Signed First Edition Ch. 01

Now, in the last chapter, I described dear old Reggie by using the moniker "verbose," and paraphrased the introduction to his book. Allow me to do pretty much the same thing here, since the personal Reggie turned out to be surprising like the written version. The first thing he did in that booth in the bar was pass me his business card, which proved him to be a sales rep for a restaurant supply firm. He told me he could make me a very good deal on an industrial deep fat fryer. The hypnosis thing was evidently a sideline, but one that had, slowly but surely, become their primary source of income.

Reginald Cathwright (assuming everything he told me was accurate), became interested in hypnosis during his junior year in college. His biggest surprise at the time was the fact that there was no shortage of sweet young lady volunteers whose greatest desire was that they be given the distinct opportunity of surrendering their free will to him. He, being a chivalrous chap, was more than happy to make those particular dreams a reality. Sex was assumed to be part of the deal, and he certainly was not averse to making those assumptions come true. Word of his "abilities" spread of its own accord, and by the end of his senior year, women from all over the campus were seeking him out, hoping to experience firsthand the sense of emotional hypnotic submission they subconsciously craved.

Things were going splendidly until a graduate intern from a financial institution approached him, asking (as they all did) if he wouldn't mind stripping her of all the dreary burdens of a free-thinking woman and please, please take her heart, take her free will, take her soul, and use her as he wished. Pretty routine, by that point, actually; except for one small thing. HE fell in love with HER. Who would have guessed?

Cathy, as a newly minted hypnotic sex slave wife, tried to give her husband everything she possibly could in life. That's evidently just what hypnotic sex slave wives DO, I guess. Because she worked in the financial industry, she decided that one of the particular things she could provide was her help in making him rich. He, unfortunately, was not as inclined toward monetary rewards as she. He wanted to take her places ... do things ... have fun; and all of these fine goals were far from advantageous in furthering his wealth. They argued from time to time, but she always capitulated, for that, too, is just what hypnotic sex slave wives do. However, that did not stop her from making suggestions ... one of which was the scheme for spotting women with an obvious proclivity toward sexual slavery and helping them attain their goal ... for a fee.

He had his standards, though, and morality ranked far above riches in his book. He needed to make sure this was what the girl really wanted ... and he needed to make sure it was what her husband or boyfriend really wanted ... before he would begin the process of enslavement. Still, Cathy's idea seemed to work from the very beginning. There were still points of disagreement, of course. Cathy thought they should charge more ... but he considered it primarily a hobby, rather than a job. Eventually, they compromised by charging different prices depending on what the couple could comfortably afford.

Then Cathy had come up with the concept of hypnotic enslavement for subservient MEN, as well. Reggie had found the whole idea a bit of a turn-off, but his pretty wife believed that, through instruction during deep hypnosis, he could adequately teach HER to become adept at the art. They'd tried it, and he found that she had a great knack for it. She was very beautiful, and by dressing for the part of hypnotic dominatrix, obedient men were practically entranced as soon as they set eyes on her. There were far fewer couples who sought out this particular relationship, of course ... not necessarily because there was a lack of submissive men, but because their wives and girlfriends often lacked adequate dominant tendencies; and Reggie refused to let hypnosis get involved when he knew that the end result would not be mutually satisfactory.

There were a few instances when they provided a "dual service," in which both husband and wife were convinced to share hypnotic fantasies, then "trade off" by letting first one be dominant, then the other. Cathy implanted hypnotic suggestions in the man, and Reggie did the same for the woman. These cases proved quite gratifying, at least to Reggie, but it meant double the effort for no greater financial reward.

And through it all, Cathy remained firmly enslaved by her husband, not because he chose to keep her submissive and subservient, but because it was her choice to be so.

Then, just lately, Cathy came up with yet another variation on the same theme ... gays and lesbians. This really made Reggie uncomfortable ... not (he told himself) because he was homophobic ... but because it just "wasn't his cup of tea." Cathy made a persuasive argument, though, especially when she suggested that they simply continue as they had been, with her taking all the men clients, and he concentrating only on the women. And the number of homosexual couples who fit their "profile" was surprising. It made sense, however, when they realized that there tended to be naturally dominant and submissive partners in a majority of such pairings.

Finally, after doing this "hypnotic enslavement for profit" gig for almost five years, the money started pouring in. Cathy began talking more about Roth IRA's and other tax deferred retirement accounts. Reggie suddenly had his eye on a house up at Lake Arrowhead.

The concept of the books had been his idea, though it had irked Cathy a little. One of their "clients" had turned out to be the wife of a printer/publisher from Altadena, but for once, they had wound up spending money rather than making it. It had been a great business investment, however. They had even written the text in such a way that it didn't matter if the "couple" was straight or gay. Thinking back on it, I realized he was right. The "wife or girlfriend" had been the main subject in my book, but her significant other had always been referred to as "spouse or lover." The hypnotist was always out of frame in the pictures, and a girlfriend is always a girlfriend, after all. (I won't get into all the political upheaval that California was going through in 2011 about legalizing gay marriage, but even THAT context would be acceptable in the book.)

By this time in the diatribe, we were well into our hamburgers and Reggie had ordered yet another round of beer. "I wound up being real friends with that publisher," he told me, eating and gesturing with his free hand. "And you would not BELIEVE what that guy does for fun! He gets modeling clay, and he ...."

"Makes letters of the alphabet," I guessed.

He gawked openly at me. "How the hell did you KNOW that?"

I shrugged. "He runs a small press. I doubt it's enough to keep him alive financially. It's more a hobby. People might hate their jobs, but they all LOVE their hobbies. AND, he set up your book in a totally unique typeface. He created it. Those letters of the alphabet were a labor of love. Professional printers nowadays all do it on the computer ... but the old timers, they still like to get their hands dirty."

"Damn!" he muttered. "How old are you, if you don't mind me asking? Twenty-five?"

"Twenty-eight."

"And you're a nuclear physicist?"

"Nuclear engineer."

"What's the difference?"

"Physicists think deep thoughts. Engineers make them happen. And I'm not even THAT, anymore. I'm ... um ... sort of ... on hiatus."

He shifted in his seat almost guiltily. "Would you ... uh ... would you mind telling me about that?"

"About what?" I leaned forward and found some of that righteous indignation I'd lost after meeting him. "Just what, exactly, did you DO to my wife?" I asked firmly. "What did you make her tell you?"

That didn't seem to have the desired effect on him at all. For the first time, I realized he was drunk. "Well, naturally, the woman is immensely proud of you. She was scared to death by your illness ... she told me that you'd almost died ... but she simply couldn't BE any more in love with you." He swayed slightly in his seat. "Could you tell me about it? You're a genuine hero, dude."

"I am NOT a hero!" I said angrily, emphatically. "The REAL heroes went back into that place the next day ... and the day after ... KNOWING that they might not come out again ... KNOWING that even if they did come out alive, they would probably be critically sick. They did it for their families and for their friends and for their country! THOSE were the heroes. Don't even begin to TRY to put me in THEIR league!" I suddenly suspected that I had raised my voice, and I glanced around the bar. People were staring at me, and even when I made eye contact with them, they kept looking. "Oh, crap," I muttered, staring at my empty beer glass and realizing it had been my third. The waiter was putting a fourth full glass down in front of me, and he was staring, too.

I took a deep breath and gazed at the drunken hypnotist. "Your wife was right," I told him calmly. "You're a financial idiot." He just gazed at me with some stupefied sense of wonder. "Let's just say for a moment," I continued, "that maybe I WOULD have paid you twenty-five thousand for that silly piece of quartz in that little bag you have in your pocket."

"Cubic Zirconium," he corrected pleasantly.

"You would give that up to hear a guy tell you a war story in a bar?"

"Dude, I'd give it up just to KNOW you."

I shook my head slowly, but I couldn't seem to clear the cobwebs. I hadn't really talked about this during the past eight months with anyone except members of my immediate family. One reporter had gotten wind of it, but he'd been easily discouraged. It was something I just didn't do ... with anyone. But Reggie sort of has that affect on a person, I guess, because now I did talk about it. I talked about it all. I talked a lot. I must have droned for the better part of an hour. At times, a small crowd formed around us and listened.

I told him what I'd done, and I answered all the questions that people usually ask, and even more. How bad WAS the earthquake? (It was so strong and lasted so long that three people in my group had gotten seasick ... one violently so.) How long between the earthquake and the tsunami? (It varied all along the coast, but where I was, it was 41 minutes. We had known it was probably coming, of course, but not when it would arrive. And it was not really a wave ... at least, not the way most people think of a wave ... not like a wave on the beach. It was more like a "swell." The water just started rising, and it didn't stop.) How had I escaped it? (Someone had lowered the fire escape ladder on the Security Building, and we all climbed up to the roof, one at a time ... but I had been burdened by the dead weight of my unconscious lady, her body slung over my shoulder. I was the next-to-last person in our group to make the climb. Perhaps if I'd been a little quicker, that last member would have made it, too. He was halfway up, but was swept away.) A Navy guy asked me why they didn't scram the reactor. (One of the reasons that there's never been a nuclear accident in the U.S. Navy is that they run drills constantly whenever they're at sea. Even the non-nuclear types hear all the announcements on the ship's 1MC system, so every sailor knows SOME of the vernacular.) (If you don't know what it means to "scram" a reactor, you can look it up on the internet. And the answer was that they DID scram them. They scrammed them ALL, just as soon as the earthquake struck. But the quake had cut all the power lines, and the tsunami flooded the emergency generators, which were providing cooling flow to the reactor chambers themselves. They immediately started overheating. That's why we put together a team to go back in and try to start them back up ... unsuccessfully).

And on and on and on I talked. Somebody bought another round ... and another. But finally, I put up my hands and declared that was all ... I'd talked enough. Those listeners-in around us simply nodded and left us alone. A couple of them insisted on shaking my hand.

I staggered to the bathroom, then used my cell phone to call Elaine and tell her where I was, and I asked her to please come and get me, since I was certainly in no shape to drive home. I sat heavily again across from Reggie.

"Thanks, dude," he told me sincerely. I suddenly noticed the green velvet bag sitting in front of me.

I slid it back across the table toward him. "I have no intention of doing anything to Elaine," I told him seriously, "using hypnosis, or anything else. I love her just the way she is. I don't WANT to change her."

He smiled warmly. "Rod, hypnosis wouldn't change her ... it would simply allow her to be who she IS."

I gave him a sour expression. "You're drunk. You're not making any sense."

His smiled didn't falter. "Drunk, maybe. But I'm not making sense to you because you're not willing to accept the truth about her. She's submissive, subservient, obedient .... She contains all the traits of the perfect sex slave. And outwardly, she is NOT your sex slave only because she believes you do not WANT her to be your sex slave. Make sense?"

I blinked at him. "No."

Finally, the smile changed to a look of patient consternation. "Dude, for someone so smart, you can be kinda dense. I did not do ANYTHING to your lovely bride. Well, except for one or two itty bitty little suggestions. But she is who she is. I did NOT change her."

I considered this for a moment. "Good," I told him.

Now he finally frowned. "Rod, do you love your wife?"

"Well, of course I love her."

"Don't you want to give her what she wants?

I studied him. "You're speaking in riddles."

"Dude," he said imploringly, "give her what she craves! Let her be the girl she WANTS to be! While she was really deep in trance, I asked her what her greatest regret in her relationship with you was. Can you guess her answer?"

The question was like a cold shower. Suddenly, I felt sober. I refused to respond, but I locked him with a stern, questioning stare.

"She told me that she wished she could give you a really good blow job. She said that she didn't like doing that ... that she didn't think she COULD do it. But she wanted SO much to give you that pleasure. Don't look so shocked, dude. That is ... BEEEEP! ... the NUMBER ONE ANSWER among submissive chicks. She just wants to please YOU, and she felt she wasn't doing that because of HER shortcomings. And so ... I made a few really deep-set hypnotic suggestions, and I turned a dislike into a 'I gotta have me some of THAT' sort of desire." He leaned forward toward me. "In other words, I gave her what she WANTS. Is that a crime, do you think?"

I sat back and put a shaking hand to my forehead. "Elaine is incredibly bright and fun and witty and ...."

"Rod, you wouldn't change any of that. She will still be HER! You would just let her be the 'HER' she wants to be."

Suddenly, I was out of arguments. Could it really be that simple, or was I being entranced by this professional hypnotist into believing what he wanted me to believe?

"Look," he said, confidentially, leaning toward me again and lowering his voice. "When you get her home, tell her to do something outrageous. Something embarrassing ... something sexual .... something humiliating. She'll do it, I can guarantee you. Not because of some hypnotic suggestion on my part ..." he raised his right hand, "... I swear to God. She'll do it because it's in her NATURE to do it. She'll do it, because deep down inside, she is ALREADY your sex slave. Obeying you pleases her. It arouses her. Try it, Rod. You'll see. And then, ask her what she thinks about when she makes love to you."

I glowered at him. "Man, nobody should EVER ask a question like that."

"Do it, dude. Ask her. I didn't prompt her ... (again, he raised his hand in a Scout's honor gesture) and you'll never guess what she's going to tell you. I can absolutely guarantee you that you're going to be super-surprised." He took a breath and thought a minute. "If two people are in love, then the ONLY problems they have boil down to a simple lack of communication."

I couldn't help but give him a sad smile. "If only it were really that simple."

"But it IS!" he persisted. And then he hesitated and examined me carefully. "What DO you think your problem is, Rod?"

I paused, too. I felt very uncomfortable talking about such intimate things with a man I had virtually just met, but the beer was flowing through my veins and the guy was so damned personable. "We're ... um ... having a small problem with conception."

He blinked at me. "Well, I guess you're right. You can hypnotize her all day long, but you can never give her a deep enough suggestion to make her pregnant." He thought some more. "I suppose you've been to experts about it." And his eyes widened with a sudden thought. "Holy shit! It's what happened to you in Japan, isn't it? It's the radiation thing!"

I nodded glumly. "Sperm count is practically nonexistent," I commiserated. "I guess I should be happy that all the rest of the plumbing still works."

"Damn straight," he told me with feeling. "You SHOULD be happy ... you DESERVE to be happy ... and so does your wife. Now, don't be a Bozo! Take this thing," (he held up the little green pouch) "try doing what I've said, and give the little lady what she yearns for." His eyes suddenly shifted past me, over my shoulder. He slid the velvet bag back across the table to me. "Shit! She's here! Take this! Put it in your pocket!" Without thinking, I did what he said, and then I looked up into Elaine's questioning brown eyes.

"Uh ... Hi, Reggie," she said, glancing at him nervously. Then she turned her tender gaze on me again. "Honey, you shouldn't be getting like this. Not yet. We've worked so hard building your strength back up!" She faced my drinking buddy again, this time with an angry expression. "And YOU! If I'd known you were going to be a rotten influence on my husband, I'd have never bought your silly book about ... um ..." she struggled for the right memory, "about ... uh ... whatever." She dismissed the thought and laid a gentle hand on my shoulder. "Rod, let's go home ... please? Where's your car?"

I held up my keys. "Bartender moved it into his parking lot for me. Said I could leave it there overnight. Really nice guy. Have you eaten yet?"

"Please, Rod? Let's go home."

"Sure." I stood up, and found that I really enjoyed the feel of her arm around my waist. "Thanks for all the kind words," I told Reggie.

He smiled up at us. "You two have a great life," he told us, with what I believed to be a great deal of sincerity.

I can remember thinking that I hadn't been this drunk since my early years of college. I can remember counting out four aspirin tablets and taking them with a glass of water. I can remember hiding the little green bag in a drawer in my dresser. Sometime in the middle of the night, I can remember Elaine pressing her naked body into mine and holding me very tightly.

But that's about all I can remember about the remainder of that evening.

.........................

To Be Continued...