‘Have you had any discomfort there?’
Tain, you mean? Pain? Yeah, lots. That’s why I’m here.’
‘Yes, well you would. Hello, seems to be some mobility there.’
He made mobility sound as if it were a pretty encouraging thing to have, like social mobility, upward mobility. ‘Loose, you mean?’ I gargled.
‘I might just check the vitality of that one.’ Roger reached for the robot tendon of the drill fixture. ‘Can you feel anything?’
‘What sort of thing?’
‘Pressure?’
‘On the tooth? No.’
‘Discomfort? … Minimal vitality,’ he murmured.
At this I coughed out the braces and sprays and jerked myself upright. ‘What are you talking about? Talk right, okay? It’s loose and it’s dead and it’s coming out. Yes? No?’
‘I don’t do extractions,’ he said primly. ‘You’ll have to see Mrs McGilchrist about that.’
‘Then just clean them,’ I said.
Roger replaced the nozzles and clips. He hummed while he cleaned. His instruments did their beaky work, their painful fine-tuning. The steel lingered on the trouble spot, the wasted block on my upper west side.
‘Mm,’ he said when the polishing was done. Daintily he plucked the gadgetry from my mouth. ‘The gum’s been traumatized by the shape of the root,’ he mused. ‘Rinse.’
‘Traumatized?’ I sipped the fizzy liquid and expelled its tactful pink. ‘Now you’re talking.’
‘Well the shape of the root is very unusual.’
‘And the gum can’t cope with this? The gum has a trauma about it?’
‘The tooth is still viable,’ he said.
I picked up my coat in the hot floral waiting room — two people there, indistinct and self-sufficient, like all ghosts in waiting rooms. I paid the chick who lurks with knitting in her windowless stall: fifteen pounds, cash, and a video cassette. No receipt. Black economy. I run Selina on the black economy. We don’t keep any books: there is nothing, no letter, no notes. There is no gentleman’s agreement. There isn’t even a handshake. But we both understand.
‘Selina,’ I had said, two days after her return,’— Alec told me a funny thing on the way to the airport.’ Selina hesitated as she took off her coat.
‘What? Don’t I even get a kiss then?’
‘He said you were fucking someone — a lot, all the time.’ I sipped my drink and lit another cigarette.
‘He’s an English aristocrat,’ said Selina intently. ‘He doubled the family fortune on Wall Street. His servants come round to get me in a—’
‘No. This is serious. This is real. He said you’d got someone on the side. Someone I know.’
‘Oh you stupid sod. Don’t listen. You know he made a pass at me once.’
‘Did he? Son of a bitch.’
‘He kissed my tits. Then he put my hand on his cock. Then he —’
‘Christ. Where were you at the time? In bed together?’
‘Here, in the kitchen. He came round when you were out.’
I refreshed my drink and said calmly, ‘Everyone makes passes at you, Selina. Waiters in restaurants make passes at you. Men in the street make passes at you.’
She shut her eyes and laughed. Then she sobered quickly and said, ‘But he’s supposed to be your friend.’
‘All my friends make passes at you too.’
‘You haven’t got any friends.’
‘Terry’s made a pass at you. Keith’s made a pass at you. My dad’s made a pass at you — and he’s family.’
‘Just don’t listen to him. Don’t you know how jealous Alec is of you? He’s trying to destroy our love.’
This struck me as a novel notion, in all senses. While unscrewing the second bottle of scotch, I thought suddenly, Something else is missing. What is it? But all I said was — ‘You really think so?’
‘You’re spilling it! Bloody hell, take it easy. It’s hardly six o’clock. Listen. Have you got those forms from the bank yet? How long have you been in here drinking?’
‘What forms?’
‘You know what forms. I’ve got to have some independence.’
‘Yeah yeah.’
‘I’m twenty-eight.’
‘Twenty-eight? Well you don’t look it.’
‘Thank you, darling. I don’t think I’m being unreasonable. Gregory gives Debby an allowance. Why are you so frightened of it? You’re quite generous over little things, I’ll give you that. But as soon as it comes to —’