Give Maisie space until she's ready

The next couple of days are more of the same. Everyone is having a great time except you. The girls make sure you stay away from Maisie, although they're not rude about it and you're not even trying to talk to her. The guys seem to pity you, but they're not doing anything to upset the girls, especially not Maisie. On top of all that, the marathon sex sessions between Brad and Maisie every night don't get any quieter. You end up spending more and more time in your room.

On Friday you're a little startled when there's a knock on your door. You answer it and find Todd there. "Come on, man, you've been shut in here too long. We're all going for a hike along a trail in the state park."

"All" turns out to be just the guys. You all have to drive out to the trail, and it's only then that they tell you the trail is seven miles long. The fact that it is called "The Hulk" sounds intimidating to you, but they're all football players and you're very much not.

An hour into the hike, they don't even mention how much you're wheezing when they mercifully stop for a break. Everyone sits on a rock and pulls out water bottles. They start off talking about the stuff they've done on the trip, then about what they'll do when they get back home. Then the conversation turns to the girls.

"Hey Todd, how are things going with Ari?" asks Brad.

"Not bad. She let me feel under her shirt one time, but that's it. I'm not particularly bothered, I don't think either one of us wants to date once we get back home. How about you, Mark? Things good with Tess?"

"Yeah, pretty good, actually! I never thought of myself as the kind of guy who dates the head cheerleader, but once I found out she was into old movies, we talked for four hours straight." Everyone looks at Brad, and Mark says, "We all know things are going well with you and Maisie."

Brad's eyes go blank. He stares off into the distaince, as if he's stunned. Finally, he says, "I think I have to marry that girl."

Todd and Mark break out laughing. Todd says, "Are you in love already, dude?"

Brad grins. "I don't know about love. Honestly, I don't even know if I like her. I just don't think I can give up the sex. It's... it's fucking insane." The grin fades. "Like, she keeps pushing me into things that are a little scary, but then I like it. I really like it every single time. Maisie seems to know things about me I don't even know, and she's so... fucking... hot! I think I might actually lose my mind if I can't sleep with her anymore."

"Wow," says Mark. "That's pretty intense." He turns to you. "What's going on with you two? I've seen you and Maisie hanging out since I moved here in second grade. Why did she suddenly cut you off and tell the rest of us to make sure you didn't talk to her? She even told us the other day that she doesn't want us to be rude to you or anything, she just doesn't want to talk to you. What did you do?"

You try to think of something that you could say that makes sense, but it's impossible. All you can say is, "It's complicated."

Brad snaps out of his daze and smirks at you. "Dude, you've got to stop acting like a loser. You should have made a move in middle school. Well, your loss equals my gain. Let's get back on the trail!"

The rest of the hike is worse than the first half, but at least they stop talking to you.

As soon as you get back Jayda says, "Let's go get ice-cream!" and everyone heads right back out as if their feet don't hurt as much as yours.

The ice-cream shop is several blocks away, but none of the others seem to mind. You walk a few steps behind the crowd, staring at Maisie's pert ass in her shorts. You think of Brad's comment about how you should have made a move on Maisie in middle school, and you're reminded that your first sexual fantasy was in middle school. It was about grabbing her ass. Obviously you shouldn't have done that as a kid, but maybe you shouldn't have gotten so scared of the idea of offending her that you never told her how much you like her.

On the way back, Maisie looks over at Todd and says, "Hey, your ice-cream is melting. It's about to dribble all over your hand." Without waiting for him to do anything, she reaches over and gracefully wipes the vanilla drips off his cone with her finger. Then she puts her finger up to her mouth and licks off the white liquid. It's slow, not so slow that it feels like she's trying to make it into a porno, but somehow her tongue is wrapping around her finger for a half second longer than necessary, and she maintains eye contact with Todd the whole time.

Everyone in the group watches this. The guys all look like their brains have melted, especially Todd. Ari points at a go-cart track and tries to distract everyone by suggesting loudly that they go there. Jayda grabs Maisie's elbow and pulls her to the back of the group. You take a few steps back to give them space to pull away from everyone else, but you're still closer to them than the others, so you overhear them.

"What are you doing?" says Jayda.

"What?" asks Maisie. You know her well enough to know that this isn't her 'pretending to be innocent' face, she genuinely looks confused.

"Why are you flirting with Todd? He's with Ari and you're with Brad."

Maisie rolls her eyes. "I'm just barely with Brad. The trip ends in a couple of days, and it's not serious for either of us. Plus, I wasn't flirting, I was just... it was just..." She looks confused.

"Not flirting?!" whisper hisses Jayda. "Maisie, I'm the straightest girl on the cheer squad and I wanted to eat you out after watching that! Plus, how can you say you and Brad aren't serious! That boy's brain has melted over you! He even-"

At this point Jayda glances backward and notices you.

"We'll talk later." Jayda pulls Maisie back into the crowd, which is now heading towards the go-cart track.

Once you're back to the beach house, you go back to your room. Today has been especially frustrating, and you need to jerk off to get out the frustration before the group orders the pizzas for dinner. You're about to start when there's a knock at the door.

"Hey," says Maisie tersely when you open the door. "Can we talk?"

"Yeah, of course!" You hold the door open, but she hesitates.

"Can you control yourself?"

"Come on, Maisie, it was-"

"Stop!" Maisie says sharply but quietly. She pushes past you into your room, then grabs the door and pulls it closed. "You said my name! I know you were just going to say something like 'It was just a mistake,' or 'It was not a big deal,' but if you say that after my name, it will reprogram me to fully believe that!"

"Oh my god," you say. "Mai-" you pause. "I'm so sorry."

She tenses up. "Don't you get it? These little slips aren't so little!" The pain on her face is intense.

Is it bad that you're still horny even when she's this mad at you? This is the most you've talked to her in weeks, despite being around her all the time.

"I'm sorry. I really am. I'll undo the command about you being so incredibly good at sex."

Maisie shakes her head. "You still don't understand. The commands don't just make me pretend that something is real, they make it real. This is who I am now. It feels entirely natural, and I don't want to change back. That's why every command we've talked about, I tried to make it as small as possible, like just adding information to my memory. Giving me a better memory could change my personality, but then that would be my personality and I wouldn't want to change! But that's terrifying, because I know that if you told me that I'm a prostitute and you're my pimp, I'd happily go out on the street and start earning your money!"

It hits you how dangerous this curse really is. "No! I'd never do that!"

"You say that, but lots of the men who have learned about my family curse have started out the same way and slowly done more and more until the women were their happy house cleaning sex slaves or worse. I thought we could avoid you getting addicted if we filtered it through text messages. Then I got a little drunk and a little too eager, and I told you to give me a verbal command because I thought I could trust you. Now I'm flirting with Todd in a way he's probably fantasized about without realizing I'm doing it until someone pulls me aside and tells me."

You sit on the bed as the enormity of this hits you. "What should I do?"

She shakes her head, still clearly mad. "I don't know. I asked you on this trip because I wanted to spend more time with you, but you didn't try to talk to me at all those first few days. I know the others want to take my time, especially the guys now, but if you'd just walk up to me and talk, I'd make some space for you. It's always been like this, we've never hung out except when I texted you and said, 'Hey, let's go walk by the river'. Now I'm afraid to talk to you because you'll have another 'little slip'." She makes sarcasm quotes with her fingers around "little".

You shake your head. "I'm sorry. You can trust me, I won't ever give you an order again. What can I do to make it up to you?"

Maisie exhales hard, angry but trying to stay calm. "I don't know. I'll think about it." She turns and walks out.

You're still horny as hell, but you're too sad to jerk off.

After dinner, and another night of watching Brad and Maisie flirt, no amount of saddness could counter how horny you are. When everyone goes back to their rooms, and the noises coming from Brad's room start instantly, you know you're going to jerk off again.You take a few minutes to find pictures of a big breasted brunette on your phone. It's getting harder to find one hot enough to even slightly fill in for Maisie in your fantasies. However, before you can start, there's a knock on your door.

You open it to see Maisie standing in front of you, totally naked. You drop your phone and your jaw.