The diary of a dental psychopath
30 Days 30 Stories: Day 5
27th September 2018
I turn 24 today. There's something I have to confess. I can't share this with even my closest friends. I get a kick out of watching other people in pain. It turns me on. I don't mean the kinky stuff. I mean really gruesome events. The first one I found was through Louis CK. He was talking this one time about an Egyptian president being assassinated during a victory parade. The people marching in the parade turned around and sprayed the stage with bullets killing the President and his aide, and Louis said one man just stood there holding his severed arm in his hand, dazed, wondering where he should go and whom he should give his arm to. I was curious. I wanted to watch that video. I thought it would be funny. When I actually watched it, I felt the blood rush to my head and I felt light.
I rewatched that sequence an unhealthy number of times, just the part where the guy holds his severed hand looking dazed. I curated a collection of gore that would be Cronenberg's dream. I didn't know about Cronenberg. I hadn't even watched a Tarantino movie till that point. I come from a religious family where the elders used to kick us out of the room when there was sex or blood on the screen. Since watching sex hadn't done much for me, I had never looked up blood either. I wasn't scared. I just didn't think there was much of a point. Boy, was I wrong.
But the first time I really felt there was something wrong with me was that day I was in an auto on the Hundred Feet road, going towards Indiranagar. There was a small stretch where people seemed to be milling about, on the highway, like a swarm of ants over a scattered patch of sugar. I guessed it was some procession, the kind in which people carry a local deity on the streets and blare music on the loudspeaker. I heard a rhythmic thudding sound to my left and saw a girl about my age sprinting on the sidewalk as if her life was on the line. She was beautiful. She wore a peacock green chudidar and she didn't have a dupatta on, and her hair was tied in a bun with a few strands flying as she ran. She was yelling into a phone that she held over her right ear. I couldn't hear what she was saying.
As we got into the thick of the crowd, I saw a lone autorickshaw standing near the median. Two people on a scooter were moving ahead of our auto. The riders wore colorful silk shirts and calf-length pants, and their hair was cropped on the sides. The guy driving the scooter jumped off and ran towards the auto, and the pillion rider neatly slid into the vacant seat and took control of the vehicle. I craned my neck to get a peep of the auto. There was no driver inside, but a small white bundle was jutting out of the back seat. I was distracted by the screaming voice of a girl. It was the girl in the peacock chudidar from earlier, with her glasses askew, and a policeman was holding her by both arms as she screamed at a pitch that I thought impossible for humans. Her words weren't important. They were just no, no, no, repeated over and over again. But that emotion, my god, it went straight to my blood and I felt my throat go dry and the muscles in my chest constrict. The guy driving my auto put his head out and risked a last look backward while I was still captivated by the screaming girl. I asked him what had happened. "Spot out, poor guy. The corpse was in the auto," he said. I put my head outside the auto without shame to desperately sneak a look at the bundle in the auto, but we had already split the crowd and made it onto the road again. All I could see was the silhouette of the screaming girl in the distance.
I was of half a mind to get out and just stand there, watching the girl as she melted into a catatonic mess. But I had a brunch date to keep with a girl I liked, so I kept going. I kind of regret it now. Brunch, kisses, hugs and all that shit didn't make me feel nearly a fraction as alive as witnessing that emotional distress.
What I'm going to say next might seem passé compared to all this confession, but I think I'm going to be killing somebody soon. I don't think I can get that sort of heightened emotion in any other way. I've been reading Red Dragon and Silence of the lambs and watching Mindhunter and the Ted Bundy documentary to see how these serial killers get caught, so that I make sure that I don’t get caught, like one of these idiots. I don't want to end up on death row, and the jails aren't really that criminal-friendly in India.
***
13th December 2018
My performance at office has been slipping a bit, because I've been staying up at night reading about serial killers and how they get caught, behind a VPN of course, all the time. I'm making notes, and I'm hiding those notes in a secret folder titled "Insurance paperwork" so that nobody can find them if they're snooping. But I think I have a plan.
This girl I met for a brunch date that day? Turns out she has a dental appointment tomorrow, and she asked me if I can take her there because she's kind of afraid to go there alone. It's so endearing, that it almost makes me sad that I'll have to kill her tomorrow. I have it all planned out – where I'm going to execute her, and where I'm going to dispose the body, and how I'm going to make sure there are no traces and that I have a clean alibi. I have movie tickets for the same time, and I know an usher at that seedy theater whom I always tip who'll vouch for me. All of this is unnecessary, but it doesn't hurt to be careful. I was watching this video of a Canadian Air Force Colonel who killed young girls for kicks. He got caught because he left some stupid tire tracks that led authorities to the vehicle he was driving or something. Such a well-crafted plan and he botched it up with just one mistake. Pathetic.
All these deviants, like me, have some problem with their prefrontal cortex. They're not animals. They know what they're doing is wrong. They can recognize that killing is a wrong act, that they're taking the life of another human being. This Canadian Major even asked the officers who were arresting him to make sure that his wife wouldn't be affected by his arrest, that she wouldn't have to be hounded by the press and have her life turned upside down, because she was absolutely innocent. He was a high functioning guy. Yet he was chopping up bodies. I can understand that.
I wish there was some other way. It's the pain part that’s indispensable to me. I just don't know how to get that level of intensity without killing.
***
15th December 2018
Well, I'll be damned. There just might be another way. I don't need to kill.
I thought it was a nuisance to visit this girl's dentist, but it was convenient because it gave me an excuse to pick her up and take her someplace for, you know, the execution. But at the clinic, this girl was so terrified that she begged me to stay with her in the procedural room while she was getting her root canal done. Root canals can apparently be quite painful, even under anesthesia. When she said pain, I was like "Sign me up bitch." Of course, I didn't say that. I just acted like I was concerned and mildly annoyed.
They usually don't allow friends or family of patients inside, but this dentist made an exception because we asked nicely. It might not look like it from these entries, but I come off as quite charming to people. I held her hand throughout the procedure. My god, it was something, I'll tell you that. Every time the drill hit her teeth and something probed her mouth, her hand pulsed in tandem with the dentist's instrument and she grimaced and sighed in synchrony. Yes, all the euphemisms there were intentional lol. I was breaking out a sweat on my forehead and thank god they were both too busy to notice.
I've never felt so close to her, even when we were together in bed. Sex doesn't do that much for me anyway. It just feels like a performance that people mime based on everything they watch. But pain you can't fake. Every time she squeezed my hand, it was real.
After the treatment, the first thing I asked her was when she had a dentist's appointment next. She thought I was being sweet, and she told me with joy that it was all done. Bummer. I'll have to dump her and find someone else.
But I never thought that rotten teeth could be the solution to my problem.
***
27th April 2019
It was Aakash's birthday today and when I told him that I had dumped one more yesterday, he said I'm cycling through girls faster than Leonardo DiCaprio – which is kind of true if you think about it, because girls run out of root canals in their mouth faster than they turn 25. But this feels like an unsustainable strategy. There are so many variables involved.
For one, I keep having to find new dentists because the old one got suspicious after I brought two more girls to the same clinic. Can't blame her. And then one girl just didn't want me to accompany her, and when I did, she didn't want me in the room. I didn't even wait for her. I was so pissed that I left when she was inside the operating theater and broke up with her over text.
Then there was one girl who went through a root canal without batting an eyelid during the whole procedure. I held her hand which just lay there like a piece of cold styrofoam, without reacting once to the drill in the dentist's hand. Talk about frigid. There was no hope for that one, because I want someone vulnerable, who preferably screams in pain, and she was the exact opposite. I was a little scared of that girl to be honest. She seemed like the nemesis of whatever substrate I was made of.
It’s so frustrating. It’s so much effort to date someone and court them based on all the potential dental treatment, and then it turns out not everyone is sensitive to pain in the same way.
***
24th May 2019
I feel a little bad for my prospective targets. They have no idea I'm dating them for their rotten teeth. They think I'm charmed by their beauty, intelligence, body, whatever and my visit to the dentist with them is despite their teeth. That I'm scoring brownie points by filling the cavities in their teeth so that I can fill their other cavities later. (Ugh. What's happening to my sense of humor?) But they all seem to like such jokes. That's another side-effect. I'm making jokes all the time because it lets me get a good look inside people's mouths when they laugh. That way I know whom to pick out next.
There's this one girl I really want. She has a terrible, terrible mouth. But she's so hard to catch for some reason. I'm worried that I won't last much longer if it goes this way. It's been a while since I went to the dentist since my last breakup, and I'm getting hungry for some pain. I need to move fast.
***
21st June 2019
Today is the start of a new era. I took Shika to the dentist. That's her name, the girl with the rotten mouth. It's not just root canals. Her palate is a disaster. Her teeth stand askew in all directions, like a whale's ribcage, like an elephant graveyard, like stonehenge struck by a meteor shower. It's beautiful. I could write poetry about that mouth for days. It's so bad that my gums started bleeding when I kissed her once. Even the dentist winced when she opened her mouth the first time. Said it was one of the worst cases she’d seen. Shika says she's never dated anyone in her life. I don't doubt it. It takes someone special to see her inner beauty. Her parents skimped on her dental visits and she never thought she was worth it, but I'm so happy with my find that I'm sponsoring all her dental visits. I got a bonus at work last month, I might as well spend that money on something that makes me happy.
She doesn't understand why I would do something like this for her. I tell her that love doesn't need explanations.
***
11th August 2019
I've been seeing much more of Shika. She likes sweets. She loves sweets. But when I try to buy her desserts, she keeps refusing. She brushes twice a day. She says she can't take advantage of me, just because I pay all her dental bills. Her, taking advantage of me? If only she knew. I wish she would go wild and spawn a minefield of cavities.
But for now, I'll have to make do with all the renovation in that mouth. I've spent so much time understanding what the problem with her buccal cavity is that I feel like half a dentist myself. But I need to understand, so that I can schedule our visits optimally. You know that sinking feeling you get when you're really enjoying a TV series, and then you realize that you're running out of episodes because you're binge-watching them, and then you're scared that the show will end? Well, that's how I feel with Shika. Her performances at the clinic are the best I've felt with any girl so far. Her touch is so sensitive, and she reacts even to the smallest sound of the dentist's drill. She's like a timid mouse. It's endearing to watch.
She once told the dentist that she can take on even more pain if that means she can get more beautiful for me faster. That excited me, not because of her beauty because I don't really care much for that, but because of the possibility of intense pain bringing out something truly spectacular in her. That's also the trade-off you need to make sometimes, do you go for a big bang and run out of juice faster, or do you ration the pain and stretch it out for longer.
But you know something, I also felt something I haven't felt in maybe forever. When she volunteered to take on more pain for my sake, that felt kind of... touching? I wonder, am I getting soft?
***
17th November 2019
Shika told me she loves me today. She's not the first one to tell me that. But you know what, I'm kind of annoyed. Because I'm kind of starting to feel something here, and it's not just about her teeth. I'm beginning to enjoy her presence when she's around and I miss her when she's not around. I can't enjoy Tarantino movies the same way without her by my side. Any time I find a morbid meme, she's the first one I think of sending it to, instead of Surya. She has the same fucked up sense of humor as me and she loves playing this gory video game called Hades which I had never given a shot before but which is pretty good if I say so myself.
The embarrassing thing is, I even got kind of whiny and complainy about something in front of her once, and I was telling her about something about the way I grew up as a kid and all the annoyance of being a lonely kid in a small town. At that moment, she pressed my hand, and I got a small kick out of that touch the same way I got a kick at the dentist's office, and I kind of jumped back a little because it felt so uncanny. She comforted me a little saying it's okay, and she understands, and I had to pretend a little like sharing that stuff from my childhood bothered me. But what had bothered me was that strange nice feeling.
I'm scared that I'm actually beginning to care for her. And she doesn't have that much work left to do on her teeth. We have another 6 visits at most, and I'm having to stretch it out.
***
12th February 2020
There's just one more session left. I'm scheduling it for some time in March. But...
I don't want to let her go and find someone else. I don't know what I'm thinking. I need these hits of pain. Otherwise I'm going to have to kill someone. And I can't imagine killing her. I can't understand why I have sudden qualms about this sort of thing, but I can neither dump her nor keep her with me.
And it's also sort of bothering me that she doesn't know any of what's going on in my mind. Guilt is not something I'm used to feeling. But the awareness that she's caring for me without a clue that she's a pawn in my game of pain-chess is killing me. Weirdly, that's a feeling of pain in itself and I thought I would enjoy that. But I only enjoy other people's pain, not my own, so it kind of sucks.
I don't know what to do. There's also something in the news about some flu from China that's already spreading across the globe. I hope that doesn't make its way to Bangalore. I don't have that good of an immune system.
***
27th March 2020
We had to beg the dentist to get an appointment. I think we might even have broken some laws getting there because of all the lockdowns. Oddly, this time around, her final "performance" in the dentist's clinic, felt oddly empty. I've been watching the news of people falling ill all around the world due to COVID-19, and there was this animated documentary about a girl in China who lost her fiancé to the disease, and when I watched this stuff, I didn't get the usual high I get from emotional pain. I was mildly agitated, but that excitement is missing.
And with Shika's treatment done, I don't know where I'll get my kicks from next. But for now my mind's busy with survival. I'm taking her back to my place so that we can weather this out together.
I know what you're thinking, "You're just looking for an excuse to kill her and dump her body somewhere convenient." But it's not like that any more. I don't know how to explain it. Yes, I need the pain, but not at her expense.
***
14th April 2020
Uh oh. I have this mild stinging feeling in my throat, and I'm having trouble smelling the spices when I'm making tadka for the dal. Shika's been sneezing since yesterday too.
***
21st April 2020
Shika's alright, she's taking Vitamin C and Zinc and she seems to be getting better. But I'm having trouble breathing. I'm feeling a little light-headed. Shika said she knows a doctor friend who can get a bed for us at a hospital if it's necessary. I'm having to write this entry when she isn't around, so these entries are short. I have to fucking lock this deep inside some cupboard and hide the key somewhere she would never look. If I die at a hospital and these diaries are my legacy, I'm done for.
***
20th June 2020
This is my last entry.
I spent more than a month at the hospital. My insurance covered some of it, otherwise I would have been broke by now. But what I got to see was a wildfire of pain. I was in a haze of unconsciousness for the most part, and I saw so many people in so many beds when they wheeled me in, and I could hear the clamor of people begging to be let in at all times of the day. They were pumping me with Remdesivir as well. I have a pathetic immune system, but I somehow avoided the ICU. But I saw other perfectly healthy-looking people wither by the end of the day and be sent to the ICU in a desperate bid. Many died.
The air was a chorus of wailing people and beeping monitors. I saw people fight to not break their tenuous thread to this world. And I realized that I was part of this web as well, just one more thread ready to snap.
I'm not a cold-blooded killer. I'm just a poser. I'm just one more guy who was looking to feel human by feeling something real, and pain was the only real thing I could feel, my only connection to people. When I go back and read all my edgy posts about executing the girls I dated and stuffing them into bins, I cringe. I've seen death up close, in the dozens, and it made me retch. Phantoms of pain float before my eyes when I close them in the dark.
Through it all, Shika was with me. We held hands again, but this time I was the sick one. I implored her to go home. She insisted she'd be fine because she had got COVID once, but who knew how this damned flu worked? She said she owed me this. It was payback for all the days I skipped office to hold her hand at the dentist’s, she said. I was sick to my stomach. If only she knew. If only she knew.
No, she can never know. I know, full transparency, true love understands everything, blah blah blah. But fuck that. The only thing I did right, throughout this misadventure, was to hide my traces well. And I'm not going to ruin that now. Shika is sleeping and I'm writing this frantically in an attempt to give myself closure to this story before I start a new life with her. There's a night watchman on our street corner who burns newspapers and coconut husks to keep warm in the night. I'm going to walk over there and throw this notebook into the fire and make personally sure that it burns to cinders. I can't leave this to chance.
When Shika wakes up in the morning, I have a shot at being the guy she thought I was all along.
Story notes:
Thanks for reading. I had fun writing this story but I’m also nervous about what you’ll think after reading this, so any comments are welcome.
There are probably some plot cavities in this story related to the dental stuff. But my uncle, who’s a dentist, is probably going to read this, so I’ll let him correct me in the comments. Dental treatment is nowhere near as painful as I’ve described in this story, or at least, that’s been my experience. Once when I was in my uncle’s clinic, I was waiting for my turn while he was treating my mom, and I was getting bored out of my mind. I imagined, “What if the treatment were painful, and there’s a guy sitting in the room getting a kick out of watching someone else in pain?” And then the idea kind of developed from there.
If you liked reading this one, I recommend “The Kangaroo Communique” by Haruki Murakami in the collection “The Elephant Vanishes.”
I’m writing one story every day for 30 days. Today is day 5. To get future stories in your inbox:
You can read my previous stories here.
The themes are getting progressively darker