Read Online One Year After: A Novel by William R. Forstchen - Free Book Online Page B

get it taken care of.”
    John kept his mouth closed and shook his head, willing himself to think that it really didn’t hurt all that bad and could wait.
    “Well, at least let me take a quick look-see at something else. Promise I’ll leave that bad boy alone.”
    John reluctantly complied. Richard leaned in, tapping John’s lower-left canine, and John winced a bit.
    “Yeah, thought so,” Richard announced while still peering into John’s mouth. “Start of a cavity that could go nasty there.”
    All John could do was mutter a strangled “Damn it.”
    “I can take care of that nice and quick,” Richard continued, sitting back up and rubbing his hands on his apron. Gone were the days of latex gloves and masks, the few in the town’s supply reserved for major surgeries only. “Drill that sucker out in five minutes and pack a filling into it.”
    John looked at him wide eyed.
    “Compromise with ya, John. Let me fill that before it goes bad, and you get off free until tomorrow with the bad one. Otherwise, I go to Makala, and she lays some mandatory treatment order on you as the public health official.”
    John glared angrily at Richard for pulling that trump card and finally nodded a reluctant agreement.
    Richard smiled, and whistling, he went over to the boiling pot, tossed in the instrument he had been using to probe John, and pulled out several others with tongs. John tried to look the other way as Richard pushed the foot-powered drill up alongside the chair and clamped a drill bit in.
    It was yet another reason why, before the Day, John would shake his head when folks waxed too enthusiastically about the alleged beauty of living in the nineteenth century. They never thought about medicine and sanitation, let alone dentistry.
    Richard pulled out a rubberized bag from under a counter. It looked like an oversized balloon with a nozzle on the end.
    “I’ll open the tap on this,” Richard said with a grin. “You take a good deep breath in. Nitrous will chill you out for a few minutes.”
    Richard stuck the nozzle into John’s mouth and then opened the valve.
    “Go for it,” Richard said, and he did have a bit of a maniacal grin as John breathed in deeply.
    Within seconds, it hit, and John actually did feel mellowed out, even giddy, as Richard closed the valve, put the bag down, swung the old-fashioned drill around in front of John, and started to pedal furiously. There was a low humming as the oiled cables spun in their sprockets, the drill bit spinning. Richard moved quickly, prying John’s mouth open and pushing the drill bit down on to the cavity.
    John felt like his entire head was vibrating, the sound of the drill bit flashing him back to early childhood, a dreaded dentist who had yet to go high tech and used an old-fashioned cable-driven drill, but at least that one was electrically powered.
    For the first minute or so, it really didn’t bother him; in fact, he was tempted to crack a joke. There was pain within seconds, but for a blessed moment, he really didn’t care. It was strange how nitrous allowed one to feel pain but not care about it.
    And then it hit. The gulp of nitrous was wearing off, the treadle-powered drill was setting up an awful racket, he felt like his mouth was vibrating apart, and the pain was building.
    He started to gasp, waving his arm for Richard to stop.
    “Hang in there, John, just another minute—almost got it all.”
    Gone was the electrical-powered suction tube. John’s mouth was filling up with saliva and drilled-out bits of tooth, and it smelled like something was burning. He began to gag, waving frantically for Richard to back off.
    Richard pulled the drill out and held up an old-fashioned spittoon, John gagging, spitting, and cursing.
    “Think I got it all,” Richard stated.
    “ Think you got it all?” John cried.
    “Well, you were putting on such a show there.”
    “You’re damn right. I swear you’re a sadist, Richard.”
    Richard grinned. “I’ll pack it