurant, the food on his plate, the restaurant itself, and the world outside in general were actually real, in the strictly objective sense that he himself was, self-evidently and provably, real. It was an important question, and he had been grappling with it for some time.

Certainly, that which described itself as ‘Katya’ and other such apparent externalities behaved as if they were independently real. Quite often, they even talked as if they were distinct individuals with their own free will, emotions, and whatnot. But how could one be absolutely sure? It was all so circular. There seemed no obvious answer.

‘Katya’ really was extraordinarily beautiful, and presented as wilful, sensual, independent, and strong; he marvelled again at the ability of his wonderful mind to conjure up such objects of desire. But although she, ‘Katya’, presented as a young woman who knew exactly what she needed and wanted, he believed there were a number of deeper needs and wants which she did not articulate. These needs and wants seemed repressed or denied, possibly buried beneath imprinted codes of ‘normal behaviour’. He paused momentarily to ensure all this was logically consistent. Yes, if he were to assume that the other was independently conscious, she would by definition also have a subconscious. If she was not, experience told him that she would still behave and respond as if she did, which amounted to largely the same thing.

Instinct and experience told him that others loved it when you knew them as they really were (if they really were) and what they secretly craved. He felt confident that once she knew how well he understood her most deeply hidden desires, she would embrace this as a necessary and desirable part of the self-improvement process, and she would present as suitably grateful.

He just needed to get past this ridiculous knowledge / trust business and get her to appreciate him properly.

But how time flew! He realised fully three seconds had already passed since ‘Katya’ had spoken—almost four, now. Karsten Talv was a very quick thinker even then, and he’d learned a long time ago that social protocol dictated a spoken response within a given interval, for the avoidance of what he’d sometimes heard described as ‘awkward silences’.

So thinking, he organised his face into the special smile he knew worked best, and said:

“I understand, Katya. So what would you like to know?”

He doesn’t often dwell on his youthful experiences these days, he said, let alone the nature of reality. The past is the past, and he was a different person then, naïve and foolish, feeling his way towards his vocation. Nowadays, his skills and his work do not invite meaningful comparison with his early immature efforts. That said, he is a very self-aware man, and he recognises and nurtures certain formative events as valuable learning points and milestones of personal development. These are the tipping points where decisions are made and paths taken, and once taken they are taken forever, and where we learn and move on. Looking back, he said, he understands, and he is richer for the understanding.

But he just couldn’t make sense of it at the time. He had even been angry for a while; a whole new emotion for him. All that time and effort and dedication and single mindedness, all with the very best of intentions, and the end result was: unaccountably, incomprehensibly, wrong.

Consider: he’d shared ‘knowledge’ that evening in the restaurant, in the pursuit of ‘trust’, and some of it had been true. He hadn’t yet been sure if this in itself swayed the evidence in favour of external reality, or whether his mind was simply playing a clever trick on him.

Anyway, he’d told her all about papi and how he’d helped get the occupation out of the Old Country; all the heroic fables of the reconstruction. (He didn’t dwell on the way assets always seemed motivated to repurpose themselves to the benefit of Mister Talv senior.)

He’d spoken fondly of ema and her wise and warm and funny ways and how she was the very beating heart of his much-loved family. (He omitted to mention the many times he had quietly peered through her bedroom window to watch her endlessly striving in the service of a series of anonymous, faceless men, who may or may not have been real).

In response to one of her lines of questioning, he’d even made up a suitably romantic, innocent and rose-tinged story that could have come straight from the old myths. He’d explained how his first love, his soul mate, Hämarik, whose smile was like the sunrise, had broken his heart, and this was why he was alone in the world. Please, he didn’t want to talk any more about that. It made him sad. This had caused ‘Katya’ to present as smiling sympathetically, and she’d reached for his hand.

He’d talked about his passion for conceptual art; how, at its best, it allowed bland everyday objects to find a natural self-expression, transforming mundanity into beauty, and that included people too. And on this basis, things had proceeded gratifyingly and according to plan, and they’d returned to his, Karsten’s, apartment by the waterfront.

Whereupon the world had gone mad.

All that detailed analysis and planning: for nothing. He’d thought it all through to perfection, and his explanations were surely unambiguous. He had even drawn her a picture—several pictures, in fact!—in exquisite detail, to show exactly how the outcome would be, which was surely exactly what she wanted, if she would only see. He’d been so sure he’d understood what she wanted. It was the most extraordinary gift, and all would be for the best in the best of all possible worlds. Surely she must see? She would have it all. It was obvious.

So why on earth was she frowning at him like that?

And then, after all his most compelling insights and arguments and suasion, after all his good intentions, all he’d offered her, when with a final flourish he’d explained how their relationship would work from now on, all hell had broken loose. She had actually shouted at him—well, screamed, really—and thrown wine in his face, and slapped him—twice, hard—and then just flounced out of his apartment in a steaming rage.

It had been a revelation, an epiphany.

So the world outside existed after all, it seemed; but more importantly, it had feelings, desires, wants, spontaneity and will. And as she—Katya, mystifyingly, indisputably real—slammed the door behind her, he’d resolved to ditch this juvenile, solipsistic self, and grow up. He would be a better person in this world. And then, he could make the world a better place.

Here in New York, fifteen years on, I watch as Karsten puts his hand to his cheek at the memory, still fresh after all this time. I think he can still feel the sting of her hand.