Final one for tonight. This was not a writing prompt, but an idea I had after having all four wisdom teeth surgically removed at once. What if a werewolf had a cavity?
“Well? How ‘bout it?”
Frank was a good guy, but I’d hit him with a lot of shocks lately. I waited patiently as he drained the two fingers of scotch, his back to me.
“I dunno,” he said finally. “It’s still kind of weird to me.”
“Hey… I haven’t eaten your kids or humped your dog yet.”
“I’ve seen the way you look at my dog. If she gets knocked up, you can take care of the puppies.”
“Anyway. What’s the problem? It’s just like any other procedure you’ve done. I’ve got money; I’ll pay extra.”
“It’s not the money, it’s just- look, I’ll do it, but you owe me.”
“For what?”
“For freaking me out three weeks ago. Couldn’t you just go to a vet?”
“I don’t know any vets. You, I know.”
He looked longingly at the bottle of single-malt on the counter before grabbing his jacket. “Well, then, let’s go.”
The drive was inordinately long. I guess if I had as much liquid cash as Frank, I’d live way the hell out of town as well. We parked close to the building. I stood patiently in the frigid air as Frank fumbled with his key ring. The door opened after a couple of grunting twists on the lock and he slid inside to disarm the alarm. I watched as he pressed the door shut with his shoulder, squeezing it the extra centimeter to get the bolt thrown.
“You charge these rich folks how much for an appointment, and you can’t afford to fix your own office door?” I asked.
“I just never got around to it.” He unlocked an interior door and began flipping on light switches. “Sit” he commanded, pointing to a large padded chair on a pedestal. I eased an instrument tray out of the way and began undressing. “Do you have to change?” he complained.
“You can’t get to it unless I’m changed,” I said. “You don’t have to watch.”
“Thanks.” He turned to a shelf and began selecting sealed packets, but I could see him watching me out of the corner of his eye.
I skinned off my underwear and kicked my clothes out of the way. I half-crouched over, holding my arms in front of me. After almost a month of practice, I still can’t change slow enough to actually see what’s happening.
There was an instant of pain, as if I’d caught my insides on something and pulled- and then it was gone. My arms were covered in thick, inch-long, chocolate brown fur. My hands were covered in shorter fur, with dark skin on the pads of my fingers and palms; and- most impressive, I thought- curved and wickedly sharp claws where my nails used to be. This time I imagined that I could see the fur sprout. Usually it’s over, bam, before I can blink.
I settled into the chair and leaned back into the headrest. It was quiet for a few moments behind me, and I could feel Frank’s gaze burning the back of my head before he rattled around again. I’ve watched myself in the mirror before; I guess it is kind of impressive, visually. I wore myself out in the first week, watching myself change over and over.
Frank had the same wallpaper that it seemed everyone in his profession did- a sort of olive-green vertical stripe with improbable looking flowers. Why couldn’t they just paint it a solid color, I wondered? Probably the wallpaper hides the blood splatters better. Directly in front of me on the wall was an enormous framed diploma. The school’s name was buried in so much filigree as to be illegible. The language didn’t look like any Latin I remembered- maybe Italian, or pig-Latin. The only things I could make out were in English- “Franklin Wesley Grimes” and “Doctor of Medical Dentistry”. Did that say “University of Grenada” under the signature?
Frank laid a set of mediaeval -looking curved picks on the instrument table. I looked up and jerked reflexively. His face was covered by a blue paper mask and a pair of bulbous goggles. “Gah!” I said. My voice is wonderfully deep and rumbly when I’m changed. James Earl Jones, eat your heart out. “The Communion aliens have landed!”
“Just open your mouth.” I shut up. Frank was jumpy. He adjusted the ancient enameled reflective light over my face- those things must be hideously expensive, because I swear they’re passed on from generation to generation- and I opened my mouth as wide as it would go.
Which, in median form, is quite wide. My canines are each an inch and a half long from gum to tip, and with my mouth open fully there’s a good five inches between them, tip to tip. The better to eat you with, my dear. Frank looked a little faint. I was about to ask if he was OK when he recovered and jammed a clear tube under my tongue that immediately sucked up the flesh there. He moved it and began looking around with his mirror.
I could see his nose wrinkle up under the mask. “What do you eat?”
“Ahr eet.”
“Whatever, it stinks. Don’t you brush?” He picked up one of the small hooks and began picking at my teeth.
“Oht aher ah ust ahe ah ehr.”
“What?”
“Oht aher ah ust ahe ah ehr.”
“I can’t understand you.”
I glared at him and pushed his fingers out of my mouth with my tongue, and then bit down hard. The plastic tube severed and I spit the end out. “I said, not after I’ve just taken a deer.”
He looked stricken. “That’s more than I needed to know. And add a quarter for the tube to your bill.” He plucked the stub out and replaced it with a fresh one and it went back to sucking up the underside of my tongue. I locked my jaws open and stared at the ceiling.
He wiggled the pick in every crevice in my mouth. When he got to the hole in the side of my left upper carnassial the pick went in and hung, but he pulled until it came free anyway. It sprang out of the hole with a ‘pop’ and the point imbedded in my gums. “That’s the one, eh?” he asked without a trace of sympathy. He dug around and picked and scraped in the hole, grimly prying the bits of tarter off the tooth and clearing out the hole. My head jerked with his more vigorous efforts. I was afraid he was going to stand on my chest and go to it with both hands.
He stopped for a breather and I swallowed, tasting blood from my tortured gums. “What happens to it when you’re… human?” he asked. I stared innocently at him until he pulled the suction tube out.
“I’m not sure. I can’t tell if the tooth is resorbed into the body, or just kind of retracts up into the gums. My jaw hurts about where that tooth is even though it looks like a different tooth when I’m in normal form.”
“Hunh. We’ll have to X-ray your jaw and see if we can see them up there or not…” He trailed off, as I was shifting back to human.
“Take a look.”
Frank had shut his eyes. “No.” he said.
I shifted back to median. “Geez, Frank, are you ever gonna get used to this?”
“No. Don’t do that.” He turned and fumbled on the table while I smirked.
I stopped smirking when he turned around with the pneumatic drill in his hand. “Whoa, now, what’s that for?”
He hit the floor pedal to give the drill a couple of experimental whirrs. “It’s for your filling. That’s the biggest the cavity I’ve ever seen… hell, that’s the biggest tooth I’ve ever seen. It needs a filling.” He stuck the tube in my mouth again and poised over my face with the drill. “But I don’t know how Novocain would effect you, or how much to use on you like this; so you’re just going to have to endure for a minute or so.”
I swear he was grinning.