Horror Bites - Dental Assistant

This weeks Horror Bites photo prompt was too good to miss and of course opened up a whole world of pain to write about, yet strangely when sitting down to write it I found it hard to get going - a little like pulling teeth (sorry couldn't help myself). But I like what finally came, and I hope you do too.

 

Jackie carefully picked up each instrument and polished it, she wanted them gleaming for tomorrow when Mr. Benson would be in. Then she laid them out on the tray just how he liked them.

She took her latex gloves off and flipped open the appointment book to review the schedule for the morning. It was going to be busy and she liked that, no time for dawdling and fussing over patients.

She closed the book and patted it. This job was exactly what she’d been looking for. She liked Mr. Benson the most out of the three dentists practising here. He had a more mature manner and didn’t pander to the patients; he got on with the job at hand and didn’t hold back.

The following morning when he came in, they sat and went through the appointments, checking the dental charts of those booked in. There was nothing special, just routine check up’s until 10 O’clock. That was the one Jackie was looking forward to the most.

On the phone the man had clearly been in pain, his muffled voice making it apparent there was significant swelling. And when they’d pulled up his dental records, there was a definite history of problems; it would probably lead to an extraction or at the least a root canal. Mr. Benson wasn’t one for waiting on antibiotics, he believed that if there was an infection or swelling from an abscess the best thing was to open it up and clean it out – another reason he was Jackie’s favourite.

By the time the patient arrived, Mr. Benson had warmed up and Jackie knew he wasn’t going to waste any time and risk falling behind. When the gentleman sat in the chair, he went straight in and had a good feel around.

When the man cried out, Jackie made soothing sounds, reassuring the man that Mr. Benson knew what he was doing and he was in safe hands. She quickly put the suction tube near the open wound that was now leaking some kind of yellow, bloody puss, and could see that they wouldn’t be able to save the tooth. She smiled behind her mask.

The man made a garbled request and Mr. Benson said that he’d administer some more aesthetic shortly, but there was a chance it might hurt for a while longer yet. The yell the man gave when Mr. Benson started pulling gave Jackie goosebumps, and she knew the best part of the job was coming up.

As the cracking squelching sound escaped the man’s mouth, so did his sensibilities; tears streamed from his eyes and a thick sob let loose from his throat. She patted his arm in a mock sincere gesture, while reveling in the knowledge that he couldn’t do anything but lie there and submit to further pain and humiliation. There was no other job where you could get ring side seats to such torture disguised as treatment.