Cemetery with Falling Teeth (vignette)

Illustration by Thomas Stetson 

I was on my way to school on that ashen morning when my teeth started coming loose. My backpack was too heavy and my head bowed down. I spit out a tooth and it landed in a puddle of mud at my feet, its white like ice, like hail. I swallowed the next ones out of fear and shame. I avoided biting and kept my mouth slightly open, but my tongue was restless and it kept pushing at them. On my way, I met two of my classmates, my usual companions, and gave them a tight-lipped smile. They weren’t talking much anyway, burdened by their packs, not fully awake. It was foggy and started to drizzle. We made our way down the familiar streets, between the usual gray apartment buildings, mud sticking to our boots, as heavy as silence.

There was construction on one of the streets. Beyond the orange barricades, the street was now a giant crater, extending to the foundation of one of the structures. Was that building sinking slowly? I couldn’t tell for sure, but it didn’t look straight. When we negotiated our detour I remembered I had to recite a poem in class. My heart sank. How was I to recite with no teeth? I’d be a laughingstock. Panicked, I lagged behind my classmates and darted inside one of the buildings. I ran up the steps to the top floor and huddled up in a corner, my tongue still working at dislodging my front teeth. Doors opened and closed below me, steps descended, whispering shadows, people going to work. 

I waited as more teeth fell. Their roots snapped and sent jolts to my brain, like earthquakes just behind your eyes. I pressed my lips tight and fought back tears.

When I felt that the class has started I went out on the muddy streets, my legs unsure where to take me. I couldn’t go back home. My mom would yell at me for skipping school and losing all my teeth. She’d say I must be contaminated and would take me to the hospital, leaving me there with strangers, needles, and scalpels. Those green walls and nauseating smells, the eternal waiting. It was worse than being on the playground when no one wanted to play with you. The hospital was a deserted playground with barbed wire.

I found myself in the cemetery. The rain picked up, hard. Through the deluge, I saw a hole waiting in front of a marble cross. The earth under it softened, and the cross started to lean over. Finally, it fell inside the muddy hole with a wet thud, just as I spit out my last tooth.