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Trying To Stay Dead

by Richard S. Crawford.

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Doctor Bell’s assistant led me into the tiny exam room and gestured at the leather-padded chair in the center. ‘Are you ready to do this?’ she asked, smiling.

I hesitated. I’d been psyching myself up for an animectomy for two months, but now the exam room gave me pause. It reminded me of a dentist’s office: The chair in the center of the room sat benignly beneath a single circular lamp that could be moved and aimed in any direction, while beside it lurked a movable desk with a tiny computer and a single instrument that looked like a dentist’s drill. ‘I suppose.’

‘You’re nervous, I can tell.’ The assistant wore a simple pink smock, the kind dental and mental hygienists all over the world wore. Her teeth gleamed an almost unnatural shade of white, and her silky brown hair cascaded lushly over her shoulders. She looked like a model.

And why not? The tiny scar on her left temple and the ever so slightly unfocused look in her eyes told me she’d already had the Snip. She acted happy and well adjusted and was unaware of anything she or I were saying or doing.