Nocturnal Erethism
Copyright© 2006 by RitalinUnderdose
Chapter 1
er·e·thism (r-thzm)
n. Abnormal irritability or sensitivity of an organ or a body part to stimulation.
er·e·thism (r-thzm)
n. Abnormal irritability or sensitivity of an organ or a body part to stimulation.
Beth woke all at once.
She trembled with a deep, gentle explosion of sensation starting in her abdomen and spreading through her body. It felt as if individual pores were snapping open and shut, though she knew pores didn’t actually work that way. Waves of pleasure washed over her. Her pussy clenched on nothing as she slowly realized she was alone in the bed.
As the waves subsided she stayed where she was, staring at the ceiling fan and trying to figure out what her body had just done.
The fan turned lazily above the bed. One blind hadn’t closed all the way, so a narrow stripe of morning light cut across the wall beside the closet.
Her heart was beating faster than usual.
Also ... there was the other thing.
Beth blinked once.
Then again.
“Well,” she said to the empty room.
That had definitely been an orgasm.
She lay there another minute confirming that conclusion, the way you sometimes do when something strange happens and you want to be sure your brain didn’t improvise it.
Nope.
That was exactly what that was.
Beth pushed the blanket down and sat up. The clock read 7:03. One foot had gone slightly numb and her hair was pointing in three directions.
“Okay,” she said.
She waited a moment to see if anything else surprising planned to occur.
Nothing did.
The apartment sounded normal. A car passed outside. Someone upstairs dropped something and muttered about it. Pipes clanked somewhere in the wall.
Beth shuffled toward the kitchen.
Coffee first.
Coffee seemed like a responsible way to handle whatever had just happened.
The machine took a minute to warm up. Water burbled through the grounds and the smell filled the kitchen. Beth leaned on the counter and watched.
She tried to remember if there had been a dream attached.
Nothing.
Usually there was something. Missing a flight. Being late to a class she hadn’t taken since college. Occasionally something interesting.
This had just been waking up.
Beth poured the first mug and took a careful sip.
After a moment she noticed she was smiling.
“Well,” she said again.
That was new.
Dan called around eleven.
“You sound cheerful,” he said.
Beth tucked the phone between her shoulder and ear while spinning slightly in her office chair. A half-finished email sat on the screen.
“Oh, do I?”
“Yeah.”
“I slept well,” she murmured with a nervous chuckle. “Sweet dreams.”
Dan laughed.
“Good,” he said. “I’ll take credit.”
Beth looked at the screen for a moment. She thought about telling him, then pictured that conversation and decided maybe not.
The second time happened in the middle of the night.
Beth woke with her breath halfway caught.
For a moment her belly felt like a wonderful and terrifying bundle of nerves and hot blood. The sensation rolled through her in waves. Her hands rose instinctively and clenched the air as her body heaved once in helpless arousal.
The warm scent between her thighs reached her a second later.
Then the sensation was already fading.
The room was dark except for the clock.
2:41.
Beth sat up.
“Oh come on,” she said.
She turned on the lamp and stayed awake for a while. When she finally drifted off again she felt slightly suspicious of sleep.
Perhaps betrayed.
The next morning she googled it.
Coffee sat beside the keyboard while she tried different search terms.
woke up orgasming
She deleted that one immediately.
“I should have known better...”
Beth tried again.
involuntary orgasm during sleep
The first few results weren’t helpful.
One page blamed hormones and stress. Another looked like it wanted to sell supplements.
Beth clicked through several anyway.
Most didn’t say much.
One forum thread finally mentioned a phrase she hadn’t seen before.
Nocturnal erethism
Beth read it twice.
“That sounds like a Victorian disease,” she muttered.
The link underneath led to a medical abstract that didn’t say much either. The language was stiff and careful.
Something about involuntary responses during sleep transitions.
Beth leaned closer to the screen.
Rare condition ... Poorly understood...
Beth sat back in the chair.
She stared at the screen a moment.
“Fantastic,” she said, not feeling fantastic at all.
The office felt unusually quiet that day.
Someone had brought doughnuts and left them beside the printer. Beth opened the validation script she’d been working on and traced through the inputs again.
Cheryl walked past carrying a mug and stopped at the cubicle entrance, leaning one shoulder against the partition.
“You alive in there?”
Beth rubbed her eyes.
“Debatable.”
“You look like you slept under a truck.”
“Something like that.”
Cheryl lifted the mug and gave it a small wag.
“Coffee?”
“I already had some.”
“Have more.”
Cheryl had always been a little intense. Beth had never decided if that was flattering or dangerous. Still, coffee probably wasn’t optional.
Beth stood up.
“Sure,” she said. “I could use a friendly face right now.”
Cheryl smiled.
“Lucky you.”
She waited for Beth to grab her mug before turning toward the break room.
By the third morning the novelty had worn off.
Beth woke before dawn with the same abrupt awareness.
For a second she didn’t move. She already knew what it was.
The sensation had started before she fully woke, a heavy warmth spreading through her belly and tightening lower.
“Oh, come on,” she whispered into the pillow.
Her body ignored her.
The pleasure rose quickly, flooding outward through her limbs. She tried to lie still, breathing through it, but the pressure kept climbing until the release came anyway. Her hips jerked once against the mattress and she gasped.
Then it was over.
Beth lay staring at the ceiling while her breathing settled.
Three times.
She rolled onto her side and pulled the blanket to her chin.
“This is ridiculous,” she muttered.
Coffee didn’t help much that morning.
The office was warm after lunch.
Someone near the printers was telling a long story about a customer call. The same sentence kept starting over every time someone interrupted.
Beth had stared at the same piece of code long enough that the words stopped looking like words.
She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes for a second.
Just to rest them.
The sensation arrived immediately.
Beth jerked upright.
Her hand hit the desk and a pen rolled off, bouncing once on the floor. She grabbed the desk with both hands and froze.
Oh no.
Her body tightened again, pressure building fast and deep in her belly. Every instinct screamed to move, to gasp, to let the rising pleasure break loose.
Not here.
Please not here.
Beth pressed a hand over her mouth and held herself rigid. The effort made the sensation worse.
The office noise continued as if nothing had happened. Someone laughed. A chair rolled past in the aisle. The phone at the empty desk across from her started ringing.
After a few seconds the wave finally broke and faded.
Beth stayed where she was.
Her face felt hot. A tear slipped from the corner of her eye.
She looked down at the desk, then at the cubicle wall.
No one said anything.
That almost made it worse.
When she finally stood the room felt slightly tilted.
She walked toward the restroom.
Halfway down the aisle she realized Cheryl had been standing by the printers.
Cheryl wasn’t looking at her now.
Beth kept walking.
The doctor’s office smelled faintly of disinfectant and old magazines.
Beth sat on the paper-covered exam table and explained what had been happening.
Dr. Levin listened without interrupting.
After a moment she asked a few questions. Medication. Sleep habits. Stress.
Beth answered as best she could.
“I found a phrase online,” Beth said eventually. “Nocturnal erethism.”
Dr. Levin nodded.
“There’s another term used more often.”
Beth waited.
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