vituperation

…continued

When the drill bit got up under the edge of my filling and pressed down on the crack in my tooth, my eyes flew up and I stiffened in the chair.

No, not that way, you pervert.

The feeling was 50% pain, 50% ook. I don’t know what other word to use. The pain part—which was pretty big, but not enough to make me flail around in the chair or slap the dentist’s hand away—was simply due to where the drill bit was. The bit acted as a wedge, if you will, like the kind you use when you’re chopping logs. It pushed down into the crack and forced the sections of my tooth apart in a place where the Novocaine didn’t quite reach.

And yet the ook part was far worse.

Imagine for a moment that you’re listening to the whine of a dentist’s drill. I’m sure most of you know what that’s like. Now imagine that sound, that incessant screaming whine that makes you want to claw your ears off, imagine it shifting from somewhere behind you to inside the center of your head. Think about your head thrumming with the sound, that godawful pitch bouncing around inside your skull where your eyes don’t go. And all you can do is lay there helplessly and try to keep your sanity.

That’s the ook part.

The dentist pressed down harder, chipping away at the cracked part of my tooth. Time slowed. My head screamed. My eyes watered. She paused for a second to get a better grip.

“I can feel it,” I said.

Senior looked alarmed.

“Do you want to try and push through it?” the dentist asked.

“Okay,” I said. God forbid I look like a wimp.

“Raise your left hand if you need me to stop.”

She leaned back in, hit the switch, and pressed the drill against my tooth. This time the pain was bigger, and I gripped the arms of the chair as hard as I could. She worked on my tooth for an eternity, at least 30 seconds, chipping and burring enamel away in wispy smoke while Senior sprayed what felt like ice water on my cracked tooth. The whine of the drill raised and lowered in pitch as she worked, a tuneless song that made my brain bleed.

She paused again.

“I think I need another shot,” I said, no longer caring if I looked like a wimp.

“No problem, this isn’t supposed to hurt.” She hung the drill somewhere behind me and waited for Senior to prepare another of the big steel syringes. When she was ready, I opened my mouth. She stuck the needle into my gum, near the back of my mouth. “Did you feel that?”

“Unh unh.”

She came closer to the front and jabbed the needle into my gum a second time. My un-numbed gum. I jumped.

“I helnt nhat,” I said, my mouth still wide.

“That’s it,” said Senior.

The dentist injected a big dose of Novocaine. Have you ever noticed how hard they seem to have to bear down to do that? I guess it’s pretty hard to get stuff injected into the area since it’s so bony. She pulled the needle out, another ooky feeling since I wasn’t numbed, because there was a weird sort of sucking sensation to it, like when the plastic surgeon pulled my drain tubes out after my skin surgery.

The dentist started to drill again, as soon as she’d handed the steel syringe to Senior. Before the Novocaine had any sort of chance to start working. I danced in the chair.

“You still feel it?” the dentist asked. I nodded.

“I’ll give you a few more minutes,” she said. She hung up the drill and left me alone with the TV, which now showed some kid and his apparently imaginary friends. The show was strange, with some parts done in computer graphics and some parts done as cartoon. I wasn’t really paying attention, so I don’t know any more than that.

I do, however, know that Fruity Pebbles looks mighty tasty, even when you’re sitting in a dentist’s chair with half your tooth chipped away.

They left me to my own devices for 10 or 15 minutes; it’s hard to tell because time is syrupy in a dentist’s office and there are no clocks to tell you how long you’ve been there. You have to turn off your cell phone in the back, so watchless people like me have to try and judge time by commercial breaks and the changing shadows outside.

My mind returned to the ant problem.

If I seal the whole bottom part of the sill with duct tape, then any ants that get through will only be able to get out at the ends. A little more tape, a little bit of caulk, and voila , problem solved until the windows get replaced.

I realized I really needed to pee.

“Ready to try again?” the dentist asked, pulling up a rolling stool.

“As ready as I can be,” I said, and smiled.

“That’s all we ask.”

She commenced to work on my cracked tooth once again. It didn’t hurt nearly as much now, though there was still a little discomfort. I suspect that some things can be completely pain-free only through being rendered unconscious. The ook part was just as strong this time around. I maintained my sanity by watching some birds hop around in the trees outside.

And trying to not think about how badly I needed to pee.

Or fart. I’d been fart-free for over an hour by this time, which is some sort of record for me. I lay in the chair, alternately clenching my legs and my ass, willing my body to obey my mind. I tried to think of England, but that didn’t really work. All I could think about was the pressure in my bladder, the pressure in my ass, and the pressure in my brain.

No wonder I’m so damn twitchy.

Finally, after at least two complete lifetimes, she finished drilling my tooth. Setting the drill aside, stood, and left. Senior moved into her place, and Junior stepped into sight on the other side. Senior held up something that looked like a gun.

“I need to put some string down between your gum and tooth, so we can get a good impression.”

I nodded. She stuck the gun into my mouth and squeezed the trigger a couple of times on either side of the tooth. I felt nothing. When she pulled the gun out, a drip of blue liquid—not string— dripped out of its end and fell on my nose. She took another of those earplug-shaped pieces of cotton and set it over my tooth.

“Close slowly,” she said. “Just until they meet. You don’t want to put too much pressure down.”

I did what she said.

“Okay, Dr. P will be back in a few minutes. Do you want the remote?”

“No, I’m fine,” I said. “But can I go to the bathroom? I guess I should’ve skipped that last glass of water.”

She showed me to the bathroom—I never realized what a maze the dentist’s office is—and with great gusto I emptied my bladder. I would’ve farted, but I could tell by the acoustics of the small room that it would echo and be heard by all and, well, there are limits to the embarrassing things I’ll do. I flushed and washed my hands, then did what I was simply dying to do. Leaning over the counter to get close to the mirror, I used my hand to peel my right cheek back and turned my head for the best angle.

Half my tooth was gone.

/to be continued…