A Brush with Teeth

(1000 words)

Known to my friends as a rather, dare-I-say, boring type – “Sammy doesn’t even have a television, he reads books!” –  and for someone who eschews festivities and hedonism in general, I surprise even myself with what I am about to reveal. How a staid bachelor-type, working in an admittedly mundane computing role, came to regularly indulge in an activity with a buxom young Thai, that is, well, what some might call downright kinky. But I digress.

Well, there I was a mere six weeks ago, ambling along in my lunch break, when I passed a branch of Boots the Chemist. Rubbing a sore patch on my chin, I recalled I needed some new razor blades, the old-fashioned kind I favour, along with a genuine badger hair brush and shaving soap. Being bamboozled by all the new-fangled shaving devices, I determined to waste no more time and headed towards the girl serving on the counter for directions to the plain blades I required.

The sales girl was occupied with a woman who reminded me of a circus clown, buying a stack of make-up.  I marked time by looking at the electric razors, something alien to my upbringing. But my eye was caught by formidable black boxes containing electric toothbrushes. Just that very morning I’d noticed a yellow aspect to my teeth, years of smoking Woodbines in my youth I supposed, a habit inherited from my dear old dad. I reeled at the price of the things, anything from forty to a hundred guineas, daylight robbery, as Dad was wont to say. Yes, I like to price things in guineas, it comes from a singular mental agility I possess. Odd, I know.

Anyway, at the top of the daylight robbery tree was the Titanium Shine, with its six settings: ‘Clean, sensitive, gum clean, white, deep clean,’ and the enticingly-named ‘special clean.’ Throwing caution to the wind, I took it to the desk, just as the clown lady left with enough bottles to make up the whole circus.

The girl looked me up and down, then smiled with dazzling white teeth. “I use one of these, sir, it’s great. Your teeth will definitely thank you!” Then seeing me blushing, “Sorry, sir, I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

“No, that’s, er, that’s quite all right.” I paid for my package and hurried back to work to secrete it in my desk before the others returned from lunch. Only then did I realise I’d clean forgotten about the razor blades.
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Well, that night I started a love affair. Just me and dear Titanium Shine. At first, anyway. It took three days to learn to keep my arm still and not move it up and down in a brushing motion. And to get used to the deep vibrations penetrating my teeth and jaw as it did its tooth-whitening work. After a couple of days, I began to read the manual in more depth. Seems there was a Bluetooth function to hook it up to my smartphone. Then I could see how often I’d cleaned my teeth, which setting I’d used, the length of time brushed and the estimated amount of plaque removed per brushing. And that information was sent to a ‘dashboard’ that opened in a browser window on my computer, allowing me to see my ‘brushing history’, ‘cleaning profiles’ and more. Amazing! What will they think of next? The only thing was that the damned toothbrush tended to spray toothpaste everywhere, so I took to cleaning my teeth in the nude, making sure the curtains were drawn, of course.
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Things developed. Not only did Titanium Shine give me all that, but there was also a forum where ‘Titanium Shiners’ could leave comments and ask for help with various tooth-brushing problems. And you could ‘like’ and ‘friend’ other tooth-brushing forum buddies, even ‘unfriend’ them if they got annoying. Well, one day I posted about a little problem I’d encountered. My gums would bleed after a couple of minutes of the ‘special’ and I had a helpful reply from a Thai lady, Suchada. After a few days of tooth-brushing chit-chat, she began to private message me, firstly about the type of toothpaste she preferred, then about her husband and how he was unfaithful to her.

Well, that wasn’t what I’d bargained for at all but then she began to send me photos of herself and I had to admit she was a ‘looker,’ even in mid-brush, and I always did favour oriental women. Soon she suggested a ‘meet up’ to discuss our experiences of the different settings. She said the ‘special’ ‘did something to her,’ but that she’d have to tell me in person.

In for a penny, and a week later Suchada called round. Turned out she lived in the same town, conveniently. Well, she was one attractive woman, perhaps forty, but pretty damned sexy, I had to admit. Well, after some tea and biscuits and chit chat, seated at my little ‘Fortnum and Mason’s table,’ she said “Sammy, my teeth feel, how you say, a leetle sugar-coated. Where is bathroom please?” Then, blow me, she pulled out her Titanium Shine, winked, and headed off, beckoning to me as she reached the door.

So, now we have a little ritual. We stand cheek to cheek with our Titanium Shines, and then the music starts. I like Saturday Night Fever, she likes Chic. There’s much hilarity and a great ‘vibe’ between us as we ‘do the bump’ on the same settings. I’m plucking up the courage to ask if we could clean each other’s teeth, but perhaps that’s going a bit too far, don’t you think? Well, Suchada just messaged me to say she likes my idea of cleaning teeth in the nude. She says the Titanium Shine is a little messy, particularly on the ‘special,’ and would I mind if we tried it together? Well, it couldn’t do any harm, I suppose. Could it?

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Featured in the book, Letters from Reuben and Other Stories: 40 Little Tales of Mirth

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