The Pull

A short story.

I’ve never had good teeth. I know it’s a bit of a British stereotype, but generally I’ve not met many people with teeth as bad as mine. As a child I forgot to brush them before bed most nights, and that only got worse when I hit my teens. When I shipped off to University I’d wake up most mornings after a night on the town binge drinking my allowance away and I wouldn’t even have washed my mouth out with water. My breath used to smell like a car exhaust. Of course I floss now, I brush with Sensodyne, but the damage is done. The last time I tried going to the dentist properly was awful. I couldn’t stop thinking about their faces. They looked completely disgusted with me. How could somebody let things get this bad? It didn’t matter to them that I knew and that I was trying to make it better. I hated that air of judgement. No, I didn’t go back. I couldn’t stomach it.

But then, recently, I saw this advert. It was on the tube – that row of posters along the top of the opposite side of the carriage. Usually they’re for things like vitamins, Bitcoin scams and recipe boxes. But my eye got caught by one… A pretty woman, smiling. Her teeth were very white. In big red letters, the words EMBARASSED ABOUT THE STATE OF YOUR TEETH? Floating in a void next to her face. Then, underneath that: VISIT www.doctorchew.org. Doctor Chew. I took a picture of it on my phone and googled it when I got in. Despite the goofy name, the website looked like a proper oral health practice. I had been put off so much by that previous visit, of course, but the repeated emphasis on a lack of judgment had me hooked. I don’t think if you’ve never had bad teeth, you can quite understand how constant the anxiety around them is, how much time you spend just worrying about them. I’d been having some pain, recently. Maybe my wisdom teeth. Maybe something else. God, I thought, I really should get that looked at… I couldn’t find any information about payment, which I knew meant that it was probably very expensive, way out of my price range. I filled in their inquiry form anyway. The next morning there was an email from them – signed Dr Chew - asking for pictures of the inside of my mouth.

The response came fast. Dr Chew said I needed some fillings, which I had expected. But according to him the most pressing issue was one of my top front teeth. He said it might need pulling, and that I should come visit him as soon as I could. He gave me a price – I couldn’t afford that if I worked every day for the next month. But then there was his offer. A special deal. The whole procedure, the fillings and the front tooth, could be done free of charge if I consented to having it livestreamed for his students to watch.

I’m not stupid, really. I was just anxious. I knew how it sounds, but I felt desperate. I held off on responding but that night I barely slept – I kept brushing my teeth over and over again until they throbbed. No, I couldn’t cope with this. I sent a reply saying I’d be fine with that and two days later I was at his clinic on a side road in Tottenham. It looked like a semi-detached house, but there was a little sign next to the front door telling me that this was Dr Chew’s Clinci. I rang the bell. A man answered, Dr Chew himself. Short, with coke-bottle glasses. He looked like he had stepped out of some 1970s police drama. He ushered me into the back. It was just a living room with a dentist chair, lamp and three cameras sitting on tripods. I thought, well, I’m here now. I got on the chair. He pulled straps over my wrists.

“It’s so you don’t struggle,” he said. “If you struggled, I might accidentally hurt you.” We both understood what was happening. I felt sick. The red recording lights on the cameras floated in my vision.

“Thank you for agreeing to this,” he said. “I speak on behalf of myself as well as the viewers when I say that we are always very grateful to have a beautiful girl like you grace my office.” He put the brace in my mouth so I couldn’t shut it and moved one of the cameras very close to my face. “My, there’s a lot to do. Can you see? Now, let me get the pliers…” I was sure I’d end up on the news dumped in the canal or something. But I guess it worked out alright. I have my fillings. He replaced the tooth he pulled, and you can’t even tell that it’s fake unless you really look. He even threw in some whitening as an extra because I took the whole thing like a champ. I couldn’t get the taste of the powder out of my mouth for weeks.

The site isn’t there now, but I did get a weird message on Instagram the other day by some spam account telling me that I had such a lovely smile. I’ve not found the video, but I wouldn’t know where to look. I’m grateful in a strange way. I’ve not felt this good about my teeth in years. I think the nightmares are probably worth that.