Footbound (Chapter 13) (Patreon)

Mitch sat at his desk, lurching forward and backward in his chair like a metronome. His eyes were bloodshot and his joints ached; it was obvious now, with three nights’ worth of proof, that his body was not resting and recharging as it naturally should’ve in slumber, beginning from the first intimate “dream” he’d enjoyed of Eve. Indeed he made a point of emphasizing the woman’s fictional nature to himself again and again as he sat in a listless statue-state in front of his monitor, getting dazed by its frying blue light and reassuring himself that the footjob goddess’s threats to take his soul were moot, because she was only a figment of his undersexed imagination, much as he wished her more positive aspects were applied to a real person. Frightening and yet still arousing as it had been to hear that hot nectared voice declare his damnation to her as an inevitable finale, not a battle to be won or lost, Mitch smacked himself in the forehead every time he started to feel uneasy again, because he was not a child who believed in fairy tales.

For there could be no actual danger from a nightmare, no matter how vivid, and the fact that his wettest-ever dreamscape full of crinkly soles and sweet night sweat and warm skin had abruptly soured to that demoralizing moment where Eve promised to take ownership of his very spirit told Mitch that maybe three nights in a row of her was plenty. The lack of deep restorative sleep was clearly getting to him in all sorts of unhealthy ways, while both conscious and unconscious, and he decided right then and there that he’d take a sleeping pill tonight, revive, and perhaps afterward give his mind another try at conjuring a foot angel who’d make him kiss and cum to her arches, then politely take her leave without also condemning him to some abyssal eternity.

“Are you going to get that?”

Lilina’s voice droning up-close in Mitch’s ear was no longer a surprise, but it still made him jolt nonetheless in this sluggish slump. His awareness returned, he also realized she was talking about his phone, which had been ringing for at least thirty seconds now. Scrambling for his headset, he almost dropped the rig to the floor, while Lilina calmly witnessed his strung-out clumsiness with her usual mysterious look of nonjudgmental curiosity. She gave him a quiet smile, seemingly out of pity, while Mitch mopped perspiration from his forehead and recited the usual scripted greeting into the mouthpiece. Of course Lilina was just as meticulously refined as always in her beauty today, made-up and collected through every inch, complete with nude hosiery that sparkled like new-fallen snow and her black locks somehow imbued with more of that crimson radiance than usual, though Mitch knew this could’ve just been a trick of his tired eyes. He almost felt embarrassed to look so disheveled and drained in her presence.

“…how may I be of assistance today?” he muttered, barely awake enough to articulate.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like some assistance?”

The husky feminine drawl on the other line licking its way into his ear made Mitch wince so hard that he would’ve dropped the phone, were it not hooked around his skull. Lilina raised an eyebrow at his reaction, but still said nothing, waiting patiently with her head bowed and hands folded across her waist like a nun. Once he caught his breath, though, Mitch even had to question himself during the pause. For the first time this morning, his memory had succeeded in clinging to the sound of Eve, and though for a flash he wanted to swear that he heard that same sultry tone coming through the phone now in his waking life, upon further consideration, it was definitely not her voice. His brain was just cooked.

“Um, pardon? I… no, I don’t need any assistance, ma’am. Is there some way I can help you?”

“None? At all?” she queried with a gasp. “Well, we’ll see about that. Anyway, I’m calling about a very specific product.”

“Great. I’d be glad to help you track it down and make a purchase. If you could just give me some information about-”

“It’s a pretty specialized thing,” she interjected. “See, it’s meant to be positioned under a desk, to put my feet on, and help me relax.”

“Oh, I… I see,” Mitch stammered. “You’re… looking for a footrest?”

“Not exactly a footrest. No ordinary one, anyhow. Like I said, it’s special. Something that isn’t just meant for holding up my feet, but pampering them through the day, the way they deserve. I can’t tell you how badly I’m dying to get my hands, or I guess my feet, on one of these things. Just pull the ol’ workday stockings right off, go barefoot and carefree, and really rub down into it, hard. Get the kinks worked out of my soles, push in on my heels until they’re numb, then spread my toes and massage from end to end to get that nice little tingle running through both my feet, and make them feel so good that they just want to melt…”

Mitch patiently waited for this woman with the admittedly sexy voice to finish gabbing on about her fancy footrest. In his short time here at the call center, he’d encountered plenty of whacky characters on the other end of the line, some pranksters and some just askew, so there was nothing about the unnecessary detail of her explanation that caught Mitch particularly off-guard. Still, he had to heighten his focus and keep the bottom half of his body stowed thoroughly below his workstation, as the chatty stranger was already beginning to make him stiffen, and with Lilina still sagely overlooking him from a foot away.

“…so do you think you could help a poor girl out? My feet would sooooo appreciate it,” the would-be customer said, concluding her flowery exaggeration of the hypothetical super-footrest, but still without giving Mitch a single useful detail to search. He’d have been annoyed if her voice wasn’t turning him on so much.

“Ma’am, I… don’t know if I can pick out exactly what you’re after without a brand name, but I’ll happily just get the catalog up here now and-”

“Do you know the feeling I’m talking about?” she interrupted again, and Mitch was all for it, as her voice took on such a sizzly moan now that, were the subject matter not sales-related, he might’ve guessed her other hand not holding the phone was up to something uncouth below the belt. And maybe it was anyway. “Just pulling a pair of tight stockings off nice and slow, and letting your feet breathe for the first time all day? Getting the air in between your toes, and feeling the fluff in the carpet brush against the cute little wrinkles in your soles? Then when you step onto the cool tile, and it makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck, because your foot is so warm from being trapped inside those nylons that you can almost see the steam rising when you pick your foot off the ground again? Your skin is more sensitive than ever, tender and a little swollen, and it seems like the only thing you need more than oxygen is to have something take care of them? Because that’s what I experience every day, let me tell you, and still no matter how hard I try, I can’t find what I need to make this feeling go away. It’s eating me up inside, you know. To think that something exists out there, must exist, that could give me and my feet everything we need, and yet I have to sit here every day, deprived, just curling my toes and rubbing my fingers down the middle of my soles to make it all better, only it doesn’t do the job…”

“Uh, m-ma’am… ma’am, please, I… understand the problem you’re having, but…” Mitch said, jumping in when she paused at last to take a breath. By now his synapses were on high alert, his pants tent at full salute, though at least the woman’s indisputably sensual rambling had the benefit of forcing the insomniac to sit at greater attention despite his fatigue. But Lilina was also still standing above him, and the longer he allowed this stranger to hold up the line, when it was becoming steadily clear she wasn’t going to purchase anything and only meant to babble, the more difficult it would be to prevent himself from reaching below the desk to touch his pulsating arousal right in front of his perfect-footed coworker. “…is there anything I can help you find?”

“Not today,” she replied, no longer wistfully out of breath, and spoke with such urgency that it almost made Mitch jolt back in his chair. “But maybe soon.” Then the line clicked dead.

“Having a hard sell there?” Lilina teased with a knowing nod.

If only she knew how much.

“Y-Yeah, just… somebody who wanted a free sounding board,” he said, trying to laugh, but it came out a wheeze. “Sorry about that. Do you… need help fixing your computer again?”

“Not today,” Lilina said, and though her voice was distinct from the one he’d heard on the phone, it made Mitch wince all over again. If only he’d seen even a flash of self-awareness in her gaze, he might’ve assumed the call was all part of some elaborate practical joke, but then again, he was so sleep-deprived that just about any conspiracy theory could’ve added up now. “But I did think it only professional to let you know, especially now that we’re going to be friends, that I was promoted this morning, and am now in charge of this whole quadrant of the call center floor, including you. Lucky you, you have a friend in management now.”

“Oh! W-Wow,” Mitch stammered, not sure whether to be jealous or relieved. “C-Congrats. That’s great.”

“Thank you. Now, I don’t know if you know this about me, but I approach any leadership role with an iron fist. You know, real put-your-foot-down style,” Lilina continued, becoming gravely serious at once in tone and expression. Somehow this made her even lovelier, if icier, to Mitch, who nonetheless was unsettled. “So I won’t be able to tolerate any dawdling and lolly-gagging from you, not when there are sales to make.”

“R-Right. Sorry, sorry, you don’t have to worry about me,” he sputtered, feeling a sweat trickle traverse his spine. “I’m just feeling a little-”

“I’m only teasing you,” she said, breaking the tension with a warm smile that nearly melted the frazzled fellow. “So long as the job gets done, then everyone is happy. Symbiosis, you know. But… maybe you shouldmake sure you get better rest. If only for yourself. You’re looking like you’ve been having a few too many of those late-night not-parties.”

“You’re probably right,” Mitch huffed, too exhausted to try disputing her, especially after so much nervous flip-flopping of expectations. “T-Thanks for letting me know. I won’t let you down, um, Boss.”

“I know you won’t.”