ice cream delirium

yesterday i had four teeth pulled right out of my head. four plus one supernumery growing out of the side of my mouth, like some freak weed.

i was lying on the chair with three men bent over my mouth with masks on. stuff was flying out in a spray, something was dripping down my gums, and a machine went whrrrr. often they would say to me, excellent you are doing very well, as though there is some special skill involved in lying there with your mouth open.

we'll just let that one rest, ok?

the sad thing about being on anesthetic is that you never really have the luxury of being detached although you often have the view. like i could see my blood on the doctor's glove, i could feel the tug of the thread as he sewed, i heard the crack of the bone as it gave way. but i could not just sit back and enjoy the show. while the child inside me went, wow a clean break, and tasteless goo flooding my mouth!, the cynical teenager knew, yeah but man, are you going to pay.

and i did and i did. first i had to tell the autowallah where to take me and through my numbed lips i managed an authoritative, babaka. he understood, miraculously. and also understood my directions along the way. bliffth, dhefth. and then i met nisha who told me a brilliant story about taking harigopalaunty shopping, and i couldn't do justice to it because everytime i laughed it felt like the stitches would tear. that was very sad and i got home in such a foul mood that every door was banged at least twice. i cannot stand pain and i really cannot tolerate discomfort.

so i bled on my pillow but the tears wouldn't come because they weren't convinced this was a special enough occasion. but it was. the doctor told me, you might wake up with a slight trickle of blood in your mouth, but that's nothing to worry about. i don't mind the trickle but the taste is so awful. and it's sickeningly familiar, the taste of blood.

after i held my head up and swallowed, gagging all the while, i would have a few moment's peace and then again, a little pool of salt and cement at the back of my tongue. if i ignored it, it would harden drawing every nerve ending to the back of my throat, sucking so hard in their urgency that my throat started to hurt.

i don't know why the taste of blood should be of shame but it is. if the flow of shame had a consistency, a color, a flavor, it would be this. like tears with memory and heavy steps. all its piquancy dulled with routine. tears gone musty and blooming with rust.