The Coffee Shop Pt. 02

The key turning point in winning the respect and trust of my subordinates came when I went to bat for Julie Brenton, the new kid on the block. She made a mistake in one of the contracts she was working on, and didn't catch it. I didn't catch the mistake either, although that is not my job. Julie sent out the contract after I'd approved it and a few days later the shit hit the fan. The regional sales manager stormed into my office and demanded to see the person who had written up this contract. With some misgivings I phoned Julie and asked her to step into my office. Tom Blackstone had a reputation in the company as a hot head with a quick temper. He certainly justified that reputation today. He wasn't screaming at Julie, but he was coming damn close. He had her nearly in tears as he verbally abused her and made her feel like she was less than shit. I let him vent out some of his steam before I stepped in. "Mr. Blackstone, I think we need to talk in private for a bit," I said to him as I got up and walked around my desk to where he and Ms. Brenton were sitting. I gently put my hand on Ms. Brenton's shoulder and said to her, "Ms. Brenton, Julie, don't worry everything will be okay. Mr. Blackstone and I need to talk privately for a short while. Why don't you head back to your desk, and I'll call you when we need to see you again."

Julie was relieved to leave my office, if only to get away from Mr. Blackstone's ranting. Once she had left I closed the door behind her and made sure to lock it. I returned to my desk, and as soon as I sat down, Tom Blackstone started in on me.

"Why did you do that? I wasn't finished talking to her, yet!" He exclaimed. I just looked at him and didn't say a word.

"Well?" He asked after a few moments silence on my part.

"It wasn't fair to Ms. Brenton to tear into her like that," I replied calmly. "She was well aware of the mistake she made once it was pointed out to her. Emphasizing the point, as you did, was no help to the situation. You nearly had her in tears. What good is that? Is that what you wanted?"

"Sure, if it will prevent her from making a bonehead mistake like that again," Tom replied with a slight smirk on his face.

"If I didn't know better, Tom," I said to him, mildly surprised. "I'd think that you actually enjoyed doing that."

"Well, yeah, kind of. Don't you?" He asked me.

"Not at all, and I am most disappointed in you. There are better ways to handle mistakes, to insure that they don't happen again," I told him.

"Yeah, well you're still new at being a manager. You'll find out the hard way, I guess." Tom said in an off hand manner. "Just out of curiosity, what would you have done?"

"Apologized, to begin with," I told him. "I should never have let you talk to Ms. Burton like that. I think you owe her an apology as well."

"You can demean yourself in front of your staff, if you want to, but I won't," Tom told me firmly. "How you handle your staff is your affair but don't expect me to apologize to that woman. She made the mistake, not me." This was getting me nowhere. It was time to take some drastic action. I looked at my wrist watch and saw that there was enough time for what I had in mind, if I hurried it a bit.

"Tom, the least you could do, when I talk with you, is to look me in the eyes, " I said to him. (Okay so, I was setting him up for a little 'attitude adjustment'. Can you blame me? Besides, after what he had just done, a little change in his personality might do everyone at the company some good.) Tom shifted his eyes and looked directly at mine. I quickly sent the mental commands, "Tom, I will now hypnotize you with a spinning spiral. Once you see the spinning spiral the induction will begin. You cannot look away from the spiral. You will have no choice but to go along with it, because it will make you feel very good to do so. Each statement and suggestion I make takes effect immediately." Tom blinked his eyes a few times as a glazed look washed over his face for a few seconds.

"I have something here on the computer that I think you should see, Tom," I told him. "It won't take long." I quickly booted up my spinning spiral program, and then swiveled the monitor so that Tom could see it from where he sat.

"What's that supposed to do, hypnotize me?" Tom said with a slight laugh as he glanced at the spinning spiral on the screen and then his eyes became locked on it.

"Exactly that," I said to him. "In fact the longer you look at the spiral, the harder it becomes to look away. With each passing moment and with each breath you take you can feel yourself less able to look away. You can feel your eyes being drawn to the center of the spiral...which leads down."

"Can't look away," Tom said absently.

"It's a lovely wonderful spiral that keeps leading you down, Tom," I said to him. I didn't have time for a lengthy and enjoyable induction. This had to be fast and quick. I continued, "With each breath that you take your eyes become tired and the eyelids become heavier and heavier. And when your eyes close Tom, you will fall deeply asleep. The spiral is powerful and you can feel yourself surrendering to its power as it continues to lead you down deeper and deeper."

"Deeper, eyes getting tired....want to close," Tom said. He was blinking frequently now, and he was starting to have trouble keeping his eyes open.

"Getting harder and more difficult to keep your eyes open, Tom," I told him. "You're on the edge of entering a deep sleep even now. When I snap my fingers your eyes will close and you will fall deeply asleep."

"Can't keep eyes open....so tired....need to sleep.." Tom said with some difficulty. He wanted to close his eyes, but he was compelled to keep looking at the spiral as well. I was enjoying his dilemma. Of course that was necessary so that he'd fall into as deep a level of hypnosis as possible.

SNAP! With that snap of my fingers, his eyes closed and his head nodded forward to his chest heavily. He let out a deep sigh as he slipped away into medium level of hypnosis. It was not deep enough for what I had in mind, though. "Tom, how do you feel now?" I asked him.

"Good. Relaxed. Comfortable, thanks," Tom replied.

"Do you want to go even deeper and to feel better?" I queried him.

"Yes, please," he replied simply.

"Each time I say, 'my wallet is empty', Tom, you will return to this state twice as fast and go down twice as deep as before, because it just feels so good to do that, and to follow my voice as it takes you down deeper and deeper. Understood?"

"Yes, I understand. Go deeper....feels so good....yes" Tom said quietly. I quickly took Tom even deeper and told him that as he continued to go deeper his body would become so relaxed and comfortable that he would slowly slide out of his chair and slip easily to the floor where he would be content to just lie there and listen to me. First of course I had him turn his chair so it was parallel to my desk, as that left lots of room for him to slide down onto the carpeted floor. It was a delightful few minutes, and I got wonderfully hard as Tom's body slowly, oh so slowly slipped out of his chair and onto the carpeted floor.

So, there he was, the office bully, I guess you could call him. Tom Blackstone. Lying on the carpet in front of my desk. Body limp and with a big smile on his face as he continued to go deeper and feel even better. . He was wearing a two piece double breasted light blue pinstriped suit, with a wide red tie, with a large paisley pattern on it. His long sleeved shirt was a blue and white striped affair with very wide stripes. His jacket was partly buried beneath his back so I could see that he was wearing a plain black leather belt in his pants. His pants were pleated on the front with cuffs on the bottom of the pant legs. His shoes were plain black leather and slightly scuffed. Tom was a bit out of shape. He had a bit of a gut on him, but the way it made his shirt tight across his middle was actually kind of attractive. I really enjoyed looking at him.

"Tom, do you trust me and believe everything I tell you?" I asked him.

"Yes, of course," he quickly replied.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because you hypnotized me. I must obey you when I am hypnotized by you. It is what hypnotized people do. Feels so good, too," Tom replied simply.

Now this was a interesting development, since I had not yet had the chance to even suggest such a thing to Tom as a hypnotic suggestion or a 'command'. I thought about it for a moment, and then the reason hit me. Tom was a bully, and like most bullies, deep down he was afraid of appearing weak in front of anyone else. I had gotten past his defenses by hypnotizing him, and Tom's natural submissive nature was now coming forward. I supposed I could have corrected his misconceptions about hypnosis, but I decided not to. At least, not yet. "So you crave to serve and obey me, Tom? Is that it?" I asked.

"Yes, yes sir. I serve and obey only you. Feels so good to say that, sir," Tom replied without a moments hesitation.

"Good, Tom, very good." I said to him. He just smiled and nodded his head in agreement. I really enjoy naturally submissive subjects, but they seem to be few and far between. Tom was only the second one I'd ever encountered. "When I bring you out of hypnosis, you will feel refreshed and wonderful, and you will know that you have been hypnotized by me. You will know that it was a wonderful session and that you wanted it to happen and that it was your idea from the start. Understood?"

"Yes, sir. Of course, sir. It was my idea to have you hypnotize me, sir," Tom replied quickly.

"As well, Tom," I continued. "You will NOT mention or discuss that I have hypnotized you with anyone, ever. You are enjoying yourself a lot, aren't you? You want to be hypnotized again sometime, don't you?"

"Oh yes sir, very much so," Tom replied. "I will not tell anyone about you hypnotizing me, ever. I did want you to hypnotize me and I do want you to hypnotize me again. I enjoy it SO much, sir."

"Roll, over on your stomach, Tom," I instructed him.

"Yes, sir," Tom replied and then quickly did as he was told. I now had a clear view of his butt encased in his pants. His suit jacket was a bit twisted up and around his chest, but he wouldn't be in that position long enough to make any serious creases. The bulge of his wallet in his right back pocket was huge. He must carry a lot of stuff in it. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I'm a butt man. It's what I usually notice first about how a suit fits on a guy, and its the first thing I look for. Tom's butt was nice to look at. It fill out his pants nicely, without appearing too big or fat.

"That's your wallet, that big bulge in your right back pocket, right Tom?" I asked him.

"No, sir, it isn't," Tom answered. "It is your wallet, sir. I'm just carrying it for you."

"Ah, Tom, my wallet is here with me. That's your wallet. You came in with it. What makes you think it is my wallet?" I asked him. This was a bit confusing that I wanted to straighten it out.

"It is true that the wallet in question contains identification, money and credit cards that have my name on them and thus belong to me, sir. But as I am your slave, all that is mine is yours, so the wallet is yours, sir." Tom explain patiently. This seemed quite logical to him. "I will of course use the contents of the wallet in whatever way you see fit, for purchases of whatever you wish, sir." "But only when you are hypnotized, Tom?" I asked him.

"Yes, sir, if that is your wish," he replied, almost reluctantly. Now this WAS getting good. I would never take advantage of someone who was this submissive, but it was an incredibly sweet thrill to hear Tom say this to me. I walked over to where Tom was lying, knelt down beside him, touched his hand with mine and scanned Tom's mind to confirm that what he was saying was the truth, at least as he saw it. I suddenly got very, very hard as my scans quickly confirmed what Tom had said only moments ago. As he lay there face down on the carpet, Tom Blackstone, was my total and complete slave....and by his choice. Memories of Officer Steven Stokes flashed across my mind as I realized just what a gem of a man I had here. I didn't know if he was gay and frankly right now I didn't care.

"Get up and sit in the chair just as you were when I first started to hypnotize you, Tom," I told him.

"Yes, sir," he replied as he scrambled to stand up. He sat down in the chair, and made himself comfortable. I returned to my chair and sat down.

"Tom, I am going to wake you up in a few moments," I said to him. "When I do, you will feel very refreshed and pleasant. You will realize that you do regret your earlier outburst with Ms. Brenton, and you know that you will feel much better, as if a weight as been lifted off your shoulders, when you apologize to her. It will help her feel better, as well as help you to feel better too. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," Tom replied. I turned off the spinning disk program, and turned the computer monitor back to face me. I quickly counted Tom out. Tom blinked his eyes a few times and seemed somewhat disorientated for a few seconds until he recognized me, and realized that he was in my office. He took a couple of deep breaths and just looked at me strangely. I wasn't sure if he was upset or not.

"How do you feel, Tom?" I asked him. "Are you okay?"

"Well, I feel wonderful, great in fact, " he replied, but he still looked at me strangely.

"What's wrong, Tom?" I asked him.

"Well, I'm not sure exactly what happened, here. Something doesn't seem right and yet the more I look at you, the less that seems important."

"Well, I did hypnotize you, you know," I said to him in an offhanded tone of voice.

"Oh, it's not that," he quickly replied. "I know you hypnotized me, and I'm a bit surprised that it worked. In fact, I'm grateful to you, as I haven't felt this good in awhile. It just seems as if something is wrong or something is missing, and I can't put my finger on it." He continued to look at me with a slightly confused and worried expression. "Well, before I hypnotized you at your request, we were talking about Ms. Brenton and the mistake she made," I said to him.

"Oh, yeah, right," Tom said. "I remember now. Listen could you ask her to come back in here again for a second?"

"Sure," I replied. "No problem." I picked up the phone and dialed Ms. Brenton's extension. When she answered I asked her to quickly come back into my office. She opened the door nervously, and timidly. I am sure she was still scared of Tom Blackstone and did not want to listen to more of his comments about her abilities. Before I could even open my mouth to invite her in Tom Blackstone began talking.

"Please, sit down and make yourself comfortable, Ms. Brenton, and please close the door. This will only take a few minutes," Tom said and actually smiled at her. When she saw that smile on Tom's face, Ms. Brenton suddenly reminded me of a field mouse when it sees a hawk swooping down on it. She sat down, but she was far from comfortable or at ease.

"Mr. Walton and I have been talking about you, and we have come to the conclusion that an apology is in order. So before you say anything, please allow me the chance to formerly and sincerely apologize to you earlier for my overreaction to the situation. I said some things to you that were unkind and unnecessary. I hope that you can forgive my loss of control and I promise you that in future I will do better at keeping my temper in control. I know that you are good at your job and that everyone makes mistakes. Look at me, for example, I made a big one a short while ago when I lost my temper with you. We're only human, after all, and we're supposed to make mistakes. I'm sure, though, that in future you will not be making that mistake again, since you now know how to avoid it."

I don't know who was more shocked by what Tom said, Ms. Brenton or me. I knew he was going to apologize to her, but I did not expect him to be so eloquent, nor to kiss her hand gently when he finished speaking. Ms. Brenton, just sat there stunned and I was a bit taken aback myself.

"Well, Paul," Tom said as he smiled at the looks on our faces. "I have to get back to my own department, so I'll have to say goodbye now. I hope I can call you again about that topic we were discussing earlier?"

"Uh..sure, whenever you have the time," I answered. "What about Ms. Brenton, then?" I asked him.

"I've said all that I need to, about that," he replied as he headed for the door. "She's a good worker. I'm sure she'll do a great job on any more contracts that come her way. Now, I really must be going. Bye." And with that he calmly walked out the door and closed it softly behind him.

Ms. Brenton and I were left in an embarrassed silence for a few moments as she just looked at the closed door in disbelief.

"If I didn't know better, " she finally said as she turned and looked at me. "I'd think that Mr. Blackstone had been replaced by a 'pod person' from 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'. Just who was that anyway?"

"It was Tom Blackstone," I said to her, hoping that I wouldn't have to use my powers on her to explain Tom' change in attitude. I hadn't expected it to be that radical and I hoped it would not cause any questions to be asked. "We just had a long talk and he finally agreed that you attract more flies with honey than with vinegar, if you get my drift." I looked at Ms. Brenton as she thought about what I said.

"Right," she said doubtfully. "Well, whatever it was you said to him, seems to have worked. It looks like he won't be on my back about that error in the contract."

"Don't worry about that," I said to her as smiled at her. "Just go on and do your job. I know you know what you are doing, and now so does Mr. Blackstone. I'll handle Mr. Blackstone if the need arises again, but I doubt that it will. It's 11:30 AM, but why don't you go for lunch early and come back at 1 PM as usual? I think you've earned a bit of a break after what happened earlier."

"Okay," she said simply. "And thanks, Mr. Walton." She was still a little bit puzzled by Mr. Blackstone's apology, but I felt that by this afternoon she'd be back to her old self. Having someone apologize to you has to be a boost to your ego.

The rest of the work day went by smoothly. Word got around that I had 'defended' one of my people, to the company bully, and actually gotten him to apologize to her. Some of my new staff were bold enough to ask me exactly what had happened, since this seemed so out of character with Tom Blackstone. I simply told them it was a private matter between the two of us, and that if they wanted to know more, they'd have to ask Mr. Blackstone. Not much chance of that, of course, since Mr. Blackstone still had the reputation of being unapproachable. Still this did a lot of good in helping me to gain the respect of my new department. ___________

I didn't think much about Tom Blackstone, for the next week or so, even though I saw him about once a day. We'd just say 'hello' when we meet and walk on by, since our business paths rarely crossed. At 3 PM on Friday afternoon, my phone rang.

"Hello, Paul Walton speaking," I answered.

"Hi Paul, it's Tom," a familiar voice said. "Listen I need to talk with you in private before the end of the day. Do you have some time, say about fifteen minutes right now?" "I suppose so," I said to him. "What is this about?" I asked him.

"Uhmmm.....I'd rather not say over the phone, okay? Could you please come to my office?" Tom asked. I was curious, and I could detect a touch of urgency in his voice. Something was up.

"Sure, I'll be right there. Bye," I said as I hung up the phone. I headed out the door and over to Tom's office. It wasn't a long trip, but there was plenty of time for me to think about the possibilities as to what this 'private' conversation was going to be about. I dismissed the various thoughts that popped into my head. I'd know about it soon enough.