Repeat Customers are Everything

by Arbutus

Rating: mature
Tags: Spa Ponies, Rarity, Fluttershy, Sex, Human, Twilight Sparkle, Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 28168

Licentious porn featuring Aloe and Lotus Blossom at everyone's favorite spa.

There's a pretty big difference between a spa with a following and a spa that just has customers, and since keeping ponies coming back for more is the only real way to do business in a small town, I've decided to start tracking our most successful accounts. One day, Lotus and I might be able to put the lessons I learn from this to good use.

I just really hope she doesn't find it in the meantime.

(Licentious porn featuring Aloe and Lotus Blossom at everyone's favorite spa, starting in chapter two. No redeeming qualities whatsoever. I've been writing this for fun while wrestling with some other stories, so I'll be taking the liberty of switching between pony and human to keep it fresh and keep me from getting bored. Chapters are labeled thusly for those who wish to winnow.)

Published 2012-11-12 06:20:01 UTC
Last updated 2012-12-22 05:55:23 UTC

Miss Fluttershy (Pony)

Miss Fluttershy

Every now and then, somepony will ask me how a business like ours can be so successful in such a small town. It's not a dumb question. Rent and supplies are expensive, our prices are reasonable, and we all need to take something home at the end of the day. I've been thinking about it more and more, and the answer just isn’t that intuitive without seeing our books. Walk into our spa and there’s nothing to suggest we’ve spared a single expense, even though everything looks fine on paper. We don’t live exorbitantly (except at work) but we do well enough. Parties, food… we aren’t misers.

It confused me at first, so a while ago I asked my sister.

Lotus was on a self-help kick at the time. She got really prissy and looked down her muzzle when I brought it up. “Las Pegasus wasn’t built by the winners, Aloe,” she said.

I know sister. I read the same magazines you do. Pretending you came up with that was really dumb, and it doesn’t even answer my question. Lotus likes to sound smart and sometimes she succeeds, but since she always just says the smartest thing she can think of… well, she isn’t always right. But I think there might actually have been something clever in that fortune cookie’s worth of wisdom she pulled out of her mane.

Las Pegasus wasn’t just built by the losers, it was built by the chronic losers.

Okay, I’m putting this out right now: we are not like a casino. I have no trouble concluding that the comparison ends there, no matter what some ponies think. But on that one front, we live and die by the same factor. Spas and casinos breathe the same air.

I'll explain. How much more valuable than the average customer do you think a repeat customer is? If you run a business, don’t answer. If you don’t run a business, take a guess.

Double it.

Double it again. You might be getting close.

Keeping customers is way more critical than it seems. I’ve been asked, ‘If all you have are repeats, how can you grow?’ Well, think of it this way: when we lose a repeat client—just one—we lose a stream of bits that might have gone on forever. One-timers and infrequent visitors may do good business, but there’s still no comparison. Last-minute bookers show up maybe seven times a year, while regulars who all have periodic appointments book at least monthly, and many do more. Monthlies alone have almost twice the value of an infrequent.

Dealing with repeats is also much, much easier. It’s expensive to run through every treatment, option, and page of paperwork with a new client if they're only going to come once in a while. Because of time and material waste, the first visit or two barely makes a profit. Advertising campaigns get maybe a couple dozen visitors each, and one or two will book long term. The cost of losing a good client is really the cost of gaining another one, and if you look at our books, you can work that out to between ten and twenty new visitors.

That’s right. Ten to twenty. If it meant keeping our best client and there was no other choice, it would still be worth foregoing twenty prospects.

Okay, so why am I writing about running a spa? Well... because I told my sister I was going to. Keep a journal about our business, that is. Or record or something. I forget what I said. If she figures out what I’m actually doing she’ll probably disown me, but I need to keep this on paper if I want to think about it.

So Lotus—or whoever is reading this—it’s just for me. Feel free to put it down now and walk away. I’m not talking to myself or anyone else, I’m writing to learn about how we keep clients and why it works. These are just my reflections on what we do. Observations. I’m surprised you don’t do this yourself, Lotus Blossom, especially since you never talk to me about it. It’s our job for Celestia’s sake, we’re both professionals, right? I deserve to be able to better myself and my talents, and that means I need to understand them!

I should back up, maybe. My sister and I are both earth ponies, so obviously no flying and no spells. Instead, we have the usual earthie connection to animals, plants, and nature. It’s really hard to describe to pegasi and unicorns.

Lotus and I, animals aren't exactly our thing (they’re cute I guess). When it comes to plants and nature, on the other hoof—a bit abstract, but whatever—we have a sixth sense. I guess we always have more or less, but it became clear to us when we found our special talent. Yes, we both have the same one.

Lotus and I can make anypony feel relaxed. It’s totally instinctive, but weirdly conscious too. What plants, mud, oil, or soap to use; what music to play, and how loud; what to say, and when to listen; where to touch, and how to touch; these little decisions have always been effortless for us. And it’s not just that what we do makes others feel comfortable. More importantly, we can sense what will make ponies feel cared for while we work on them, and then do it. I’ve never had wings or a horn, but I know how it feels to have them, and how it feels when they feel good. It goes without saying that there’s a lot more to the other tribes than wings and horns, but I can sense it all, and Lotus can too.

It’s hard to explain.

So when it comes to getting repeat customers, we’re pretty well-furnished. It takes a session or two to figure somepony out, sure, but once we do… Lotus always says something about making them feel ‘snug as a bug in a rug’. Some client said it to her once. She thinks it means they’ll keep coming back and I think she’s wrong, but whatever.

I’ll stick a picture of us in here sometime.

I might be writing for myself, but we do work together so I should think about how I can help my sister too. Both of us should work to make the most of our abilities. We’re a team, and our sensitivity to the feelings of others makes our relationship a little… teamier than most.

For now I’ll just note that Lotus Blossom is my identical twin. She’s the blue one, pink mane and tail. I’m Aloe, obviously. Pink, blue-blue. I’ve never really gotten used to being called 'identical' here; our mother tongue has a cleverer turn of phrase to explain monozygotism, so even though I get it, it still sounds funny. We do both have blue eyes, though, so I can usually get over it by pretending that's what the pony who said it meant. These little language things bug me sometimes.

I really hope she doesn’t find this.

So I’m going to write about our repeat customers and why I think they stay. None of them want the same things and they all have complicated ways of relaxing that most of them don’t really understand. We’ve been getting more bookings lately and I’m finding it harder to keep track of things, so maybe working out the details of what made our past successes successful will make it easier to do the same in the future. I was planning on Miss Rarity today—who has more bookings than anypony else by far—but on the off chance that lotus finds this tonight I’m going to write about Miss Fluttershy instead.

Miss Fluttershy was the first of Miss Rarity’s many referrals. The two still join each other for a brief weekly session, but Miss Fluttershy will come alone as well. Even though she’s a pegasus, she lives on the ground and keeps animals, so she smells like an earth pony. Her usual is a shampoo, bath, and hoof trimming, with a rasping when she needs it, and a full preen. The first time I met her I didn’t realize she was a pegasus. She was wearing a robe, and I reached for her forehead with a horn file. Super embarrassing. Thanks for the heads-up, sis.

I get the feeling she dislikes having attention drawn to her wings. When she finally booked a private session, she turned down a preen because she ‘doesn’t fly much’ (what a bad excuse), but she eventually got a basic one.

Miss Fluttershy isn’t very talkative. I don’t like to carry a conversation while I work since being the active speaker is distracting, so we usually just handle her in silence. It took a couple sessions before she really got comfortable with us, and we could tell she didn’t want to talk until that happened. Ponies like her are more open to informality once they trust you.

Trust is an especially important issue with pegasi, and preens are probably the most volatile and invasive treatment we offer, being rooted in tribal practices that predate the unification. Pegasi are always passively grooming, both themselves and to varying extents each other, much more, in most societies, than the earth ponies or unicorns do. Those twitchy ruffles, the unconscious biting, the stretching and contorting, all plumage maintenance. It's like a more intense version of the way ponies usually fix their mane and tail throughout the day. Pegasi are taught are taught from the moment they learn to fly to be aware of the wings of those around them, and instinctively nip wayward feathers back into line. It's instinct that's an artifact of the old, militaristic cloud cities: every pegasus has a little bit of soldier in her, and that means the urge to be ever-aware of wing discipline. Mutual grooming usually occurs between close friends or mates—anywhere that intimacy is expected, really—or with a professional.

Even with good hygiene, though, plumage gradually becomes unkempt. Feathers lose alignment, break, get dirty, and slip from their pattern of overlap. Pegasi also molt, and some get feather mites, and a filly can’t take care of that on her own. When that happens, not many pegasi will let an earth pony have a free-for-all on her wings, and even fewer will pay for the chance to do so, but my sister and I are special.

I usually do preens. Horns are my sister’s thing, though I can put up a fight there too.

We had her the moment I started.

Part of what makes wing upkeep hard is that pegasi lack the preen gland most birds have. They produce powder down, but the demands of modern society take more waterproofing, dirt resistance, and flexibility than that. Innate magic helps, yeah, but it’s no match for a full preen with real preen oil. Once Miss Fluttershy was gently reminded of this (she knew, of course, but everypony knows to brush their teeth and Colgate still has clients) she became a dedicated customer. I think she saw it more as a technical procedure than anything else, and that distance made it a bit more comfortable for her.

Being a beautician usually means having to see the trees and not the forest, and since even the most spectacular bodies have flaws I usually end up intimately knowing all of them. Miss Fluttershy’s first visit was bad. No lice, and her grooming was okay, but her feathers were really under-oiled. I don’t even think she’d been using wing soap, just loads of regular stuff. At the risk of belaboring the metaphor, this is roughly the same as brushing your teeth with shampoo. Miss Rainbow Dash would have been struck speechless when she realize (and might actually have been, since I don't know she hadn't).

So we had a suddenly acquiescent Miss Fluttershy on board. Preens take a long time and they're too distracting to do in group sessions, so her weeklies with Miss Rarity had to be supplemented. After the second, I got one of the most fantastic complements I’ve ever had: Miss Fluttershy told me she was flying more.

But preens aren’t a high-margin service, and there’s more room to force relaxation on introverts like her than anypony. It would be bad if she started seeing us as feather-dentists (sorry, last one) or something like that. What’s worse, the tension never left her wings when they were extended and she fidgeted every second I worked on her, which made me think I wasn’t doing enough to calm her down. That gave me an idea.

I would work her wings with my hooves—the magic behind my special talent grants me a little extra-corporeal dexterity when it comes to things like this—while my sister did Miss Fluttershy's hooves. Basic preens.

On her third visit she had a damaged patch, so I offered her a full preen. Truthfully, there isn’t much of a difference between them. It just takes longer, and ifI need to then I’ll use my mouth as a grooming partner would. It’s not that my hooves aren’t good enough; they just feel to clinical, and since I’ve already washed her wings by this point it doesn't really make a difference to me whether it's my limbs or my lips. And, I had a hunch.

This might have been a weird case to start this project with, but it’s a trick that’s worked for me before. Massages that require the masseuse to be on top of the patient can be very relaxing. The contact is more intimate, it’s easier to detect and respond to the client’s little cues, and—it took me a long time to realize this—the weight of another body can be incredibly reassuring when you’re feeling anxious. So when Miss Fluttershyagreed to the full preen, I set myself down across her body to reach her far wing from above.

Now, I’d never have done this if Miss Fluttershy didn’t know what my preens felt like. It’s not so reassuring to have somepony on top of you when you don’t expect it, but she already knew what she should be feeling, and it was a simple matter to supply that and feel her nervousness slowly peel back. Not being able to see me, she needed some other way to get the message that what I was doing wasn’t out of the ordinary, and my technique conveyed that message. When I put my weight on her and adjusted myself she tensed up immediately, but I moved on and didn’t hesitate, working at her yellow feathers with my muzzle when I hit a spot that needed it.

Explaining yourself isn’t always a good idea. Once the client has agreed to something, you have a little window to make them accept it. I’ve seen the thought-process at play a thousand times, the best thing you can do if you've accidentally (or not so accidentally) baffled someone is carry on as usual.

Her first wing was the worst. I made sure my sister was on her hind hooves so that Miss Fluttershy wouldn’t have anyone to look at, but her pulse was still elevated and her wingtips were twitching. However, by the time I was working on her other wing my sister was in front of her and neither of us had given any indication that what I was doing was unusual. She left a little ruffled that day, but she still came back for her next appointment. Asked for the basic, I offered the full. She tried to look like she was thinking about it before she accepted.

Miss Fluttershy started relaxing after that. Her warm body would go completely limp when I rested on her back. I think she even started taking my weight as a cue to release her muscles, and though I couldn’t see her face I could still hear her sigh—once—before her breathing would become really slow and deep, lifting me every few seconds. From my sister’s little smirks I imagine she looked relatively peaceful. Hay, she even fell asleep.

Twice.

Getting a pegasus as anxious and sensitive as Miss Fluttershy to start eagerly lying prone on our couch before we even touch her is an achievement I am proud of. Sending her off with shiny, flawless wings was one thing, but doing that and watching her skip away with a glowing smile was another. It’s important not to underestimate the power of simple positioning in comforting a client. Less is quite often more.

I wish my sister had remembered that on the day she almost lost us Miss Fluttershy’s account.

Okay, okay. That’s a little unfair. Really she just put all my patience and careful work in jeopardy. Miss Fluttershy will sometimes come in with her friends, and on one such occasion she asked for a preen. Full. I was a little rushed, but mostly I wanted to keep everything sociable, so I didn’t augment my technique as I usually do. To dispel any suspicions that might have arisen because of this, I made sure to take a couple quick breaks to check on her companions as well.

She was nonetheless suspicious. Not so suspicious she worked out that I was doing what I did for her benefit, but she didn’t have quite the same spring in her step when she left that day. Maybe I should have refused her, offered her a complementary visit next time or something like that, but she was distracted by her friends and I thought I could get away with it.

At her next visit, while I was settled on her back with my muzzle in her feathers, her wing tensed up. “Aloe?”

Lotus was finishing her front hooves and gave me a look, not missing a beat. Miss Fluttershy’s eyes must have been closed.

“Yes, Miss Fluttershy?” Here it comes…

“Sorry, it may be nothing, but, I—”

“No need to apologize, Miss Fluttershy.” She has a sensitive spot under her wing at the joint, and I put a little pressure on it, just in passing. Just to remind her why she kept coming back.

“Ahh, I…” She sighed, and moaned like she was biting her lip. “No, well, sorry… I mean, it’s silly, but… with my friends, the other day?”

My sister was moving for some reason, and she had the wrong look on her face. I tried to shake my head, I looked at her like don’t you dare, but she didn’t acknowledge me.

“Yes?” The wing in front of me was done. I was just working the muscle at the base, not wanting to get anywhere she could see me before I ended the conversation. When my sister’s hoofsteps stopped, I waited a beat.

“When you… ohhhh, wow.”

Judging by the ripple of tension that passed under me and suddenly dissolved, I must have timed it well. Right when Lotus should have grabbed Miss Fluttershy’s hind leg I gave the bundle of tough muscle under her wing a solid knead and her question fell apart. “Um, when you were doing my wings, you, ahh… did them from the side.”

“Yes, Miss Fluttershy.”

“Not… well, above…”

“Yes, Miss Fluttershy.”

If a client has something to say, don’t say it for them.

“Was that because you were so busy?”

If my sister was about to do what I suspected, I hoped she would wait out this line of questioning. It’s never fun to have to rob someone of the peaceful little contrivances you’ve woven for them. Granted, I badly hoped she wouldn’t do anything at all, but when Lotus gets an idea in her head…

“I was very busy that day, Miss Fluttershy.”

All of us knew this wasn’t a real answer, and Lotus and I just had to let the silence hang there like a dark cloud while we kept groping her. I could feel the gloom of unease starting to penetrate the atmosphere and thicken in her muscles and wanted nothing more than to dispel it, but Miss Fluttershy had to ask for the canned answer I had waiting.

“Is this... how you usually do this?”

Thank you. I stopped my hooves immediately and tried to sound insecure. “Oh, I’m sorry Miss Fluttershy, I have done something uncomfortable?”

Her head shot up, shaking furiously. Thank you too, partial language barrier. “Oh, no no no no no, not at all.” Five noes, I counted. Her other wing was twitching, really demanding some attention, but I just kept up a lazy massage. “I was just wondering, I mean…” Celestia, just say it. “Is this normal?”

“Miss Fluttershy,” I started, like I was reading from a brochure. “Nothing is normal. There is no single way Lotus and I work, especially for our regular clients. Everypony is different.” I rested on her more heavily, forcibly weighing on her limp torso, and she bit back an approving sigh. “If you think you would find something more relaxing, you need only ask.”

She didn’t. She just set her head down again and went soft. I slid off her back and walked around her body, sneaking a glance at her tranquil face. If my speech hadn't reassured her then her face didn't show it: her lips were parted and just barely smiling, her eyelids had drooped and only the edges of her pupils showed. They didn’t follow me as I walked.

Lotus tossed Miss Fluttershy’s big, elegant tail over her yellow leg and nodded at me, going back to working the limb. I tried to stare her down, shaking my head, pleading silently: Don’t you dare, Lotus! It won’t work!

My sister rolled her eyes. You’re being dramatic, Aloe. Why not?

It shouldn’t be you!

What! After that little speech? She narrowed her eyes and mouthed ‘you need only ask?’

‘She didn’t ask.’ I mouthed back. I did my best to glare through her resolve, but she just blew me off by signalling towards Miss Fluttershy’s other wing with her muzzle. My delay was probably getting suspicious.

I was almost done—and starting to think my sister had listened to my advice—when the body beneath me went completely rigid and Miss Fluttershy’s wing shot out of my hooves. Lotus, I swear…

You’re so lucky she didn’t fire us.

I didn’t need to see anything to know what my sister had done. Gradually massaging closer than usual and testing for a response is a typical trick (gimmick, really), but Lotus works all the way up the leg anyways and never gives herself enough room to manoeuvre and keep it from feeling too deliberate when she makes that initial contact.

There are signals, conscious and unconscious, that clients expose about their boundaries and what liberties we can take with them. To my knowledge Miss Fluttershy had never signaled an opening at that boundary. She never lifted her tail or kept her hind legs as far apart as Lotus left them. Her attention was probably afloat, maybe on her wings, and I bet Lotus didn’t do nearly enough to soften that particular patch of ground before she just went ahead and dug in.

So she found herself backpedaling—deftly, sure, but still unnecessarily—with an offhand apology and a shift to the other leg. I didn’t break step although I was more than a little angry. Miss Fluttershy never calmed down to the same degree that day but she didn’t cancel her next appointment either, so she must have decided it was an honest mistake.

When I confronted Lotus about what she thought she was doing with her hooves, she apologized. Kind of. “Yes Aloe, you might have been right.”

I was right. You should have let me do it, she’s used to you. How could you write that off?

“I know. But when she asked you about your preens and you gave that little speech about all our clients being different… Aloe, she knows Miss Rarity.”

Miss Rarity.

I hadn’t thought of that. Not a bad point, but I somehow doubt Miss Rarity would ever say anything so plainly that Miss Fluttershy would understand it. Still, if she had any suspicions it might be worth playing off them.

“I don’t think so anymore. I don’t think she likes mares.”

Oh. Okay Lotus, blame it on that. I think fewer of our clients ‘like mares’ than their behavior around us suggests.

Lotus stuck out her tongue and I shoved her a little, but I let her save face. She’s let enough of my mistakes slide.

Grudges take too much effort to maintain. We survive in this business by trusting our instincts, but even when you’ve been working with somepony forever, trusting their instincts is never as easy as trusting your own. The most important thing I know is not to push anypony too far, too quickly: far from relaxing them, it will often just make them feel confused and resentful. We got lucky with Miss Fluttershy.

Like I mentioned in the summary, next time will be porn. If I missed any mistakes could you point them out for me? I'm basically working on the world's worst computer. Also, all ownership to Hasbro, etc.

Hope you enjoyed, I look forward to writing more.

Miss Rarity (Pony)

Miss Rarity

The most important thing you can learn about a new client is how long it’s been since their last session, so if I’m seeing somepony for the first time I’ll ask about their most recent visit to a spa. I do it once we’re alone but before I’ve started: it distracts them from any first-time anxiety and is likely to remind them of something they may have enjoyed. If it doesn’t, even better: they’ll bring up some of their preferences (and how and why they went unfulfilled) and I can work them into my method.

Most importantly, the answer to this question is usually a good indicator of what kind of customer somepony is going to be. When I asked Miss Rarity, for example, she was answering before I even finished, and I almost had to leave the room to calm down.

“Oh dear, oh dear. I couldn’t possibly tell you, darling. Much, much, much too long, my limbs are positively aching and my face is just a puffy mess, it’s completely humiliating… and my hooves! I can’t even bring myself to think how long it’s been since they’ve been touched, much less trimmed by a professional, but longer than I ever plan to allow again. Oh, and my hair? Have you seen my mane and tail? Well, I can brush them as much as I like, but they still—”

I’ll probably never get an answer this good again. When I told Lotus about it she thought I was making it up. Then she did Miss Rarity’s next appointment.

Since then she’s been one of our favorite clients. There are a few things that make her so: Miss Rarity is a talker, and the day she delivered that little speech she looked stunning. Nearly perfect. It was like we’d stumbled into an orchard that filled with trees perpetually bearing fruit. She does keep us busy, and if I didn’t run a spa I would probably have guessed Miss Rarity would be a lot of work as a customer, but the truth is far nicer.

Miss Rarity did all the hard work before she even arrived. She was sold on us from the moment she walked through our doors, admiring everything from the bright décor to the whiteness of our towels, complementing Lotus and I on our appearance and pointing out one or two little details about both of us (which was quite flattering, considering how similar we are). All she left for us to do is the easy stuff. Our specialties.

Now Miss Rarity is a pony who cares deeply about the way others perceive her. I think she gets some of her treatments because she sees them as sophisticated and not necessarily because she enjoys them. She buys without prompt or suggestion. We offer her discounts, yes, but only a few make it through her impenetrable wall of politeness. Part of it has to do with her personality, but I think it might also have to do with her job.

I knew from her first visit that she was a dressmaker and fashion designer. She has a few idiosyncrasies and a lot of opinions about her industry, and I know them all. This isn’t because I follow fashion myself or spy on her (I don’t), but because I listen: talkative clients make things really, really easy when it comes to helping them relax, and Miss Rarity just dumps out her saddlebags every time I see her. She tells you everything you need to know if you want to make her feel calm.

The thing is, not everypony has the same talent for listening that my sister and I do, and we noticed something big. Okay, Lotus was the one who noticed it, but I realized too before she finished!

What she pointed out was that when Miss Rarity comes for an irregular visit she just gets a sauna, a bath, and a massage. Maybe a mud bath or seaweed wrap. She spends more time talking than normal, if that’s possible, and she only talks about her clients. Always, always the insufferable ones.

This is something we can relate to.

We occasionally need to fire bad clients, even though we aren’t usually fully booked: some ponies are just more trouble and take up more time than their bits are worth. But when that similarity occurred to us, we started thinking more and more about the nature of our businesses, and discovered an interesting parallel. At best, ponies visit Miss Rarity with abstract expectations and a vague understanding of what will satisfy them. There’s usually a disconnect between the value they perceive and the amount she charges, and when they have complaints about her work—justified or not—they blame her.

Familiar, right? Change nothing but the characters and it’s a story about us. I know ponies come to the spa to relieve stress, but for Miss Rarity I think the stress relief works on another level. The treatments and pampering are part of it, but she visits us when she’s feeling down so she can be a good client.

Not many ponies are like Miss Rarity. It takes a special kind of worker to spend all day dealing with deadbeat customers and remain dedicated to the success of their projects. It takes a whole new level of special to choose to deal with all that stress and anxiety in the way she does. She’s coming to us and being patient, amiable, and kind—I’ll say it, she’s a perfect client—because it’s her way of spiting her own insensitive customers.

Or so my sister and I think. Whatever the case, we started working twice as hard for her after we realized this: it’s not easy to see yourself in somepony and not empathize with their problems. One day we’re both going to buy the most amazing dresses she can design for us, and pay exactly what they're worth. Miss Rarity deserves customers as good as she is.

Although she visits us more frequently than anypony, she isn’t our best paying customer. She pays very, very well, but that honor still goes to… well, I’ll write about that later. On private visits Miss Rarity does accept a specialized service, and I’m sure ours isn’t the first spa she’s frequented for it. She never made any move to stop us when we shifted her limbs into vulnerable positions, and the way she asked about our scope of treatments makes me think she was looking for something familiar. In her case, Lotus is the one who made the first move.

I was detailing the hooves on her forelimbs and my sister was massaging her hind legs. We briefly made eye contact, and since Miss Rarity’s face didn’t hold any tension, I switched hooves and nodded once.

It is critical never to change pace or intensity in these few moments. If you’re filing, a shift in the sound or vibration will give away your awareness of what we all know is happening. It takes a lot to get somepony relaxed but only a little to set them on edge again, and overt self-consciousness is the last thing that will make anypony feel comfortable. I kept my file moving steadily while my sister worked her way up Miss Rarity’s hindquarters, rhythmically shifting her weight between her limbs, earth magic sensing and plying at the flesh beneath her shiny coat as she came back over her cutie marks. Lotus was putting a lot of weight on her hooves, and even from in front I could see how slack Miss Rarity’s muscles had gone beneath my sister’s ministrations.

Then I looked at her face, splitting my attention between the file in my mouth and the little movements of her cheeks and lipsn. Although her eyelids stayed closed, one of her eyebrows had lifted and her ears had perked up, swiveling away from me. She was still relaxed, but little tugs at her eyelashes showed a sudden interest mixed with anticipation and uncertainty, like she wasn’t sure if her assumption was correct.

Onset of acute awareness of contact, check.

Lotus had worked her way inside and out of Miss Rarity’s hind legs again and was now moving back over her flanks, hooves eventually meeting above Miss Rarity’s tail. If she were the kind of pony who let it swish thoughtlessly then Miss Rarity would probably have been doing so now, but as it was she just let it twitch from one side to the other every few beats as the pressure on her rump peaked in intensity. The way she styles her hair doesn’t really let it lie limp, so the end was just hanging off the table in a big swirl, twitching all at once when she let it.

By her third pass Lotus was digging into Miss Rarity’s cutie marks with her hooves and her tail was rising and falling—almost imperceptibly, but visibly—every few seconds. Anticipation was written all over her face now, but the earlier uncertainty had been supplanted by something like impatience. Her brow was tightened, her jaw muscles were tensed in a soft bite, and her lips were jammed shut, which I imagine meant ‘get on with it, please’.

I raised my eyebrows in an attempt to pass on the message. The next time she worked up the inside of Miss Rarity’s leg, Lotus didn’t break for her hindquarters. I lost sight of her hoof but I still saw her blue foreleg flexing, and I could watch her progress in the vanishing impatience on Miss Rarity’s face. Soon my sister’s movement changed: the pressure in her leg was directed along the length of Miss Rarity’s still-glistening body rather than sideways. Miss Rarity lifted herself a bit and her tail went as well, brushing Lotus’s chest.

Our snow-white client only remained at ease for a moment. Her lips parted and she moaned a little, but it was more of a noncommittal, take-it-or-leave-it sigh than the whine of pleasure we were looking for. One of her big, shiny eyes opened and stared straight at me.

“Lotus Blossom?” Miss Rarity said, overdoing her charming, beau monde accent just a little. I let my attention slip back to her hoof.

“Yes Miss Rarity?” My sister answered innocently.

Miss Rarity took her time to work out what she wanted to say, especially considering what was happening to her body—Lotus’s foreleg was still flexing—and though I don’t recall exactly what it ended up being I think it was something like this:

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, dear. Your hooves are truly magic—as are yours, Aloe, I don’t play favorites—but you ought to know… how should I put this… forgive me for being so forward, but I’m the kind of filly for whom a professional mouth would do a great deal more…” She opened her other eye then and lifted her head to watch me file her hoof, all of our attention fixed on the quiet scraping. “That is, if either of your mouths are in that profession...”

My sister stopped moving. Her expressions are easy to read since they’re essentially the same as mine: she tilted her head to the side and her pink hair dangled at an odd angle, which is what she does when she’s mildly—but agreeably—surprised, then sucked her lower lip between her teeth. Her wide eyes just stared at me, satisfied at how easy that had been.

She removed her hoof and stepped backwards onto the floor.

“No? Well, never mind then.” Disappointment rang was clear in Miss Rarity’s voice, and her eyes stayed fixed on my file while she spoke. “Forget I asked. I think that hoof’s done, dear, but could you start on my horn?” She closed her eyes. Lotus was propped up over her midsection almost as soon as she’d shut them, and they sprang right back open. “Lotus? Is that you?”

“Miss Rarity, forgive me, but I must either move you closer to the edge, or you must lie on your back.”

Now, I may have been taking my time with the file, but I’m so happy I got to see Miss Rarity’s eyes shrink when she realized how much more appealing her circumstances had become. It’s lucky I had a tool in my mouth or my sister’s enormously smug grin would have proven contagious. The foreleg under my face stiffened with the rest of her body before Miss Rarity shimmied backwards nervously. Lotus stopped her with a gentle touch to her flank, and she resumed her resting position.

I finally stopped filing. Miss Rarity’s breathing was shallow and paced. It sounded manual. Good. Conscious breathing is something we taught her to calm herself, so I assume she must have been trying to level off her excitement.

Having elected to remain on her front, she bent her rear legs upward so that they weren’t dangling off the table. She didn’t close her eyes now, but set her head down again and let her dark hair obscure them.

Lotus was gesturing impatiently at the supplies on the tray. She wanted me to do Miss Rarity’s horn as well. I wasn’t finished with her hooves—they needed painting, among other things—but I switched files anyway.

I’m not sure why they were both staring at me when I turned around. It was a bit funny actually, they looked half like I’d walked in and startled them and half like I was holding up the show. Miss Rarity made sense—my sister had moved her tail and she looked pretty decisively exposed—but for some reason Lotus was waiting as well.

I had to stretch to reach her horn. She was resting her head upright now, chin on her forelegs. Lotus arranged herself very carefully, wrapping her forelegs around Miss Rarity’s rear ones, resting her hooves just below her rump. She was staring dead ahead with the focus of a surgeon but the glee of a filly in a candy shop. Miss Rarity’s attention might have been elsewhere, but she must have sensed me looming over her because she peeked up and found my open eyes. I hadn’t been motionless long but she still prompted me with a strained instruction and failed badly at sounding aloof. I guess she was still nervous.

“Go ahead Aloe. It’s fi—”

She made it no further. Her eyes shot open and started fluttering closed again immediately. Setting her head down very delicately, she exhaled what must have been all the air in her body and tried unsuccessfully to draw another full breath, managing only a few short spasms.

Yeah, you can try to talk through this like it’s just another treatment if you want, but Lotus probably isn’t going to let you.

I started on her horn, more gently than usual. Miss Rarity’s is reasonably sensitive, but not so much as many others, so I was careful not to distract her and just kept the sensation complementary. It’s actually really interesting why horns need filing: how they were used physically ages ago and became accustomed to wearing down. There’s a lot of variation between them with regards both to sensitivity and the need for upkeep: no other component of equine anatomy is so influenced by the unpredictability of magic. For several other clients it’s a much bigger deal.

It’s probably worth writing what I thought when Miss Rarity made her little request. I may not remember it entirely, but the bit about being a ‘filly for whom a professional mouth would do a great deal more’ stuck with me. Actually, it would have made me roll my eyes if she hadn’t been looking at me when she said it.

The thing is, every mare from here to Cloudsdale is that kind of filly. No matter how strong or skilled they are (with the exception, perhaps, of my sister and I), hooves and legs don’t feel nearly as good as a mouth unless you’re in such a tangle of limbs that the contact is inadvertent and frantic, in which case your mouth is probably preoccupied anyway! Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing from our point of view. In the context of being a patient visiting a practitioner, most ponies don’t want to seek out more than what is offered, and hooves are about as far as things can be comfortably taken without shattering the illusion. But that method is so detached and clinical that it can take a while. Mares aren’t colts, and getting them up to the ideal level of quivering hysteria is a delicate process. Getting them to come back down can be pretty hard too.

But I must confess to underestimating how much difference Miss Rarity considered encompassed by ‘a great deal more’. Everything considered, I’ve never seen anypony respond so readily to lip service. It wasn’t until after a few seconds of conspicuous silence—where the only noises drowning out what little, wet sounds Lotus was making were my file and Miss Rarity’s challenged breathing—that she gave the first sign of being slightly more sensitive to this than most.

Her eyelids abruptly squeezed tight and all the strain in her body was released with a panicked squawk. Next thing I knew, she was whimpering and squirming and barely able to control herself. Her back hooves, still in the air above my sister’s head, were trembling like they weren’t quite convinced they belonged under her command any longer. By reverting to frantic, desperate breathing she just managed to keep the tension from building up again for a while, but eventually her body denied her any further pretense of reservation.

She went rigid, groaning, almost growling, probably trying not to scream. I almost screamed myself when her foreleg shot out and pinned mine violently against the padded table, holding it there with impressive ferocity. She started rubbing the side of her face against the table and I had to stop filing her horn, but since I was trapped by her leg I couldn’t withdraw. Lotus had one of Miss Rarity’s legs wrapped around the back of her head now, and if Miss Rarity was using the kind of force on her that she was on me then my sister was certainly stuck. I remember hoping she could breathe okay. It was really quite a sight, even if it was short-lived.

Her flesh jittered, muscles convulsing under her glossy coat, tightening and going slack again with no discernible pattern. She looked intoxicated, her face was drawn except for her eyes, eager sighs being clipped with every breath. The limb crushing my own—the only physical connection I maintained to what was happening before me—didn’t move. Soon she stopped making noises completely and the tension started staying in her wherever it returned. Her breathing stopped.

Watching her face was fun. The rest of her was so tight and motionless, if you startled her I’m sure she would have exploded hilariously with confused fury. Only her mouth and nose still betrayed her state—both squished like her eyes, but twitching and quivering—her jaw muscles flexing, her tongue pushing up against the back of her lips. She was obviously really close.

Lotus started teasing her. Miss Rarity's face would freeze for a second and she would hold her breath, right on the brink, just before being pulled back. Then she would exhale as much as she could manage, air whistling in and out of her nostrils while she kept her lips pressed tight, until her breathing sped up and she abruptly stopped. Lotus held her right there on the edge, and yanked her back every time.

Until she didn’t. Just after she wrenched her away from the brink on the fourth or fifth cycle, while Miss Rarity released her shakiest breath yet and steeled herself to quickly recover, Lotus shoved her as far past her limit as she could.

Miss Rarity, to her credit, did not scream when she climaxed. She yelped, once, then went totally silent and still for what must have been an unimaginably pleasurable moment, before her free hind leg jerked once and ripped her back to reality.

Then she screamed.

Through her nose, to be fair. Her lower lip was sucked all the way into her mouth, but it was still loud. She was quivering like a leaf; in her legs, mostly, but everywhere from her tail to her neck too. Finally she released me, but kept her twitching limb on mine while she came down. I think my Fluttershy trick would have helped her calm down right then but it probably would have been too confusing for her. At any rate, Lotus didn’t detach herself until Miss Rarity stopped shaking and whimpering like she’d just galloped to Canterlot and back. When she did withdraw, she found me watching her and smirked.

You look impressed.

With her, obviously. Don’t look so smug.

Come on, that wasn’t even five minutes!

She hasn’t for a while, I think. And we’re new to her, the first time is always more exciting. Still, that was unusually fast.

Yeah, well she’s unusually sensitive to that. And she’s excitable, that’s certain. You’ll have to try next, I don’t think this will be her last visit.

I looked at Miss Rarity’s face. She wasn’t moving anymore and there was no anxiety left in any of her features. She'd just... melted.

Yeah, this wasn’t going to be her last visit.

I still needed to work on her horn but it didn’t feel right to jerk her out of the calm that had come over her, and anyways Lotus managed that by herself when she reached between her legs with a damp towel. It couldn’t have been cold—my sister would never do that—but she reacted like it was made of ice, and that put an end to the mild, informal affection that she’d let surface.

Again we became specialists with a patient, and the change was a little jarring to her.

I think she wanted to say something. She looked satisfied, but cheerless considering her previous high. Just staring straight ahead, she didn’t move at all while Lotus toweled her, and when Lotus was done she just deflated and let her rump fall. Sometime during the procedure her breathing evened out.

I dismounted and busied myself with the tray of tools. Lotus caught my eye for a moment, then left. It was just me now, coaxing some benign noises out of our files and brushes. Eventually I heard Miss Rarity slip off the table. She trembled a little where she stood, and we both eyed the horn file I’d left on the edge of the table-cum-bed.

I find it very easy to resume my casual, slightly-flirty smile when something has surprised me or an unsettling truth about a client slips out—appearing uncomfortable does nothing for a client’s comfort, and I am a professional after all—so I’m sure I could have been photographed for an advertisement right then, but Miss Rarity made no move to soften her expression. The first time is always the worst. In the midst of things, nopony could possibly be expected to consider the fact that they’d need to be looking Lotus or I in the eye within a few minutes, or have something to say when they were. They certainly won’t want to talk about it. Whether we’re their first or their fiftieth, they always forget.

“Well, Aloe,” she began. “That was a bit—”

“Yes, Miss Rarity?”

“…Consuming.” She said. I nodded and made for the file, thinking to put it away. “Oh, let’s not dear. I can’t. Where is Lotus?”

“Lotus Blossom just stepped out, Miss Rarity.” You don’t need to see her right now, she just traded your peace of mind today so that it can more easily be instilled in the future. Your next visit will be easier, and by the one after that you’ll be smiles all the way through. I’ve seen it before, the outlandishness vanishes and once it does, this will feel commonplace, and even more—as you put it—consuming. She’ll stay once this becomes routine.

It wasn’t an easy sentiment to convey. The message under my words was there, but Miss Rarity didn’t look comforted. “She had another booking.” I settled on.

Miss Rarity nodded, still shy, looking at me with her head slightly bowed and her ears flattened. I guess I did just watch her take her first plunge in a very clandestine pool, but fueling her uncertainty with awkwardness and self-consciousness would be unprofessional. I just waited patiently.

“I suppose my appointment is over, isn’t it.” She said. It wasn’t a question.

“I’m afraid so, Miss Rarity.”

“My account is—”

“Backed by excellent credit.”

She smiled a little, gratefully. “I see. Can I… have a moment.”

“Of course, Miss Rarity.” We look forward to your next visit.

I was just out the door when she called me back, earnestness just slipping into her voice. “Aloe?”

“Miss Rarity?” I turned to face her, smiling again. I’d been hoping for a chance to fix my hair for a while. My hair band had been slipping since before her appointment and was getting really annoying, so I tossed it back and Miss Rarity did a bad job of not gazing at me like a puppy. I guess I do look a lot like another mare who had just made a pretty big impact on her, so it’s understandable.

She caught herself staring and looked up at the ceiling. “Let’s extend my appointments from now on. However long you think necessary.”

For once I let some cheek slip into my smile, stepping out of my role a little since she’d apparently found hers. “Yes, Miss Rarity.”

She blushed and tried her best to restore her indifference. “And if you two are hiding any other tricks up your sleeves, you’d better not be. Hiding them, I mean…” I quirked an eyebrow as she struggled to recover from her stumble. “What I mean is that we’ll be discussing my treatment regimen next time.”

I nodded, still smiling. “Until then, Miss Rarity.”

She showed herself out. My sister was in an empty room near the counter, lounging on a mat and reading one of her magazines. She didn’t look at me until I prompted her.

“Well, Lotus,” I said.

“Well… Aloe?” She answered.

“Whatever you did, it’s on the schedule now.”

She didn’t exactly smile, she just looked at me like she was considering the next move she would take in a board game she was winning. “You’re next.”

I nodded. “Double-book yourself and I’ll go.”

“Keep it professional.”

“Oh yeah?” I moved close enough that she had to look up at me. “What was that all about? You denied her at least five times!”

“Calm down, Aloe,” She said, tail swishing conceitedly. “I barely had time to do anything, she was so eager. I can see why she felt awkward after, she didn’t restrain herself at all.”

I stared at my sister until she went back to her magazine, then sat and finally fixed my hair properly. “Why do you think she’s like that?” I asked.

Lotus shut her eyes, then looked at me. “I don’t know. I’m not sure if she likes mares at all.”

“I was watching her mouth.” I said.

“Yeah? You think she has an oral fixation?”

“That could be part of it.” It would be a good explanation, and it isn’t that unusual. The mouth is especially sensitive—to temperature and touch as well as taste—and if her preference for sensing with her mouth and face was abnormally powerful then it was reasonable to think her mind went straight to that orifice when she thought about sex. “Maybe. I’ll try to work it out next time. If she does, it’s unusually strong.”

“I’ll say." Lotus said, flipping through a few pages. "I think she might have been chewing the quill when she was filling out her forms, now that you mention it. Anyways, next appointment?”

“Not for an hour. I’m going to eat.”

“Sure. Oh," Lotus stopped me before I made it out. "Keep your hooves on her legs or she’ll surprise you, and don’t expect to be let up for air.” I rolled my eyes. “Fine, Aloe. I warned you.”

When Miss Rarity next visited and I was the only one guiding her to the bath, her uncertain gait betrayed her suspicions. I didn’t point anything out until she was soaking in the hot water and I was about to start on her horn. She wasn’t speaking as much as usual. In fact, she wasn’t speaking at all.

“I must apologize, Miss Rarity. I’ll have to work alone today. I booked Lotus Blossom another appointment by mistake, so please consider any overrun complementary.”

She took a long time to respond. Eventually she rested her forelegs on the lip of the sunken bath, stretching outwards with a yawn. “Double-booked?”

“I’m afraid so, yes.”

“I see.” She splashed the water gently with her hoof, the ripples hypnotizing both of us. “And you’ll be able to complete everything?”

I pulled back and caught her staring at me in the mirror, and she looked back at the water, blushing. “If you’re in a hurry, I can prioritize—”

“I didn’t mean to suggest—”

“Your hooves don’t need to be trimmed, Miss Rarity, and we obviously won’t penalize you if you decide to postpone that treatment in favor of another.” I went back to her horn without waiting for her to respond.

“I see.” She said. She was quiet again, but I could see her eyes shifting between her hooves in the mirror. She made a habit of chewing her lips when she was distracted, and licked them quickly when they were released. “Aloe?”

“Yes, Miss Rarity?”

Turning to face me, she twisted through the water and sent ripples radiating outwards. “I haven’t seen my bill.”

Impressively for how antsy she was, Miss Rarity managed to look me in the eye, her own face framed by her straight, sodden mane. I bit my tongue and licked my upper lip with practiced obliviousness, and her attention fell to my mouth. As expected.

“Lotus Blossom offered a price, yes. But I think you would prefer this discussion before your next visit.” Miss Rarity looked like she would prefer to have it now.

“What is it?”

Now, in all the time since then, we’ve never actually told her what we regularly charge for this. Lotus suggested billing her at the usual first-tier rate—what we would have charged if we never went beyond our hooves—and I think it was a fair decision. If we did bill her normally it would take her a lot closer to becoming our top-paying client, but still not quite. Besides, she was easy to keep satisfied and she paid plenty for the rest of her services. I played with my tongue a bit more. You can guess where she was looking.

“I can tell you if you want, but we will only charge you at a rate we all agree on. You need not let these worries interfere with your enjoyment today.” Or indeed any day.

Miss Rarity settled back in against the wall of the bath, still uncertain and staring at me in the mirror. “Aloe, you’ve never withheld a price from me before. I may not usually ask, and it’s not really about the money—”

“I know.”

“So perhaps I should ask you something else.” I set down my file and she looked over her neck so we could see each other directly. “I trust you, so tell me: will I accept it?”

In the mirror I could see myself smile as carefree a smile as anypony ever has, and I was reminded of my favorite thing about being pink: it’s impossible to tell when I’m blushing.

I nodded.

Then she was out of the bath and dripping everywhere, mane and tail twisted into little bunches of wet hair. The big towel I used to dry her was incredibly heavy by the time she was just barely glistening, and everywhere I touched her, rubbing her coat back into smooth perfection, I felt her fretful impatience. She was trying to hold something in.

“Is there… enough time for a massage?” she asked hopefully as I was wrapping her mane in a towel.

“Yes, Miss Rarity.”

“A full one, though?”

Yes, there was. I bit my lip. “That could be difficult.” She followed me to the table, her eyes still on my face.

“I couldn’t rush you, you know.”

“I’ll do as much as I can, Miss Rarity. Unless you’re in a rush?”

On the table she didn’t need to look at me, and the words flowed. “Well, there is something I was hoping to get a head start on…”

Celestia, she was eager. I remember hoping this would die down, but for now it was clear she wasn’t going to be able to sit through a massage. I wrapped her tail in a heavy bundle of warm towel, then laid it aside. She deserved a way out. “Let’s let your mane and tail dry so I can brush them, and we can reschedule the rest.”

“If it wouldn’t be too much trouble…”

“Not at all.” And while we wait, let’s see what my sister was talking about. I may have been in the room watching everything happen, but it had still been completely passive. Sure, it was exciting, but no matter how many times you’ve had your hooves on somepony or what you’ve seen them go through, there’s a level of personal involvement that doesn’t surface until you’re doing something like staring straight down their hind legs with your head between their hooves. Miss Rarity’s white limbs were thin at the edge of my vision and grew more shapely until they reached her body. I could see the edges of her cutie mark on her trembling flanks, and the purple base of her tail where it was swallowed up by the wet towel. Then I moved in until nothing was left for me to see.

My talent largely depends on reading and responding to cues. Some of these are superficial surface indicators that are completely obvious. Others are not as easy to interpret (for other ponies anyways), and others would not be apparent without the help of earth magic. Phrasing it like that is bad since it makes it sound like some kind of special power, which it isn't at the surface, it's really just a matter of being... really, really good, I guess.

So at the obvious level, she was aroused. Her coat was still damp from the bath—I recognized the scented oils I had added to the water—but there was no way to mistake it: she was soaked. Whether because of some latent attraction to my sister or I or just anticipation in general, something was provoking an unprecedented response from her and it didn’t take long for it to work. That kind of slick glossiness is impossible to mistake for water.

At the less-easy-to-interpret level, the tension never left her body despite that. This was a problem when Lotus did this the first time: the tightness in her muscles was not just a physiological response to desire and enjoyment, there was real uncertainty and anxiety there. At this point it occured to me that Lotus might have been trying to tease her the first time because she wanted her to release some of it.

Now at the earth magic level, I already knew what the problem was. If you had to guess, you might say she was trying to vicariously satisfy the desire for someone else and found us unfulfilling surrogates, or she was just uncomfortable with her desires in general and might feel guilty for pursuing the,. You might even think she resented her sensitivity, or the fact that she had to expose it to us.

My conclusion was something else entirely. She remained on her front. She wanted her other treatments to continue. She knew how she would respond to us, but didn’t see it as outside the scope of our services. However, that response might have made it seem like she did, and I think she was worried about seeming unprofessional, of slipping out of her role. She felt, in short, like she was being a bad client. She didn’t explode with glee when we painted her hooves, and she never softened past a level of comfortable indifference when we massaged her. I think she didn’t want this to feel personal, even though we all knew it wasn’t.

Fortunately, there’s a fix for that. And apart from being effective, it's also very fun.

“Miss Rarity?” I asked. Her legs went rigid under my hooves, as I expected. She wasn’t anticipating a sound from me, she didn’t want to talk.

“Yes?” She said softly.

I didn’t move my head, so I was still very close to her, and since I could sense the heat in her body I knew she wouldn’t be able to ignore the heat of my breath if I spoke, and most importantly that it would remind her where I was. “Before I begin, do you have any… preferences?”

“Um," she started, tense, but still. "Preferences?”

“Yes, preferences. That is the word, yes? Hmm… predilections?” Just like you do for every other treatment you get? A long list of just so conditions that must be met to the letter if you're going to be satisfied?

The question obviously surprised her, distracting her from whatever she found unsettling by forcing her to think about something else. That was the desired effect: confusion. “Aloe," she began, "you know predilections, but not preferences? How is that—”

“I know them both.”

"Oh," she said. “Well, I’m… I’m not sure, actually. I don’t really know how to answer that. Aside from what I already mentioned, that I like...” She paused, and only mumbled the last word. “…tongue.”

“Tongues, you like? You said ‘mouth’ before.”

“I… I meant that.” She still didn’t want to talk about it.

Too bad.

“No, this is good Miss Rarity. It is best you are as specific as you can be. I would be glad to know your preferences.” I said it the same way I would have said weaknesses, and hoped she got the message.

“I’m… sorry, Aloe. I’ve never thought to describe them before. I could say, well, no... hmm...”

I knew it. This was a problem. She didn’t treat this the way she saw her other services, even though they were the same in her mind. Miss Rarity never had trouble articulating her other desires.

It may be a little arrogant, but when it comes to Miss Rarity I think of myself as half-subcontractor and half-goddess: I can easily find out what she wants regardless of what she says, and do it. But just because I know what she wants before she even tells me doesn’t mean she’ll be comfortable with it if I give it to her. It’s unnerving for somepony to have all of their desires fulfilled before they have the chance to sense them, and Miss Rarity has never been a passive participant in her own care.

“Miss Rarity, perhaps I can suggest something that will make this much more enjoyable for you.”

She actually turned around and looked at me like I had just suggested the impossible. I stared back at her over her rump. “More enj… really!" she started before cutingt herself off. "I mean, really? What do you mean?”

“When I begin, I want you to tell me how you feel. If you want me to do something else, or keep doing something, say so.”

“Um, Aloe—”

“And, you must be as clear as possible. You said tongue just now, right? How about lips?” Miss Rarity blushed, but soon nodded hesitantly. “Okay, then say so. Bring up anything that comes to mind.” And with that, I moved in, exhaling hot air until the moment I made contact.

She tensed immediately. I flattened my tongue and dragged it over her sticky skin a few times, not forcibly or roughly, just until my talent gave me a feel for where her sensitivity was focused. Even though I expected the heat behind her core it still surprised me: her skin was scorching and slick with scalding, clingy, conductive fluid. A shudder rolled through her body even though I had made no attempt to please her, and she squeezed me gently between her legs. Not to let any response slip by unacknowledged, I encouraged the gesture with my own hooves, pushing her legs against my head even more tightly.

One of the most jarring things that always takes a few seconds to overcome is the initial contact. Our minds spend so much time preoccupied with the subject that when it’s really happening it almost never feels right. We’re so convinced we should know how it will feel, and when it doesn’t feel that way the only recourse is alarm. That alarm is always powerful enough—at least for a second—to distract us from delight.

But delight always wins out. Under a few strengthening strokes of my tongue, broad, flat, and unfocused, she started to relish the texture and began timing the flexing of her legs to my rhythmic licking. She still didn’t interrupt me or say anything, so once she was used to this I slid further down, probing gently and dragging my lips over her nethers lazily, resting my tongue along the wet edges of her burning flesh, and right where her skin folded in on itself I found a spot I had detected earlier, a twisted knot of enflamed nerves, and I pushed past it, just once, just a little. She squeezed her legs harder and her frictionless skin invited me further, beckoned me deeper, promised even more fluid heat with evry easy millimeter, but I nonetheless withdrew and resumed my earlier pattern.

“Nggg… Aloe…” She held her breath. “No, no. Do. That. Again...”

I smiled and made sure she could feel it. That’s better. Here? I flicked my tongue quickly over her, conspicuously far from where she wanted.

“No, before... up…”

Oh, here? I started to approach the spot again.

“Hah, further, just a little… higher…!” She said, her voice rising as I got closer.

Right here? I hit it, and licked with twice the strength I had before.

“There! Yes, do… right there! Thaaaaat!”

Good little filly. That feels better, right?

She may not have meant to be answering me, but she might as well have been.“Yes, yes Yes YES! Now deeper, and… up, I guess? Ohhh, nngperfect, Aloe…”

To reward her for her cooperation I resumed my preferred intensity, and as long as she kept talking I let my talent guide my mouth. In a way I was leading her to say what she did, finding what she liked so I could point it out and she could ask for it, but that’s not what mattered. She never had to know, and in a weird, but totally foreseeable way it reminded her that she didn’t need to be passive in this relationship. She was paying for it, after all.

Like my sister had warned me, my head was eventually kicked deeper into her groin and pinned there, but in response I just shoved my face further and waited for her to ask for that too. She did, of course.

“Oh, perfect! Harder, push, just… Push! Oh, Celestia that… feels… so… goooooood!”

It sounded like she had started grindingher teeth together. She was groaning too, so she wasn’t going to be able to talk much longer. It was fun to listen to her try to find the words to keep me going and see them slip away one after another, but I decided to finish her quickly. We’d mapped out most of her preferred spots and the ways to treat them best, but I don’t think anything did as much for her as the feeling of a wriggling tongue doing unmistakably tongue-like things: squirming, effortlessly shifting from limp to rigid, flat to pointed, bending every which way and into all manner of connections with her scattered, sensitive nerves. My lips I kept pinned against her, moving to remind her they were there, always keeping her focus from resting on one thing for too long. Eventually it became too much.

She screamed for real this time. High pitched, then noiselessly, then again, more loudly, until she ran out of air and had to force a shaky breath. Her legs locked around my head tightly—not uncomfortably, but I couldn’t have stayed that way for long—and she lifted her back up a bit, jerking against my face.

She released me as soon as she was down. It didn’t take her as long to catch her breath this time since she hadn’t been holding it so much, and I only waited a few seconds to begin talking.

“Was that more enjoyable, Miss Rarity?”

She turned and smiled at me incredulously. I’m not sure what I looked like, but I certainly wasn’t dry. “It was… good advice.” Her eyes closed and she set her head down. “It may surprise you, but I actually am in a bit of a hurry today.”

So I finished her appointment with a good brushing and some chatting, and by the time she left she was talking my head off.

Lotus and I both started working on Miss Rarity after that, alternating in providing her extended service with no particular pattern. Lotus brags about being quicker but I think my work with her is slightly more intense. We may never know, Miss Rarity seems to be serious about not playing favorites, and it’s probably for the best.

She also hasn’t expanded her treatment regimen past this. I don’t think she will, her attraction to us seems superficial (I know we’re good-looking, but it’s not just about that) and she’s never indicated a desire for more than what she’s been given. She still has one of us work on her horn, or hooves, or nails while the other handles her modest desires, at least until she can’t keep still, so I think we’ve locked in a stable pattern. She has no interest in the erotic subtext of anything else, whether massage, bathing, or personal contact. In a weird way it’s a little plain: she really just wants an augmented happy ending, and taking it further (I think she’d enjoy a tongue bath, for example, or having two at once, or one on her horn, or…) would put us well past the territory that her perspective—and the perspective of the realm—allocates to acceptable horseplay with the ponies you hire to bathe you.

I’m excited about the next chapter. This one was a little forced, but what I’ve written of the next one has been really fun.

Gonna be a little while until then though. I had this one almost ready when I published the last chapter and when I got so many favorites I decided to push through and finish it. First published Fimfic, so big thanks to all of you who made this a favorite, commented, and rated. Totally made my week. Did my best to edit but if any mistakes jump out at you, let me know.

Miss Twilight Sparkle (Human)

Made it in time for the end of the World!

Sorry about the month-long delay. Big thanks to shuzumi for the chapter two review and to everyone who rated (especially if it was positive) or made this story a favorite. Since I only got one review last time I’m assuming Rarity was too boring to finish, and I tried to keep that in mind while writing this (though things did get a bit out of hand). Hopefully it’s a bit more exciting. Not all of these will be as scandalous as this one, mind you, but I had a jolly good time writing it so we’ll see.

Also, this one’s humanized. I did say it would happen. No other changes to the pretext or anything, that’s the only difference. Enjoy!

Miss Twilight Sparkle

Perhaps I should have used my own tongue for this.

Sure, if Lotus caught me she'd find it even more suspicious and I’d lose the opportunity to practice, but some things just defy adequate description in the language of the capital. How the vernacular of those ribald courtesans can leave so little room to detail the erotic without sounding vulgar, detached, or foolish is beyond me, but I should have known better. Especially considering my job. I realize now that I will inevitably need to slide in some direction if I am to continue this project, and since it is better to risk vulgarity than either detachment or foolishness, this is where I shall.

Twilight Sparkle—Miss Twilight Sparkle—is an account I’m quite proud of. She comes on weekends, a little less than twice a month, and with very few exceptions will bathe with one of us before a long, wet… well, I’m getting ahead of myself. There’s a story behind her, and I should start at the beginning.

Quelle surprise, she was a referral of Miss Rarity. A student and a powerful mage, I think she’s at the younger end of her circle of friends. She isn’t terrifically outgoing.

Two things stood out about her when she tiptoed in nervously behind a beaming Miss Rarity, content to have her own mild charm outshone by the gravitas of her companion: first, she’s a bit naïve—though less than Miss Fluttershy—and second, she’s almost exactly as tall as me. Really she’s a little taller (I end up looking at her lips when she stands at full height, chest out and shoulders back like a ballerina) but her posture isn’t perfect and mine is. She weighs about as much as my sister or I, but she’s not quite as strong.

Her naïveté turned out to be irrelevant. Miss Sparkle has a fantastic imagination and a curious personality, and the way she inspected everything (literally everything) on her first visit gave away the inkling she would later expose in detail. After a few appointments with Miss Rarity she came in for a massage on a whim, and I asked her the ‘When was your last…’ question.

She told me she ‘didn’t remember,’ but that her babysitter used to give the ‘best shoulder rubs ever.’

“Oh?" I asked, giving her time to continue. Babysitters have a habit of popping up in fantasies long after their charges have learned to take care of themselves. Something to do with vulnerability, I think, since they're really the first people who interact with you without your family looking on. "She was a masseuse, Miss Sparkle?”

“No, she wasn’t.” Twilight shook her head a little, shifting from side to side as much the face cradle allowed, her cheeks squeaking against the padding as she inadvertently wedged her face deeper. Despite probably being stuck now, she didn't bother lifting herself (towels have a weird immobilizing effect on people if you can make their weight feel perfectly distributed: reflexively, nobody wants to undo it, and I’d arranged her body under a heavy one). “She did have hands like one, though.”

“Indeed?”

“Oh yeah… but that’s not all, though. There was something more than that . Whatever she did—no matter what, I mean it could be anything—it would just be really comforting." Twilight went silent, and I wished I could see her face. It never fails to expose exactly what she's thinking. "I guess it’s because she gave me all her attention when she was with me.”

Good information, but pretty typical. Everybody likes that. “It sounds to me like your babysitter could have been a professional, Miss Sparkle. Such talent is rare, you know," if you don't know where to look. "A wasted opportunity indeed.”

Miss Twilight spent a few seconds inspected her ink-stained fingers, flexing them gently and feeling her nails. Then her hands fell and she tried to shake her head again. “Nah, she has other stuff going on. Actually, she married my brother last—” Miss Twilight’s frame instantly went completely and understandably rigid as her sentence was clipped off, the thought of her babysitter’s fondly-remembered hands running all over her brother probably shredding its way through a little corner of her innocence. Naturally, I froze too.

“Oh...” We said together. Wincing at the knowing disenchantment in each other's unsure voice was only marginally more comfortable than trying to weather the silence.

Well, if Miss Twilight hadn't needed a massage before this, she definitely needed one now. Still, I decided to leave her shoulders for another day.

Twilight—Miss Twilight—came back every week or three and never got the same thing twice. On her second visit we did her legs, on her third we added her neck and feet. She went for a sauna a few times, and a bath, and one time we did her nails. She had a waxing or two as well, I think. She wanted to try everything that interested her.

What did not interest her was anything aesthetic. When we did her nails it was because she thought they were getting too long and she chose the most basic finish. Her hair was never to be touched by anything without utility, which went double for her skin. What did interest her though—and this added considerable breadth to her definition of utility—were the therapeutic properties of our treatments.

Those were her words. I think she was trying to say that she needed a break, that she wanted to collect and compose herself without distractions. Miss Sparkle wanted to relax.

Well, she came to the right place.

But she was still hunting several months in, which meant she was still unfulfilled, which meant I wasn’t doing my job. I think she sensed I felt this, because she started apologizing every time she turned up and asked me to recommend something else. The only reassuring thing about the whole situation was that she seemed just as dedicated to perfecting things as I was.

It’s important to understand that Miss Sparkle is the kind of client who does her homework and never asks about a topic she hasn’t researched thoroughly, because she eventually came up with something very interesting.

One day, she brought up the possibility of an oil massage, and it became a topic of discussion over her next few visits.

“If I get one, can you do my legs too?" She finally asked. Miss Twilight's hair gets a little wild when it dries, and Lotus was brushing it back into a shiny purple curtain while I filed her nails. "With oil, I mean. My legs.” Miss Twilight spoke neutrally, almost managing to mask her eager inquisitiveness.

“This is possible,” I said.

“Yeah, I know it’s possible. Do you offer that?”

I stopped filing and looked up at her. Her face always glows with genuine curiosity, but her cheeks were tinged with a little self-consciousness that day as well. I smiled reassuringly and looked back at her nails. “Not usually, Miss Sparkle. But your satisfaction is important to me—and my sister—and I am familiar with the treatment.”

Her legs were crossed and she was bouncing her hanging foot nervously, and I couldn’t see it but I’m sure she was chewing her lip. “Can you do my feet as well?”

“Yes, Miss Sparkle, we can do your feet.” It may seem like a strange request, but it made sense. Miss Twilight had responded superbly to her first leg massage and even better when we worked for the first time on her feet; I think she must go through irregular cycles of high and low activity with her legs bearing much of the strain. Setting down the file and rubbing her hand gently, I looked back up into her purple, ever-scrutinizing eyes. “I can massage the entire body, you know. Oil or none.”

Those purple eyes widened a bit, with a little more than curiosity. She seemed almost surprised, like it had been too easy. “As can I, Miss Sparkle,” my sister cut in, apparently to make sure we all knew.

Miss Twilight set her chin on her free palm and looked out over my head. “You mean like my... scalp? And my face too?”

I paused to eye her before nodding once, and she pursed her lips. Being able to see her face made this much easier. We went on working in silence, the only sounds around us the dull echo of dripping water and the ambient scraping and brushing.

Miss Twilight's fingers were stiff. I squeezed, and she loosened them.

“People go for that?” She asked.

“Some.”

“And they..." she started, before cutting herself off and pulling back, forcing both my sister and I to stop working. "Aloe… honestly? A full body massage, you said that right?” I nodded. “A full body massage doesn’t sound that relaxing.”

When I rose my eyes to meet her her she looked straight out over my head again. That was probably the only time I’ve ever seen anyone blush from forehead to shoulder. I went back to her nails. “Yes, Miss Sparkle.”

Holding a client’s hand isn’t always a good idea, so to speak. Twilight wanted an argument because that was how she approached problems, and while I’m game for that sometimes, this was the kind of thing best left cooking in her head until curiosity gets the better of her. It took her a week to come back and book another session. She asked for a regular oil massage, but she also asked how long a full massage would take. When she had her answer she raised her eyebrows and clawed pitifully at one last excuse, almost mumbling.

“How... you know, expensive are they?” She sounded embarrassed even to ask.

“Not so much, Miss Sparkle,” I began lightheartedly, doing best not to sound like anything was out of the ordinary. “You and I can decide together on a price, we are off the menu now, you know. But for your first time… hmm…” I clapped my hands happily. “I have it: I will bill you only for a regular massage, and then you need not purchase again if you dislike it!”

I’m glad I'm supposed to look happy all the time, because if I had to stifle a smirk right then it would have been impossible. “I… A... Aloe,” Twilight stuttered, sounding almost angry. “Aloe. That’s much too generous.”

“Oh, not at all, Miss Sparkle. Nothing could be too generous for such a dedicated client. So, I’ll see you soon!” Her feet carried her out the door before she could respond, mouth still trying to shape itself around words that refused to take form.

Now this was treacherous ground. Thin Ice. I knew Miss Twilight had been planning to do that little double-escalation trick like she’d done a few times before, so removing her last alibi meant leaving her cornered. I had some room to play with, sure, but she did look a little terrified after I made the offer. Maybe even more than a little.

Well, my cards were down now.

So I wound up, yet again, with Miss Twilight Sparkle naked on my massage table, her supple body covered by a white towel from hip to thigh. Her dark hair—still damp from the bath—hung vertically, draped around her face as she looked straight down. The oil was hot and she was breathing steadily, resting her arms above her head. I could have started immediately. But I didn’t.

I like to think I’m a pretty perceptive person. There’s no box on our registration cards that asks ‘Magical Ranking, if Applicable’, but it wasn’t hard to piece together that Twilight was a high mage. A very high mage. High mages… complicate things for me.

There’s something wrong with them. Or rather, something right. I’m sure there’s an explanation for it—hay, Miss Twilight could probably tell me if I asked—but all I know for sure is that they all, and I mean all, have perfect bodies.

I don’t mean to say that they look like models. They haven’t jumped out of oil paintings and they aren’t statues come to life. It’s just that their metabolisms tend to be perfectly tuned and incredibly responsive. Somehow their biology is guided by their power and they all end up stunning down to every little detail. Nothing in their appearance is ever unsuitable to their personality or contradictory to any other feature. Even the things you don’t notice unless you get to see them up close (and preferably naked) are like that: the smoothness of their skin and the way it bounces back when touched, how it tans and colors and never blemishes; the thickness and softness and strength of their hair; the rich pigmentation in their eyes. They look—they feel—designed.

They’re usually unaware of it too, believe it or not, which makes it even more infuriating. Like it’s not unfair enough to begin with!

Maybe this isn’t true officially, but I’ve had my hands on enough high mages to feel pretty certain of my suspicions. My sister and I are fortunate enough to be blessed in appearance—we’re slim, though not lanky, and our skin tends to shrug off our labors quite well—but Miss Twilight’s figure (while it wouldn’t turn heads over someone like Miss Rarity who has the will to flaunt it) is just so good. Perfectly curved, proportionate limbs, a well-rounded chest and even better hips, every part of her has this tantalizing edge of pliability that drags your eyes all over until you end up trapped in her bottomless eyes. And her bangs! Anyone who can pull off bangs like that—like they were made for them—looks like a princess to me.

I guess what I’m saying is that I wouldn’t have minded terribly if Twilight had asked me to jump her and try to make her forget her name as our next little experimental treatment. There are just some clients whose appointments keep me up at night.

From her side, well… it’s not too hard to work out that a pair of beauticians (with a special talent for detecting and manipulating sensitivity) can cook up more than what’s on the menu. A spa is kind of like a restaurant: most people just go with a prix fixe routine from the few sets on the front page, low-impact repeats start to order a la carte, and real regulars—who know the chef and the kitchen—eventually want to see what we can do with their favorite dishes. But here’s the thing: somehow Twilight made relaxing a mission, a task that she couldn’t leave unperfected. It was almost fetishistic.

To be fair, performance anxiety isn’t unique. It’s a common and particularly intrusive problem if you charge people to relax: either they feel like they aren’t holding up their end of the bargain or they’re constantly trying to decide whether they’re getting their money’s worth. And Twilight wanted to be the best at it in her cute, bizarre little way. I think by this point she had read every book on massage, every research paper on physical therapy, all the history behind public bathing and how the practice had changed over the centuries. She knew what was out there. Oh, she knew.

And she knew what she wanted.

And most importantly, she wanted it badly.

I could tell every time I put my hands on her. No one that clever has trouble making the logical leap that links the pretty foreign girl fretting over you with the notion of the same pretty foreign girl fretting over the rest of you. Whatever was on her mind, I’m sure she’d read about it in a hundred variations. I could see the phantom images swimming in her eyes. It's just that she was also the kind of person who didn’t act without certainty when it came to that sort of thing, no matter how easily she let herself imagine it. The possibility of it really happening probably didn’t feel real to her.

But this was winter, and there’s not much to do, and when you’re not doing much you feel really, really cold. If you can make someone feel warm they’ll just float away, so to that effect I’d put the fleece cover on our table and wrapped it in a thick sheet. The room was hotter than usual, and when Miss Sparkle stepped out of the bath it was into a warmed terry. The towel I left on her had been heated. I even set out some candles, and caught her watching them. They broke her utility rule, probably, but apparently they weren’t an infraction worth commenting upon.

I realized how long I'd been taking. She hadn't moved.

It took some serious effort to keep things professional that day. By now Twilight—Miss Twili…

Nope, I give up.

By now Twilight was okay with a little familiarity, but once I’d given her shoulders and back a warm coating of slippery oil and started working the muscles at the base of her spine I had to keep myself from getting too playful. Her legs were even worse, I thought for sure I’d slip up and squeeze her limp thighs or her tense calves and she’d sense the heat behind my fingers. I almost went for it that day—her leg stiffened enchantingly when I ran my oily fingers between her toes and I nearly, nearly lost it—but I figured if I was going to lose any sleep over this, she might as well too.

She ordered the same thing on her next visit.

And her next. Never even mentioned the candles. I went for it.

I think it was long enough. Had I done it at her first appointment she would have dissolved into an awkward mess. On one of her last few she might have reacted with alarm, but probably not surprise. When I finished her legs this time, I pulled the towel down to her calves. That’s another weird thing about towels: leave one lying on someone—even just over their feet—and they won’t feel nearly as exposed as if you remove it entirely, never mind the fact that they could be essentially naked. The towel controls the mind.

I got more oil.

The first time I ran my hands over her backside and down her inner thighs felt so unbelievably good—for her, I mean, I could tell, but for me as well—I almost didn’t want to let go for more oil. A few more open-palmed strokes and her buttocks were just as slick as the rest of her, and my fingers were free to work her flesh without friction. So long as I sensed her excitement I didn’t restrain myself and let my instincts guide me entirely.

Twilight has nice breasts, but her hips and bottom are truly her most wonderful features. They give her practical, preppy work outfits—pleated skirts and dark hose all around—a fantastically blunt, oblivious edge of sexuality. I started working at the lower edges of her rear, right where her legs join her body, gradually moving up by firmly squeezing the increasingly slick flesh and letting it slip out of my hands again and again, beginning to really knead the meat of her largest muscles. My hands alternated between specific knots and bunches, working them all with varying degrees of force, until before long I was letting them slide more deeply between her glossy thighs and running them straight up to her spine, just barely dragging the tips of my fingers over the crease in her buttocks—tauntingly slowly—but eventually supplying enough pressure to gradually part them and run my nails between her soft, warm flesh and—

I went for it. My hand slithered back between her thighs and I palmed her, my extra senses straining through the immediate contact with the twisted bundle of nerves running right through her core and the myriad others clustered tightly in that one region. Twilight was burning up, and the conductive oil clinging to my fingers made that fact even more apparent. She lifted her head and looked at me, and with a bewitchingly seductive growl that even she was surprised by, asked “How much?”

I bit my tongue. She asked again. I made an offer.

Twilight flipped herself over, tangling her legs in the towel. I made a bit of a show of fixing it now that she was watching me, but left it by her knees.

She made me start on her arms, after which I did her collar and her neck and the upper edges of her chest. Her eyes fell away when my hands started running up and over her breasts, her breath catching when I first touched her stiffening, tender nipples. She shivered and trembled when I slid my fingers slid over her belly and sides, moving up and over her chest again, then again, lifting her firm breasts only to feel them slip back away. I let her contours guide my senses and my senses guide my fingers, which splayed and tried further to grasp her soft, round chest, but never found enough purchase and kept sliding off, eliciting a sharp intake of breath from her each time.

After a few endless minutes I was finally working the oil—no longer as warm but still comfortably viscous—into the skin above her crotch and then the edges of her groin. With slow, heavy strokes I moved closer and closer to her, alternating between each slippery side until my fingers were running down the middle of her body, finally pinning all of her attention beneath the palm of my hand. Her buttocks had tightened and lifted her up, her breasts were rising and falling, firm, but still yielding to gravity with a rhythmic bounce, shifting every time she breathed. Her eyes were on my hand, slowly increasing in its pace and pressure as it ran back and over the gap in the hot, smooth mound at the apex of her thighs, until I let my middle fingers disappear entirely.

It was just as slippery inside of her but infinitely hotter. Twilight bit her lip and whimpered, once, before gripping the table ferociously. I pressed my other palm down between her groin and belly button and focused on my movement and the wet sounds it it was making.

High mages are weirdly sensitive, but Twilight's first time still didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. She took longer to peak than what I can usually achieve. I was wary of numbing her, and ensured I withdrew occasionally to keep her from slipping back while I stimulated her, and with the right amount of vigor and upwards pressure she did, indeed, climax. I even managed to slip another one in while she was up.

But while she looked thoroughly routed and was still trembling after I’d washed her off, the tightness that crossed her brow as she left betrayed what I had already detected. Something just wasn’t quite right.

She came back. A month later, sure, but I was only slightly worried. This time she ordered the same but insisted on paying up front, and didn’t include the additional fee we had agreed to. I got the message.

Three more we went, front as well as back, oil. Things weren't how they felt before we went past that barrier, but even though these routines no longer did as much for her, she kept getting them.

Lotus was there as well the fourth time, detailing Twilight’s toenails. I had just started rubbing oil into her back.

“Aloe?” Twilight mumbled. It stopped me dead. She almost never talks without being given a subject to ramble over.

I started working again, slowly but my sister had noticed my surprise and was watching me. She must have caught the look in my eye that said I have no idea, because she just shrugged and went back to work. “Yes, Miss Sparkle?”

“Gah,” she stiffened. “Don’t call me that.”

“Very good, Miss Twilight.” Lotus rolled her eyes at me for about five minutes, Twilight kind of loosened. I doubt the response had impressed her.

“What we did a few weeks ago, I was wondering…” She stopped to compose herself before lifting herself up on her elbows, looking dead ahead and interrupting us both. This was it. “If you did that again, could I do something?”

I can guarantee that a look of not-quite-surprise-because-we-never-doubted-ourselves-anyways-did-we was on my face, because it’s exactly what was on my sister’s. “You would like to try something else? What is it?”

“No, that’s not… I mean, that is what I want to try. Doing something.”

“Doing what?”

“Not what,” she said, turning to face me, gazing suggestively but still leaving me baffled. “While...”

Okay. I didn’t understand, but the look on her face was begging me not to make her say it and thereby withdraw the inexplicit phrasing of her probably very explicit request, so with all the language power in my brain I set to deciphering her message. While…

They both smiled when I got it. It must have shown

“...Oh.” I said.

“Yeah.” Twilight responded.

“You want to do something—”

“Yes.”

“To me—”

“Yes.”

“While…”

“Yep!”

…

Yes! Oh, yes! Or to my sister, maybe, but… Yes anyway, whatever!

“I see.” I said calmly, snatching my tense hands away from her back, where they were probably already trembling. “Well, Miss Sparkle, such services are… available, on occasion.” Although they aren’t at the disposal of many of our customers. “For clients that find responding passively too difficult, I mean. Did you... have something in mind?”

She slid her hair over her shoulder and peeked at the door out the corner of her eye. She had something planned all right. “I’ll have to think about it.” She said, dropping her head back down.

Lotus left us, bringing her face to within an inch of mine on her way out with a look that made it clear she would eventually be given a turn. My sister agreed with me about Twilight’s enchanting balance of personality and appearance, but apparently didn’t find her as alluring as I did. I guess I’d been working with her longer, but this happens. Lotus has her pet clients too.

I resumed her massage. It took forever to get through it that day—my fault since I could sense her anticipation and relished drawing it out, working from her back straight under the towel to her legs, then to her feet; before she rolled over and I did her front. Still, eventually she was completely varnished and glistening like a demigoddess in the candlelight, and it looked like I was about to be given the chance to anoint myself with oils before her.

Twilight Sparkle's eyes… I don’t even know where to begin. They’d been watching me ever since I’d turned her over, but when I finished and looked into them I swear I could see the… not love, but… nervous desire, maybe? It sounds stupid, but I can only describe it one way:

Twilight’s eyes were sparkling. It was time, and we both knew it.

“You have been thinking, then?” I asked.

She nodded coyly and slid sideways a little. “Do what you did before, but get up here.”

I blinked in surprise. “Facing which way?” Still only my fingers?

“Away. Legs over my head.”

Outstanding.

I started slipping off my shorts—my sister and I wear these sort of long, close-fitting gown-shirts that more or less cover us to the tops of our legs, and under them short tights that go to mid thigh—but Twilight stopped me, shaking her head.

“Nope, not necessary.” She said, patting the table more aggressively.

I paused for a moment with no idea of what she might have in mind, but I nonetheless climbed over her and planted my knees beside her body. She pushed me forward until I was squatting over her neck and made no further move to touch me.

It was easier to work her upper legs and lower stomach from this position since I was oriented symmetrically and had a better view. I could use my weight more effectively as well. I’m ashamed to say I overdid it: she was so oily by the time I was done that it was coalescing into tiny droplets and puddles before my hands could come back to smooth it over. This time when I slipped between her thighs she parted them a little and pushed her pelvis towards me. I didn’t need to be told twice.

With her legs straight, the critical fold in her skin was a perfect slit that started where her flesh began to rise and disappeared between her legs, and as I ran my thumb back and forth over the length of that welcoming crease, slick and sticky with excitement, I gradually increased the pressure behind it until, in one fluid motion, my two middle fingers again slipped inside her and my thumb met with that bundle of twisted nerves running straight up her spine.

What happened next will be hard to describe. Twilight responded more violently to this than she had to my first insertion, jerking her pelvis up as my senses linked me to her response. What I was not expecting was the rogue wave of pleasure that slammed into me like bus and nearly ripped me back out to sea.

Beneath me I had a naked woman. A naked, slippery, gorgeous woman. My knees touching her torso and my fingers in her cramped, velvety, burning slit were the only points of contact we shared. I was aroused, yes, and I could feel my own excitement mounting as I anticipated of Twilight’s involvement, but I was still confused as to what she was waiting for. She had yet to touch me at all!

Then, once I entered her for that first brush with delight, I could go no further. I fell forward, just barely catching myself with my free hand which itself immediately slipped. Madly searching for support and suddenly worried about hurting the minor deity beneath me, I scrambled to balance myself and wound up clinging to the top of her thigh, my ear pressed against the warm oil coating her soft skin.

Sure, I’m sensitive. But entering her nearly floored me. This was impossible.

Twilight caught my eye. She had been looking down at me between her round breasts and my bent legs. Although she was blushing profusely, what struck me first was her mad-scientist grin that could carry only one terrifying meaning: it worked.

I tested my theory by thumbing her clit again and wound up falling flat against her, my legs thrust outward and off the table, my outfit certainly ruined. High mages…

Either she was working with my special talent, complementing it somehow, or this was something else entirely. All I know is that while I couldn’t actually feel the delicious physical interaction I had been waiting for, she was treating me to a show with my own handiwork as the centerpiece. There was nothing inside me, nothing touching me but the stretchy cloth of my shorts, but I could feel my fingers in her, detached from any sensation like texture or reality but present in the patterns of tight euphoria saturating my groin. I felt what she felt: a foreign, intrusive force guided by the best clandestine intelligence in existence concerning every single one of her greatest weaknesses. Whatever I did to Twilight, and however I did it, was sent straight back through me.

I peeled myself shakily off her. She just leaned back with her head in her hands and waited, smiling like a chess player who knows she's about to win. Not many clients surprise me. Fewer still can leave me flabbergasted. And here I was, cornered. Checkmate.

Trying not to drool, I accepted my fate. There was no point in reservation. If this was how she was going to play, I was going to expend every resource at my disposal to assure mutual devastation to the both of us. Focusing all of my attention on the physical contact I had with her, where my talent’s senses were centered, I only let pleasing her cross my mind and tried to forget about the spikes of euphoria being driven through me. Without any pretense at delicacy, I curled my fingers up into the most sensitive wall of her silky folds, and dragged with as much force as I dared.

I wound up pinned to her again, my oily clothes stuck to her bare torso. My free arm was still wrapped around one of her thighs and I was holding my face against it tightly, but her free leg got away from us both and her ankle was dangling off the table, making my head slide inwards over her thigh. I felt a burning streak of pleasure flash and fizzle in my own core before noticing I was grinding myself against her chest, legs splayed. Then I remembered my hand, and I did it again.

And again.

And again, until the rhythm was familiar to me and I could bear the sensation with equal parts deluded ecstasy and mad focus. The realization that Twilight was feeling exactly what I felt made my fingers tighten even further. I got to hear her moan for the first time. I swore it wouldn’t be the last. But for every one I coaxed out of her I was sent dangerously close to moaning myself, and I nearly hesitated before forcing myself on. I always thought I was good at this, but to be so irrevocably vindicated was delightful.

Eventually I was breathing on her. I could feel the ghostly afterimage of the puffs of hot air on my own tender nethers. I was so, so close, and hadn't been touched at all. Instinct told me to lick her, and since the edges of my lips were already pressing into her thigh it was a simple matter to test that, but I knew from my first contact that it would be too much to bear. I moaned into her leg when the sensation was fed back to me, and Twilight cried out adorably, so with an extra dose of ferventness I slipped out of her once, registered her disappointed shock at the absence, then slid back over her slit and slipped in once again—this time with a third finger—rubbing my thumb right up and over her red, engorged clit with the suicidal excitement of someone jumping in front of a train.

I bit her. It shames me to say it, but I couldn’t stop myself. My lips were on her leg already and what I’d just done to her did, in fact, feel like being hit by a train. Twilight kept up her little squeals, unable to vocalize anything else, her hands clinging at first to my thighs and then to the edges of the table. I whined into her leg, my teeth clinging to her flesh and my tongue pressed solidly against her skin, and with a few more quick strokes we were both finished.

It was absolutely fantastic, one of the best orgasms I’ve ever had. Her thighs came together and squeezed my head once before her free leg again moved off, shaking stiff before dangling well off the table. Twilight just laid there looking silly, fully exposed and completely done, and I knew I was no better. My own limbs could have been anywhere, I only knew where my hands were because one was clinging to her thigh for dear life and the other… well, I never wanted to remove it.

Her leg was marked. I knew it before I pulled back. Rolling next to her, we reclined alongside each other on the narrow table for a few seconds, still panting like animals. Eventually I stood, shakily, clinging to the edge for support.

I hate to go on about it, but Twilight, even ravished and dishevelled and indecent, is seriously one stunning girl. Looking at her like that made me feel bad about marking her.

“Miss Twilight, I must apologize.” I said unevenly. Her face tightened in confusion and she looked at me with concern.

“What are you talking about! Aloe, you don't have to... I mean, that was—” she saw where I was pointing and sucked in through her teeth. “Oh. Well, at least nobody else is gonna see it.”

She said so with some bitterness and I had to agree, albeit with a little dispelled jealousy. Their loss. I definitely couldn’t let Lotus take her for a while. At least until the bruise faded.

Twilight gave me a once-over. “Aloe, you look ridiculous,” she said. I smiled. And you look like a sex cult just mistook you for the physical manifestation of their goddess, which you should probably actually be careful of. I wonder if there really are any cults like that I can join.

I rubbed my cheek and shrugged. “We should clean you u… we should clean up.”

Although I changed my words I just focused on putting her back together. Twilight’s hair needed fixing, and that can take some time because of its thickness. She was a little sweaty and there was some excess oil, both of which I helped her towel off. Once that was done she sent me out and took care of the rest herself. I slipped into a room where we store some of our everyday supplies. Towels and soap, that kind of thing. Lotus had probably heard the door open when I excused myself so I counted on her finding me and left it unlocked. She didn’t disappoint, and was whispering before she even walked in.

“So? What ha—oh, Aloe.” She cut herself off, bringing a hand in front of her shocked smile and staring at me with saucer-eyes.

“Yes?” I said.

Lotus pulled her lower lip between her teeth. “Have you… seen yourself yet?”

I tried to stare her down, but she didn't flinch. I shook my head. “I’m afraid to look.” My sister snickered and hauled me to the corner with the sink.

Twilight had been right, I did look ridiculous. The hair on one side of my head was stuck together awkwardly and the whole front of my gown was glued to my body. It felt a little gross, honestly, tugging at the skin of my stomach and chest when I moved. The crotch of my shorts was uncomfortably wet as well, and the worst part is I was grinning like an idiot. I couldn’t even get my eyebrows to come down.

I started washing my face and my sister draped a towel over my neck. “I’m next, Aloe.” She declared.

My hands froze. The phantom texture of Twilight’s thigh between my teeth was still raw. “No,” I said. “Soon.”

She scrunched up her face like a child. Like she has done since we were children when something was unreasonably denied to her. “And why not! Did you do something? You better not have lost her—” I snorted at that, I couldn’t stop myself. Lotus hates being cut off, but she collected herself anyway. “Right. She is coming back though?”

“I should think so.”

“And you’re not just being selfish? You’re always up early when she has a booking, you know. Don’t let her get in your head, Aloe.”

I turned to face her, towelling myself with the cloth she had given me. Her arms were crossed and she had an eyebrow raised indignantly. “Too late for that,” I muttered.

“What?”

“You’ll see.” I also remember telling you I like her so that little observation isn’t very impressive, Inspector Blossom. “And I said you could go, didn’t I?”

“Did you… you didn’t… mark her?” Lotus asked, leaning way in.

This always happens. How does she know? I shrugged, then realizing I was biting my lip, spat it out quickly.

“You bit her?” Surprise really made her expression cute, and for a moment I thought about pretending I was messing with her—but she wouldn’t be able to hold her breath forever.

I nodded.

Lotus actually gasped. She stared at me forever like she didn’t believe me. “You’re serious, Aloe?”

There being no real reason to break my wall of silence, I turned back to the mirror and watched Lotus over my shoulder. I could almost see her brain crunching through the possibilities, it looked like every second I kept her out of the loop was driving her closer to a heart attack.

“Did she… Aloe, did she ask you to?”

This time I couldn’t help myself. I grinned like a vampire—a very satisfied, pretty vampire—and shook my head. I almost laughed, even. It was so comical, I’d just bitten a client and that client was Twilight Sparkle!

At some point my sister found her jaw and brought it back up to her face. “I will be next, Aloe.”

“No you won’t, Lotus.”

She eyed me for a moment, and walked out. “We’ll see.”

But we never did. Twilight came in three days before her next appointment on a visit that was strictly business. She showed up right when we opened, speaking to someone outside. We usually don’t have an appointment in our earliest slot but I was manning the desk in case someone visited. She came in alone.

My smile, as always, was calm and confident, and in no way indicative of the little pang of anticipation I felt.

“Welcome, Miss Sparkle. What can I do for you this morning?”

Her eyes shifted around until she was sure we were alone, but then she gave me a carnal smile (from which I think I am still recovering) and bounced up to the counter. “Hi Aloe, thanks! It’s about my account, obviously.”

I slipped a finger under my hair band and slid it towards my ear. “Your account is settled, I think—”

“I know,” she said happily. “I want to cancel my appointments.”

My hand froze above my ear and it took me a second to double-check her words in my brain. Unfortunately, I hadn't misheard her. “I see,” I said. You probably could have been more delicate about it then, maybe tried not to sound like you were declaring a national day of celebration, but whatever. I’d miss Twilight, but I have other favorite clients. None of them live as close as the library, but still. “I can do that right away, Miss Sparkle, but—”

“Whoa, not yet. I just said that I want to.”

“You just… want to?”

“Yep!” Twilight tilted her head with a friendly smile.

“I… If I could ask, why have you chosen to do this?”

“So I can book new ones, of cour—” before she could finish her bubbly sentence her eyes shot open and she went completely silent, bringing her hands to her mouth and dropping her usual aloofness to the floor. She went on, suddenly quite ashamed. “Oh. Aloe I’m… umm... that... may not have been the best way to put it.”

No, perhaps not. “Not at all, Miss Sparkle,” though in the future I invite you to direct your accounts inquiries to my sister, as I may not be able to survive another one. “You wish to modify your schedule?”

“Yeah, or… not quite, actually.”

“You,” oh, let me guess… “You wish to try something else?”

Her shyness deepened. She knew she’d been giving us (mostly me) the runaround when it came to treatments and I think she almost apologized again, but this time was different. She knew what she was about to ask for and she had for a while. It wasn’t just what we’d done before, then.

“Can we talk somewhere private?” She asked.

I looked around. Nobody was there. The waiting room was empty, the baths were empty, Lotus was probably on her way and I couldn’t be bothered to check the schedule to see who else was, but seriously, the spa was empty.

“Of course, Miss Sparkle.”

She trailed me to a private room near the back, and I shut the door behind us. Before I had the chance to offer her a seat, she was talking.

“I want a nuru massage.”

I blinked, unsure I’d heard her. “You want a… I’m sorry, you want a bodyslide?”

With her face burning a fiery red and staring angrily at the ground, she went on. “It’s called a nuru massage.”

“One variant is called that, but—“

“Well I want that. That one, with the seaweed stuff, and… that. That’s how you say it, right?” I nodded, amazed. “Good. I couldn’t find it in a dictionary or look up anything to reference the pronunciation, if you can believe it. I was really worried about getting it wrong.”

“I... see.” Judging by her timidness, the pronunciation wasn’t her most significant concern. Celestia, Twilight, being left alone with a mind like yours in that cramped little loft is just asking for trouble. If I had told you something like that even existed on your first visit you’d never have relaxed again, and then you just came out and asked for one.

Her attention had gone from the floor to the ceiling, which was apparently more interesting, but she was still waiting. “So… can you do it?”

“I…” yes, and I’d have you in a bath already if I could, but “these massages are not so popular with women, you know. They were created—”

Her eyes suddenly found mine and I was silenced by a look of visceral smugness. “They were created independently several times in history when red light districts in certain cities were shut down as a way of selling services to bring clients to climax without direct stimulation or penetration that eventually evolved into several varieties of erotic massage of varying sophistication—” (she paused to inhale about half the air in the room here) “—in their involvement of technique and material. I know. Can. You. Do. It.” She finished, looking at me boastfully but still blushing fiercely, even a little shamefully.

She’d obviously done her research.

I shouldn’t have done what I did then, but she’d gotten so worked up over it and after her heart-stopping entrance I decided she deserved to be toyed with. Doing my best to appear detached I looked at her, concerned, and kept my answer to myself. She watched me, waiting, as I played idly with my lip using my fingers.

“This…I don’t know if this can be done, Miss Sparkle.” I said finally.

“No?” She asked, possibly with genuine sadness. I remember feeling disappointed in myself for leading her on. “But we already… I don’t understand. Why?”

“You have quite a few appointments, and it may be difficult to reschedule all of them.”

She blinked.

Our spa never gets quieter than it was right then, and she spent what felt like an hour trying to stare through me with her big, purple eyes. Eventually she smiled softly. “I deserved that, didn’t I?”

I shrugged, but smirked reassuringly. “You would prefer morning or afternoon?” Morning would be better since I wouldn’t be tired and I’d still be clean, but nobody wants to spend the rest of the day distracted by that.

Twilight thought about it. “When do you close?”

I knew it. Oh well. At least I could prepare, then. I needed to order a few things… “Don’t let that concern you, Miss Sparkle. If you prefer the afternoon I will need some extra time I think, for this, so we can start late if you would like. Sundays maybe… we close early Saturday, but mid-afternoon would be fine.” Twilight looked to the side, exposing her profile nicely, probably trying to remember her commitments. None surfaced. “Three, shall we say?”

She started nodding slowly, then sped up slightly and just kept going. “Three. Three Saturday. That’s fine... Wow, that’s soon.”

I looked at her for a moment. Her breathing had become unsteady, I don’t think she was completely convinced that this was actually happening. “Miss Sparkle?” She didn’t respond. “Twilight?”

“Yes!” She squeaked, blinking back to attention and swallowing. Her eyes had widened considerably. Too bad, Twilight, you shouldn’t have asked if you wanted to be turned down. You’re in for it now!

“You know, you should have brought this up sooner.” I said, placing my hand on her shoulder and squeezing her muscles gently. She tensed at my touch, but her neck went limp once I gave it a few slow squeezes and she tilted her head away, exposing her collar as her eyes fluttered closed. “It may be hard to ask, I know, but if I am going to say no, I am going to say no.” Although there’s a pretty low risk of that, really. “That is the worst that could happen, yes? Miss Sparkle? Yes?”

“Mhmmnn…” She mumbled. In agreement, maybe, though I did have to squeeze it out of her.

“You have not been doing the neck exercises I showed you.”

Twilight whined like a guilty puppy. I knew some of the tension was due to the stress behind her question, but still, she wasn’t doing them. I pulled my hand back. The suddenly doe-eyed Twilight—I swear to Celestia—swooned. “We must be more candid with each other, I think, if I am to provide these services for you. Yes?”

“Mhm,” she nodded.

“Good. Thank you. Remember that I work for you, right?”

“Mhm,” she nodded more aggressively.

“Three?”

“Three. Saturday?”

“Saturday, Miss Sparkle. Until then.” I have a wholesale catalog to find.

Twilight left, stretching her neck as she walked out. All I could think was how lucky it was that I had been the one behind the counter that morning. I guess we did see, in a way.

Lotus was annoyed that I had managed to snatch Miss Twilight’s next appointment, but when I told her what she probably had in store later she got over it. She even helped me prepare, if only by inflating the mattress and then lazing around on it while I flitted about getting ready.

“You stretched this morning, Aloe?” She asked me while I was cleaning the floor.

Yes Lotus. I stretch every morning, almost always with you. And I’m the flexible one, remember?

“Do you remember how to do this?” She asked me while I adjusted thermostat.

Yes Lotus. What is there to forget?

“Is that warm enough?” She asked as I was setting the bottles into a basin of hot water.

Yes Lotus. You want me to practice on you or something?

“There’s no time now! You should have told me about this sooner!” Maybe she was still a bit angry, but I was kind of leaving her out. Too bad.

“Should I… wait?” She asked while we were sitting, waiting, in the empty lobby.

I did my best to mimic her usual cheeky smile. “If you’d like, Lotus, but this is going to take a while.” Who cares if I was leaving her out?

It might be worth probing Twilight for her receptiveness to Lotus’s inclusion, though. I’m not sure what I’d choose between getting only half her appointments or sharing them all but doing only half as many. Business decisions are difficult sometimes.

Lotus glared at me until she was out of sight. Hopefully she had a nice afternoon. I’d have to make up with her later—there was surely something that would satisfy her giant, throbbing ego—but not before regaling her with every little detail of my own overtime work. Flipping open a magazine to no page in particular, I took a seat in our dim lobby and waited. Models in swimsuits already, it was still only spring.

There was a quiet knock, and a hand pushed the door open enough to fit an arm through. Quietly as a kitten I snuck up and swung it open, and Twilight spilled in with a yelp.

“Good afternoon, Miss Sparkle.” I smiled at her professionally as she tried to recover. With a quick peek outside I locked the door behind us. “This way please!”

My sister sometimes makes good suggestions. Since Twilight was coming after hours we had shut down the rest of the building, so while it was bright outside, only a few dim tendrils of light were sneaking in through the lobby and down the hallways. The place felt empty. It was empty. It felt like I was leading her through a secret passage to a hidden grotto, and I’m sure it was having the same effect on her. By the time we arrived at the room I had chosen—spacious enough to replace the couch with a mattress and not feel cramped—we were in almost total darkness. With her sun-spoiled eyes Twilight was probably blind. I opened the door.

She swallowed as a wave of hot air washed over her. The private room was lit warmly and glowing in soft oranges and yellows. My sister and I prefer the neutral pastels in which we chose our décor, but for this kind of thing it doesn’t hurt to dim the lights and turn up the heat lamps for a change. I ushered her in before much of the nice, hot air had a chance to escape and, to be doubly sure (even though anyone who could get past the main door had the keys to get in here), locked the door behind us with a heavy thunk that made Twilight jump.

Slipping out of my shoes and sliding them under a shelf, I walked past my dazed guest to lean against the counter and let the heated tiles warm my toes. The familiar scent of fresh-cut flowers that fills every room in our spa was stronger in the nearly-tropical heat. There wasn’t really anywhere for her to sit while she took everything in, so she just stood around, awkwardly fidgeting. Someone (not her, surely) had painted her nails a dark, sparkling palette of purples to match her hair, and to me they looked like candy. I remember hoping guiltily for her toes to match.

It was unseasonably warm for early spring and Twilight had dressed accordingly, in her fashionably off-center sort of way. Dark canvas shorts over dark, rolled-up tights and an odd-fitting bright purple sweater that had a collar wider than her shoulders, with a white top underneath and what I could already see were black bra straps. All things that would be fun to take off her. After letting her eyes linger on the grey inflatable and the wooden bowls on the counter—both new additions to our inventory, the best I could get on short notice—she finally caught me looking at her. I’d usually have stopped and glanced away, but this situation merited another kind of attention that was far too easy to give.

I pulled my hair out of its band and ran my fingers through it, letting it hang loosely and naturally around my face. I do like my work look, but it can be a little goofy: it makes my forehead look enormous, for one thing. Twilight’s eyes trailed my fingers, her own hand feeling a strand of her long, dark hair. There was no reason not to jump right into things, but she looked like she had something to say. I could have pushed it back—I was clearly in control—but I thought it would be better to sound her out now and have my fun on her next few hundred visits.

“I’m going to begin, Miss Twilight,” I said, speaking softly, tugging out my earrings and setting them by my headband in a woven tray next to the sink, before reaching behind my neck to undo my choker. “You know what is going to happen now?”

“I think so.” She said. It was the first time she had spoken and her voice was a little quiet from disuse, and possibly anxiety. “I mean, there seems to be some variation, like you said. It’s not an exact science, but… I mean, you do have a… method?” She tried to speak gently, but in the empty building there was nowhere for her voice to hide.

“Well,” I began, clicking my nails against the marble counter top. “Not quite. I do find it best to permit some variation, as you put it. It can be good, this service leaves much room for… flexibility.” I moved a step or two closer to her, dropping my eyes to her legs for a moment before bringing them back up to her face. Celestia, Twilight looked cute terrified.

She nodded slowly, not quite able to swallow my double-entendre whole, but trying diligently. “…Like?”

“Like today, we will shower; next time, a bath?”

“I showered already, Aloe—” she said, and her eyes immediately shot open with fear. “Not that we can’t as well I mean, also… or—”

“The gel works best on wet skin, Miss Sparkle, that is all.” I wouldn’t need to wash her hair, then. I don’t really mind, but it does take time.

Twilight gathered herself again and looked around shiftily. “Hot,” she said.

“Again, the gel. It is quite… mm...” I had the word, but I let her find it.

“Conductive?” She offered timidly.

“Yes,” I smiled. “Conductive. And water-based, thus—”

“The humidity? So it won’t dry out?” It was obviously possible to overpower her nervousness with her interest in the science.

“That’s right,” I said warmly, letting myself sound impressed. This time she blushed with a little pride. “But we expect nothing less from our clever librarian, especially if she could find this kind of thing in Ponyville’s small archive…” Overstepping my boundaries a little, I hooked a finger over the edge of her stretchy sweater and pulled her towards me.

She lifted her cheeks shyly and looked up at the ceiling. “I might have had to dig a little deeper…”

“Oh? I see.” I had suspected as much. “I have not seen such things in any public collection since moving so close to the capital. But it is as you say, the moisture keeps it from drying too quickly.”

“How long will it last?”

“Let me worry about that, Twilight.” I said, shaking my head. “Now, you came early, but I think we have already begun our session.” I stepped even closer, so that there was maybe enough room between us for someone to slip through sideways. At full height and with Twilight slouching, I could look ever-so-slightly down at her.

“Yeah,” she started, still hesitant, eyes pleading for another few seconds. “Any last advice?”

Even though I knew she was stalling I still did my best to think of something meaningful. “You will… how should I say this… you know of the history of this practice, yes? Well, you’ll feel its origins, Miss Sparkle.” Twilight was looking at me quizzically, about to interrupt, but I shook my head. “No. I will not explain this to you, you will understand soon.”

I wasn’t lying—there’s reallyno way to mask that this is a purely sensual service—but I was going to do my best to obfuscatein the meantime. The uncertainty you can force on someone when so much ambiguity in roles and behaviour can be left unexplained is truly delicious, and with a client like Twilight it’s the icing on the cake. At first there are clear signals that we are still a client and practitioner. I undress first, then undress her. I lead. I test the water, guide her, massage her. But while I go about my business I get to pepper her with little intrusions, cross the line back and forth, confound her so much that she has no idea what my role is and therefore cannot possibly know hers, and the tension and uncertainty mount until they finally spill over and drive her crazy. I can see why these caught on. They’re quite fun to give, and I usually end up getting as much out of it as the client.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

“Just try to relax, Twilight. You will find it comes naturally and you will learn quickly, I think, but you may wish not to speak. You are ready?”

Twilight nodded, but found one last question. “Why do you know how to do this?”

I saw the alarm in her eyes when she realized how she had phrased it, but I let it slide. She could know if she wanted, but not now. “Be careful, the gel is more slippery than you are expecting. We are no longer working with oil. Don’t be afraid to involve yourself. My sister says something sometimes: embrace the spectacle.”

And right on cue, we felt the silence overtake us.

I undressed quickly and smoothly, slipping out of my thin clothes and folding them with practiced precision before placing them silently behind me. This sometimes calls for more teasing and attitude, a lip-biting, eyelash-fluttering, slightly-self-mocking flourish to start off, but there would be plenty of time for that in her next visits. Right now in Twilight’s mind I was still the professional, the girl in uniform, and I didn’t want to dissolve that notion yet. Besides, I felt her eyes on me—I saw her watching me, red-faced but no longer ashamed, and I knew how to direct her attention. Already she was looking where I wanted her to. I could see us in the mirror, watch myself step towards her out of the corner of my eye.

“So, really… completely—” She started, but I fixed my eyes on hers, and she went quiet.

In my first contact with her I was running my hands over her hips and searching for the hem of her sweater. Grasping it tightly, not yet exposing my palms to her sides but keeping my knuckles against her shirt, I pulled it off delicately and she lifted her arms obligingly. Next I moved behind her. Her shirt was tighter than her sweater had been and now I let myself feel her sides as I removed it, sliding my hands along the ticklish skin beneath the bunching, stretchy fabric, sneaking my fingertips along the edges of her bra and just passively lifting her breasts as I slid her shirt over them, until I could pull that over her head too.

Still toeing the line between clinical precision and restrained lust, I reached around her with both arms and ran my thumbs around the hem of her shorts, setting to work undoing her bottoms. With nothing for her arms to do her hands just hovered over her hips. She was clearly trying to appear as though all was as it should be, but something was stopping her. Keeping her on edge. It might have been my chest gently pressed into her back, but who am I to say?

With my chin in the crook of her neck I could look straight down through her cleavage to watch my fingers unbuttoning her fly. No zip—interesting choice, but fittingly atypical. It also meant I could take my time undoing every button. The thought that she might even have wanted this made me involuntarily squeeze her and she tensed up slightly, but I played it off quickly before mentally chiding myself. Not yet, focus!

Eventually her shorts were undone and I let them fall to her feet, eagerly anticipating the rare opportunity to feel her familiar legs and superb hips in tights. I almost didn’t want to undress her further—she wears incredibly sexy underwear for someone as chaste as she suggests she is—but I did.

With a few less evocative motions and a little increased proximity I had her naked. I had us both naked. Between us now there was nothing visually distinct to cue for behavior. Now, it was just a game of follow the leader.

Setting her clothes in a pile beside mine I took a moment to compose myself and let her wait. When I turned around she was still standing where I left her, arms crossed beneath her breasts like she was cold, even though I could see the moisture beading on her brow.

“Here,” I said, moving to her side and placing my palm at the base of her spine, guiding her towards the glass enclosure of the shower. I went in first—it was even hotter under the heat lamps there, but I needed to set a good temperature—and once the water was flowing I stepped through it and reached for her again with a dripping hand. I kept the water hotter than what one would generally use for cleaning, about the temperature of a warm bath or a hot spring, perfect for thermally relaxing muscles. We have spacious showers with broad overhead nozzles and wooden benches, and I had Twilight sit there for me.

She winced when the heat first hit her, but was indeed already clean, so once her hair was wet I shaped it unobtrusively behind her back. Using a floral soap I prepared a sponge, and somehow guessing what I was about to ask of her she raised a foot for me. After cleaning whatever she indicated—spots that she probably finds hard to reach, feet, back, and so on—I slipped behind her and quickly soaped myself up before washing her back. Now for the fun bit.

I have a little theory when it comes to doing stuff like this to people. No matter what, if it’s someone’s first time it’s guaranteed to fly by. The first time I received one and the first time I gave one were both like that, and while nobody in Ponyville has asked me for one of these massages other than Twilight, everything else I do leads me to believe I’m right. It grants me a fair bit of leeway when doing a first-timer, but it’s really important to ensure that the blur of events they’ll be rushed through leaves them aching for more. Being show-offy and expecting interaction are paths to losing customers before you even have them. It also sets their future expectations, which leads me to another important fact: sex is almost completely psychological.

I know, big shocker, but it’s true. Feelings like excitement and desire don’t come from erogenous zones or stimulation, they come from the brain. Don’t believe me? Pick an erogenous zone, your favorite one. Now imagine a pretty, talented beautician rubbing herself against it in a luxurious private bath that smells like a garden. Take your time, do it. Now imagine your best friend doing it. Or someone platonic. In your kitchen, or your garage. How about a family member? Yeah, right? Bad example for me, I guess, and some of those places might be a little exciting now that I think about it, but the point still stands.

I’m trying to say that massages like this don’t exist just as a substitute for sex. If you’re skilled enough, you can make one better than sex. I can make one better than sex. Well, normal sex anyway, since it’s a kind of sex too, but that’s not what’s important. What’s important is that it gives you a million ways to get in somebody’s head, fire them up, confuse them, lead them on, make a toy out of them or make them play with you like a toy… I end up getting just as much of a massage as the client, like I said. Why should slipping and sliding all over someone feel so good on its own? I don’t think it does, it’s really everything else. Controversial, maybe, but without the enthusiasm and mutual excitement, it’s really just two meatbags covered in jelly. What Twilight was really buying—was really here for—is an expression and fulfillment of raw, mutual desire. It’s mental. It’s dopamine, actually.

So we’d been in the shower for a bit. I was clean but Twilight was still a little soapy, so I had her stand and shoved aside the stool, finally bringing her warm body against mine beneath the steady stream of rushing water. It was easy to take my time rinsing her, turning her and feeling her for what remained of the lather I’d created, pushing it off and splashing her down with a redirected palm or two of water, making sure I never let the innuendo slip away. I brushed her breast accidentally once, then palmed it a little the next time; she looked at me suspiciously but I was careful and gave no sign to indicate anything was amiss. I moved in like I was about to kiss her and it fooled her, her hand was suddenly clutching my hip like it had broken free from a chain, but she recoiled when she realized it wasn’t going to happen and looked a bit embarrassed. I didn’t back off.

Damn. I really wanted to start on her in the shower, and if she was going to make these a regular purchase I’d be sure to do so in the future—I think it's worth going through a little more intensive foreplay before moving on—but today I was resolved to save it for the mat. Just before I reached her groin while I was sliding my hand up her leg, I killed the water and pulled back.

Twilight was red. She still looked uncertain, but impatience was beginning to win out, lighting up in her eyes. I dried her off with a special towel we ordered for its terrible quality. Barely absorbent, it’s meant to leave you damp. I used the same one on myself.

It feels weird leaving a shower still dripping. It’s contradictory, it feels like you should be at a beach or a pool, somewhere recreational. I find it kind of exciting, it’s another one of those elements that violates the pretense of a treatment and makes it feel more wild and unplanned. Disorganized, almost. I can’t tell if Twilight felt it at that level of abstraction too, but she was getting used to my groping while I was drying her and even pushing back when she anticipated me. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she was already having fun.

Her nervousness returned when she was standing before the mat, though. I’d opted for a large one even without Lotus’s prompting (it fits three, four in a pinch). Without knowing its intended purpose one could easily mistake it for an odd pool toy, but to the initiated the sizable cushion-parts at each end are clearly for establishing footholds. My sister had left one of those thin towels on the pillow-end for comfort and friction (and to cover the obnoxious logo that had been left unmentioned in the catalog), even tucking it in. Generous of her. Twilight stared at our new apparatus with a little fright, like she was looking at a saddled horse but had no idea how to mount it.

I set my hand on her lower back and pushed her forward. “Relax. Just lie down, Miss Sparkle, and I will take care of everything.” She looked at me and I gestured at the bed, and finally she made an attempt.

It was as funny as I expected. Since she was already slippery the slick vinyl squeaked under her and she winced in embarrassment at every noise, awkwardly shifting her naked body through a clumsy series of knee-jerk motions that eventually brought her from standing to lying prone. She kept her legs wide for balance until she was down and squirmed until she was comfortable. I favored her with a tiny giggle and was rewarded when her shoulders and bottom tightened, but she heard me move to the sink and did eventually loosen up. She’d be quite relaxed by the time I was ready.

I hadn’t actually done this for a while, so I was extra careful not to be wasteful. The gel was warm and already soft when I poured some into a wooden bowl (wooden because if you slip and kick it across the room then you won't be naked on an air mattress covered in lube that's surrounded by broken glass). I accidentally thinned it out too much and had to add more, and ended up with a lot when I was done. So much for being careful, but oh well.

There was already a towel by the mattress for me to kneel on when I brought down my bowl of slime, followed at every step by Twilight’s antsy gaze. Despite the heat in the room I actually felt a little cool after the shower, and was myself getting eager to be smothered in warm girl. I caught her eyeing me playing with my gooey concoction, so I lifted a few strands out of the bowl and let them stretch out from my fingertips until, one, by one, they snapped in quick succession. Her eyes narrowed like she was slipping into a dream.

I cupped a palmful and broke it free of the rest. Before much of it had a chance to run between my fingers I pressed it to the top of my chest, and it was squeezed from below my hands to slide down my body. Twilight was watching me rub myself and I had every intention of giving her a show, but despite my warning to her even I had forgotten how slippery it was and suddenly wanted nothing more than to play with it for its own sake. I didn’t even notice her start biting her lip as she watched me run my hands over my shiny midriff, stomach, and bust, it took me that long just to remember I wasn’t only playing with myself.

I looked down. Suitably coated, and the gel was pooling between my thighs. placing the dish on the mattress beside her I slipped up and over her, setting my knees beside her ribs and hovering my backside over hers. I was dripping a little and I knew she could feel me shifting the mattress with my weight, so I moved myself from side to side so that she slid into my legs each time, driving them further apart until I was squatting on her completely and just gyrating against her. With a scoop of gel, I set to work on her back.

Her excitement was palpable, but manageable. Between the familiar pattern of massage that she knew and my not-infrequent grinding against her rump I managed to squeeze much of the tension out of her muscles and save what I wanted for the next step. It was a short massage, to be sure, but I can work quickly if I need to. She went limp beneath my hands, taking in whatever sensations it pleased me to give her, and I felt deliciously powerful. Giving her another quick coating of gel and scooping some onto myself when it pooled in the small of her back, I pushed my hair behind my ears and without any fanfare, fell to press my entire weight against her and wound up with a face full of purple.

It worked, she hadn’t expected it. I was a little worried about slipping off but I caught my balance and slid until I was centered, then just laid there for a second to let her get used to my weight. Truthfully, I kind of needed to get used to her too; I’d forgotten how good this felt and it was Twilight I was on top of.

I felt up her sides with my hands, easily slipping between the curves of the frictionless mattress and the edges of her stomach when I wanted, before running them up her arms to entwine our fingers on the coarse, damp towel. Holding tightly, I pushed myself back and began sliding over her in small circles. I was rewarded with a sharp flexing of every muscles in her body.

“Nnn, Aloe,” she moaned, “you—”

I nuzzled the crook of her neck on my next pass and she cut herself off. My movements were lengthening and I was learning where to focus the pressure: she gave the best responses when I pressed my breasts against her back as I slid forward and when I shifted the weight to my pelvis when it was right against her slippery backside, but her legs were still mostly dry and I couldn’t let that slide. Pulling myself over her spine once more and grazing it with my lips, I slid back past her elevated rump—giving it a quick squeeze—before twisting myself around and pulling one of her legs up between mine.

Again I made this new limb the focus of my attention, but now made sure not to waste any potential contact elsewhere. While I was running my fingers from her thigh to her calf, improvising patterns and pinning both to my torso, I kept one foot in contact with her side and the other—whose leg was extended straight outward—sliding up and down her free calf. Neither of us had yet acknowledged our more intimate points of contact with anything but a reflexive nudge, preferring to focus on the more extreme regions. Twilight hadn’t even moved to reciprocate yet.

That is until I accidentally tickled her, running my thumb a little too gently over her slick foot, and she let out a startled yelp as she attempted to pull away. But since there was nothing to gain purchase on she just wound up tangling us more tightly as she tried to recover, snorting softly once, when she noticed she had pinned my leg under hers and started playing footsie with me while I worked.

I slipped under her to work her other leg, which was already slick from our little game. This time I could rub my entire body against her. With one leg sliding along her side and the other bent over her rear and laying on her back this took considerable force, especially as both Twilight and the mattress became more slippery, it’s grooves diligently retaining what little gel came off us.

With her foot beside my face I gave her sensitive toes a lick, grinning when she reacted even better than before and wrapping my free leg around her so that I had the leverage to grind against her thigh. This time I made no move to appear inadvertent.

Once she started anticipating me, flexing her own leg against my groin when I tightened against her, I reluctantly slipped back and sat up between her calves, pulling myself towards her with my hands on her hips and spreading my legs beneath me. From where I sat she was totally exposed, her long legs spreading just enough to accommodate me and pull the muscles of her buttocks to either side, stretching out her smooth, perfect skin which was broken only by her glistening butthole and beneath it, the visible end of her slick pussy. I used my fingertips to trace the edges of both and then slid a hand below her pelvis, lifting her a little. She slid her knees forward in response, revealing herself even more clearly.

I licked her. For real this time, running my tongue along length of her slit to get a sense of how she felt. Seeing her toes curl and her rear rise further at the contact was unimaginably satisfying; I almost dove back in immediately, but for some reason spotting the still-fading mark I’d left last time made me pause and run my palm over it before kissing it apologetically, which made my lips sticky with flavorless gel. I moved on.

Hardly had I fixed my lips around that nexus of nerves at the center of her body before she was pulling her little trick again. When I slipped my tongue out and ran it along her sensitive skin for a few probing, lazy licks, I felt suddenly wetter and painfully aware of it, like I might even be dripping. If this was truly how she felt what I was doing I worried I might melt her, it made me pin myself against her with even more force and when I did, the tightness in my groin was met with patterns of scalding, unbearable glee.

Delightful as it was, I was moving too fast. In one fluid, squeaky, wet motion I detached myself with a squick and slid right underneath her, flipping us both when I came to a stop. Twilight’s front wasn’t as slippery yet, but with a few quick strokes and a gratuitous demonstration of just how flexible I can be, that was taken care of. My massage resumed from the front, and now, already aroused, I took my time.

Really though, I lost track of time. Between the immediate texture of bare, slimy skin invading my senses everywhere, the cyclical contact of sensitive areas with unusual, novel body parts, my sensitivity to her responsiveness, and her own magical feedback forcing me to contend with the arousal of two people, I had very little time to plan my actions. Something like intuition guided me, tangling me and untangling me in her limbs again and again. Occasionally we held each other trapped, then found ourselves released and scrambling for purchase, and all the while the squeaky, rubbery sounds of the mattress beneath us (and the sucking and smacking of our own flesh) made it impossible to look beyond the immediate, physical, embarrassingly carnal world and take refuge in the burning sensations within us.

Sooner or later I was facing her. Sliding slowly up and down her torso, pressing my breasts against hers and feeling them inevitably slide off before I brought them back, making up a game on the spot where I tried to keep our nipples touching as long as possible. Hers were stiff but soft at the edges, perfectly round and ever-so-slightly inflamed. Her hands were on my hips, then my sides, then gripping my butt, and eventually she held me tight and made me stop. Twilight’s legs kept mine pinned from the outside, but other than that my full weight was on her front. We’d been looking at each other but I hadn’t been tracking my expressions; truthfully I was lost in her eyes. So dark, but such a friendly color; they reveal exactly what you need to know and nothing more. Not what she wants you to know, mind you. Her eyes know better. Right then they told me that she had no idea if what she was about to do was okay, but that she was going to do it anyway.

She kissed me.

I allowed it. Within a few seconds she had her arms wrapped around my neck and was holding me by my hair, forcefully pinning me against her. I slid my own arms beneath her and tightened our embrace even further, as much as I possibly could. I know I cut us short and that it didn’t last long, but every second our tongues were in contact I did my best to anticipate hers and tie it in knots, and her spell gave it the weird effect of feeling like I was both kissing her and kissing myself, of being handled and handler, all at once. It was quite astonishing and very wearing.

Silence had slipped in. Our mouths stayed connected by a strand of colorless gel when I pulled away.

“Aloe,” she said. Purred, if I can be permitted some immodesty.

I slid away from her head, back down and up again a couple times for a few fervent pecks, but each time I got further and further away. The gel was drying and getting stickier, but would still be fine for a while. Picking up where I left off, but this time with her eyes on me, I ran my tongue again over the absolute center of her attention.

I was getting used to the feedback now. It still burned and left me aching, but it was tolerable. Unable to decide whether to look at her face or at the soft mound between her legs, both getting more flushed, I settled on her breasts and watched them slowly start to heaveas I brought my skills to bear on the sensitive tracts of skin beneath my lips. Mixed in with our slimy, odorless medium I could already taste the flavor of her, diluted by our eager inclusion of copious amounts of lubricant. I nonetheless did my best to seek out the her essence like nectar, and was rewarded with an intense, wet warmth spreading from my groin.

Stopping, I spun myself to face her. If she was going to play, the least she could do was play manually. She raised an eyebrow but didn’t complain, and after petting me a little she tested the waters with her tongue.

I realized immediately that this was going to be short-lived. Her leg trembled and a shudder rolled through her body, and I could only assume that her little spell was channeling my sensations back through her as well. She stopped momentarily, and then with an awkward, squeaky twist flipped me on my back so that she was on top. Fine by me.

Twilight kept a lot of pressure on my face but I held her tighter anyway and slipped inside her with shallow, quick flicks of my tongue. Because of the link she had forged between us it was virtually certain that we’d climax together, and since I wanted to savor the experience (and our fates were no less entwined than our bodies) I felt no need to rush her. The spell gave her a quick learning ability—she just had to follow the signs on herself to figure out how I liked being touched—but since it was her who was doing it I didn’t really care that much. I just wanted her.

Now that she had exposed her appetite for exploration I could feel her finally starting to relax. It sent a warm feeling through me which she must have sensed. Far away, Twilight giggled and dragged her tongue roughly, almost jokingly over the edges of my slit. I pushed back eagerly.

We kept quiet for a while, a little self-conscious of the sounds we both were making as well as the slippery squeaking of the mattress. Twilight, despite her noble efforts, was the first one to finish. I could feel the tightness in her legs and the warmth that joined it spreading outward in me when I slipped into her more and more firmly, occasionally flattening my tongue and slithering it over her swollen lips and tiny, engorged clit. She was far from being numbed so I seized upon the chance and quickly brought her to the edge with a battery of sharp, long, rough strokes against that sensitive bunde of nerves.

The tension immediately filled me to the brim and I kept us both there with a few dangerous licks, before Twilight got the hint and, with a cute little whimper, stuck out her tongue and shoved us roughly over the edge.

I squirmed when we finished but she shot up harshly, shoving herself against my face and rubbing me in earnest, not screaming but almost surely biting her lip as she groaned through her nose. She moaned at a higher pitch than usual, trying to talk but managing only a few sighs, “Whoa”’s, and “Ahhh!”’s.

Still deep within my own orgasm I was pretty surprised and felt a little abandoned. I could feel she was high enough for another and I felt I was too, but my brain didn’t have the motor control yet to send any signals and hers certainly couldn’t have interpreted them. I had no qualms with the notion of granting her another, but since I was apparently already reflexively fingering myself I kept my tongue still and hoped she hadn’t severed the connection (but even if she had I was sneaking another one in, end of story).

“Aloe?” Twilight asked apprehensively, before crying out in alarm. “Aloe! You— Nnnnnggah!” She released, her voice dropping into a satisfied whine.

Yeah, turns out she hadn’t severed the connection. It might not have been the best thing to do when she was still riding my face, but at that point I didn’t care. Fired up by her cute little moans and now with full control, I dragged us both through a seemingly endless orgasm that left me twitching and moaning into Twilight’s burning pussy, while her legs trembled beside my head until she eventually collapsed, still unable to stop grinding against my face. She fell on my torso and nearly wound up biting me back, and when I finally released us she just stayed there, limp and quivering, nerves probably so fried that a misplaced stroke would send her recoiling into a twitching mound of squirming, gibberish-dribbling mush.

So naturally, I tickled her.

She squawked once, almost like she was about to cry, but then slowly turned herself with great, deliberate focus to face me, ripping my arms off her and pinning them with all the strength in her body. I was panting and giggling; her breath was uneven and animal. She suddenly grabbed both my cheeks and kissed me. There was no strength left behind her lips, only moisture and the unmistakable flavor of our respective secretions, but the sheer delight she felt came through. I played along for as long as she wanted.

Twilight was blushing furiously when she pulled back, but grinning foolishly nonetheless. “That was really, really fun.” She said.

“Yeah?” I asked, squeezing her hips and feeling them tighten in surprise as her eyes widened.

“Stop it! I’m serious Aloe— ALOE!” I cut it out and let her catch her breath. “You’re meaner than you let on, aren’t you?”

“Excuse me?” I said incredulously. Twilight ignored me.

“You know Aloe,” she paused to kiss me, before looking at me seriously. “You haven’t given me a price.”

I poked her in the side and she squirmed back again, biting her lip and gripping my forearms roughly. “Well, you’ve stolen quite a few of them, so how much do you think my kisses are worth, Miss Sparkle?”

Twilight actually stopped moving and looked like she was thinking about it, and I realized it might have been bad to joke about money. “Consider it complementary, Twilight, so long as you are planning to return.”

“Mhm,” she nodded, smiling in agreement before dropping to lie on me again. “Oh, I’ll be back, Aloe. You can charge whatever you want, I'll be back.” She went silent for a moment, before something made her breath catch and she lifted her head again. "Although, I'm a girl on a budget, so the cheaper you make it..."

The more we can do it. Maybe she does have a sense of humor about money. I, on the other hand, am screwed.

After a minute she was breathing steadily again. The gel was now a sticky film holding us weakly together, but there was plenty more in my dish. “Shall we continue, Miss Sparkle?”

Her eyes shot open in surprise. “Today? There’s more?” I nodded. I could feel her heartbeat quicken, but she shook her head anyways and reluctantly peeled herself away. “Save your other tricks for next time, I think I’ve already had enough to distract me for at least a week.”

“As you say,” I said, shrugging. Though I’m pretty sure this will be distracting me for longer than that.

Cleaning off the gel is fun. The water reactivates it and you get a minute or two of hyper-slipperiness again, and since Twilight had become more playful since we started I could have a bit of playtime with her in the shower. Nothing overtly sexual, a little game of ‘who can hold who without being held herself’ emerged and we had a good time slipping away from each other while trying to find a suitable hold. She kissed me a little more, and while I played along at first—even pinning her and showing her how it’s really done when your partner isn’t enchanting your tongue—I eventually distanced myself and slipped us both back into our roles. By the time she was scrubbed down and her hair was drying, we were back at square one. I towelled her off and got her dressed, then led her to the door in a robe. She scheduled her next few appointments on the spot and paid in advance once we decided on a price.

There was one thing I wanted to ask her before she left. “You remember your exercises, yes Miss Sparkle?”

“Yes Aloe,” she nodded, lifting a hand to her neck in exasperation. “I remember my exercises. Mostly, I think.”

“You should do them more often.” I know I sound like everybody’s mother when I say this kind of thing, but they really are good for you. “Aside from improving your posture and flexibility, they will increase your stamina as well. They won't tire as quickly, you see.”

She blushed fiercely. Looking suitably ridiculous with her red face and frizzy hair, I gave her a kiss on the cheek and shoved her out the door. Now to clean up our mess.

The towels I tossed on the edge of the empty bathtub. I hoped the mattress would fit in the shower, it would be infinitely easier to spray down and—

“Cleaning up?” Lotus asked.

I nearly jumped out of my skin. I must not have closed the door all the way.

“I’ll help,” she offered before I could respond.

“Oh, thank you. You don’t have to, though.”

Despite her offer, or maybe because of my rebuttal, she made no move to do anything. She just stood there staring at me, a towel in hand, before latching the door behind her. “I’m next, Aloe, but… do you think she would be up for us both?”

I blinked. “Difficult to say,” but I really hope so.

Lotus nodded at the dish, smiling gently. “You made too much.”

“Yeah, I—”

“Haven’t done it in a while?” She said. I shrugged. Lotus eyed the robe I was wearing. “What do you have under that?”

I looked down, and back up. My sister had the bowl in one hand and was playing with its contents in the other. “Lotus?”

“You had fun today, sister. It was very good, yes?”

Oh, I did, and it was. “Lotus?”

“Yes Aloe?”

I chose my words with care. “I made too much gel.”

“I know.” She said, nodding slowly and taking everything in. “And you left the mattress, and you didn’t get dressed, and you have far too many towels.” Lotus sucked some air through her teeth disapprovingly, shaking her head. “How long would you have waited?”

I swept my twisted hair over my shoulder. “If you want to go next, you should practice. I was sloppy today.”

“You were?” She asked, walking over to me and undoing the belt of my robe, pretending to take it off. Then she suddenly yanked the cord tight and looked at me with a bit of sibling annoyance. “’Tell me your plans, Aloe.’ How many times have I said that?”

I let a squeak escape at being trapped by my twin, but merely shrugged at her question.

“Well,” she continued softly, loosening her grip on my belt and tugging me towards her. “Thank you for thinking of me.”

So you made it through. Thanks for giving me a chance on this, dear reader. Why not let me know how it was?

I don’t think any more will be as long as this. Believe it or not I even planned for it to be longer... What was I thinking? Like I said, things just got out of hand.

Dash is next, maybe. Though I dunno…

(EDIT January 28: proofread everything again for good measure, here's an update on things if you're interested.)