The Lover

"Of course you do, my dear. Remember when you asked me why I hadn't shared my abilities with you before? Who says I didn't? As a matter of fact, I showed them to you many times in the past. The first one was when we met: when your eyes met mine and you suddenly started having strange desires about me. That's right, Megan. I hypnotized you that day though you don't remember it ever happening because you were instructed not to! Your bisexuality doesn't date back to your honeymoon days like you told your husband. I created it! And it happened so fast... you're very easy to manipulate, you know?" The smile was now an ever-changing smirk with as much of insolence as of fascination.

"You're lying!" Megan screamed, realizing that her eyes were slowly filling with tears. She had to be because if she wasn't then their whole story had been nothing more than an elaborate charade comprised of smoke, mirrors and hypnotic triggers. Ingrid's eyes locked onto hers and the veil of deception was lifted.

"Not this time and deep down inside you know it... It's been a while since I last used your triggers because after the initial conditioning you were pretty much everything I could hope for in a lover... However, things have changed. You weren't supposed to wish for the liberation of your husband and advocate freedom instead of submission. Yesterday, I was hundred percent sure that you were entirely devoted to me even when not in trance but today a spark of defiance came rushing in and one leads to another and another... that's going to have to be fixed and I'll start doing right now... Listen to my words, Megan: frozen ballerina!"

Almost immediately, Megan found herself completely immobile as the dormant trigger was reactivated once again. It was a terrible feeling to lose complete control of her bodily motions but an even more dreadful one to be conscious of it happening. She had been played right from the start and now the path ahead was one of utter helplessness. "This is how Joseph must have felt last night... God, I'm so stupid!" she thought. Though she really wanted to cry, now the tears wouldn't fall—they too had been stopped in their tracks.

"This will be all over soon, I promise..." Ingrid declared. "In just a few moments, you will lose the recollections of this morning. All it will take is a kiss, a simple kiss. When my lips touch yours, everything will be erased and we'll continue to have fun together. You'll be mine and I'll be yours!"

Despite the fact that a part of her wanted to believe her, Megan knew it was too late. "Who's to say you won't treat me as your slave whenever you feel like it?" she thought. "No one... you'll continue to mess around with people the way you see fit... Oh, Ingrid, if only I could tell you how much I hate you right now!"

But she couldn't. All that was allowed was the stiffness of muscles, the freezing of joints... She was a statue of flesh soon to be redesigned. Powerlessly, she saw Ingrid leaning over her and then the reality she knew ceased to exist.