The dentist

A visit to the dentist is always dreaded, and today came fully up to expectation. With the dentist himself I was fortunate: a couple of X-rays, a bit of poking round, and the message that the teeth were all still there and functioning normally, with no change in outlook to the dental bulletin. But then the bombshell: "We'll just get the hygienist to clean them up a bit." 

The dentist only spent ten minutes with me, but the hygienist made up for that with a full half-hour of total torment. "Just try to relax," she cooed, with the soothing tones of Beria calming a victim bound for Stalin's gulag. I was taut enough for my rigid legs to be in the air, forty-five degrees from the couch like a man with tetany. My lips would not relax from the gums, and my dry tongue kept attempting to push the instruments aside in reflex protest. Luckily this emissary from hell had fixed dark protective goggles over my eyes, so she could not see the desperate terror behind the mask.

I believe, on the whole, I behaved well. I didn't swear or scream, and I forced my legs back to the couch to simulate a relaxed state. I brought my head back in line with the light, and managed to crack my mouth open a little, enough for the white-coated monster to quickly slide in a suction pipe and mirror, followed rapidly by a screaming drill. Each tooth was attacked ferociously, as though she intended to root them out like unwanted weeds at Kew. She finally finished, and proffered a small plastic cup of green swill to remove the blood and debris. I stood and shook my head, thinking the teeth might fall and scatter like beads from a broken necklace, but by some miracle they were still intact, and I had survived for another year.

When Ann came out from her check up, she was smiling and boasting of her super white teeth. "They're always so gentle and understanding there," she said, "I never mind going to them."