Story of My Life

Back from the surgery, next came the hangover – naturally, naturally, naturally – but as I was a child it would be kind, more a mild type of fog than a headache. Beyond it I’d be given soldiers with soft- boiled eggs, gentle food for an affronted mouth and a sudden hunger – oh, such a lively hunger – and a quiet mother comfort to meet it with a little spoon. Then a bath and an early night pelting with lurid dreams of thieves and tunnels and running for my life, right through my life and out the other side and into nowhere: the coppery taste of absence, liquid heat.

Once I was older, I decided I had no more time to waste – people to do and things to be – and avoiding the dental issue became attractive. I brushed regularly, kept my head down, ate everything wholemeal for added wear, but it did no good: my teeth are forceful. They insist.

So when I’m twenty-four, twenty-five, I’m back in the surgery – new dentist – and the first of my wisdom teeth is leaving. Local anaesthetic this time, much more practical and safe, and I haven’t enjoyed the injections, but I’m hoping they’ll do the trick – mostly my eye’s gone a little blurry, but that’s nothing to fret about – and here comes the dentist – big man, meaty forearms, substantial grip – and it’s plain that he’ll check now, tap about to see if I’m numb and therefore happy – except he doesn’t. He does not.

And I should pause here briefly, because it lets the story breathe and even possibly give a wink. I step back to let you step forward and see what’s next. This way you’ll stay with us. With me.

Which is the point.

You staying with me is the point.

And, no, the dentist doesn’t check, he is incurious and generally impatient, goes at it fiercely with the pliers and no preamble and here comes a clatter, a turning yank, and then tooth – I am looking at my tooth without me, grinning redly in the light – and I am puzzled because of this feeling, this building feeling which I cannot quite identify – it is large, huge, and therefore moving rather slowly, takes a full count backwards from tennineeight to arrive and then I know, then I am wholly, supernaturally aware, I am certain in my soul that I’m in pain.This is hitherto unguessed-at pain – pain of the sort I have tried to anticipate and forestall with insulating activities and assistance. Numb is best – I always aim for numb, for numb of any type – but pain has found me anyway. Worse than imagination, here it is.

To be fair, the dentist was upset – looking down at me and saying, ‘Oh dear’ a number of times before offering a seat in his office and an explanation involving wrongly positioned nerves – it was technically my fault for having provided them. His secretary gave me a comforting and yet excruciating cup of tea.

I walked home – it wasn’t far – dizzy and racing with adrenalin. They put it in the anaesthetic, presumably to give it extra zip. Which is to say that you go to the dentist – somebody worrying – and he then injects you with terror – pure fear – you feel it rush your arms, cup its lips hard over that bird inside your chest.

And it is possibly, conceivably, odd that this is so familiar, so really exactly the simple jolt of many mornings, and you draw near to your house and wonder, as usual, if so much anxiety should not have a basis in fact. Perhaps a leak under your floorboards has caused rot, perhaps you’re ill – genuinely threatened by what, as soon as they knew you weren’t suing, your dentist and his secretary called a head injury – this making you feel very noble for not complaining, but nevertheless in many ways it sounds dire. And if you really want to fret, then perhaps you shouldn’t lend that guy your money – your guy, your money, but shouldn’t they still be apart? You like them both but they should surely be apart? And what if he isn’t exclusively your guy; you’ve had that unease, felt that whisper, about him before – and it’s screaming today. And what if your life is, in some degree, wrong or maladjusted when hauling a live tooth raw from the bone leaves you and your state no worse than an average night, a convivial night, a pace or two along your path of joy.

Sensitivity, you see? It causes thoughts.