Perfectly Imperfect

Chapter 1: My Scraggly Opinion

I went to the orthodontist today, which makes this the worst day of my life.

The dentist sat me down in a hospital bed-like chair and I layed down.  Dr. Whitetooth put this heavy jacket across my chest and put an odd looking machine up to my face. He showed me a black and white picture of my scraggly teeth.

“You have an overbite with two very uneven rows, and three cavities,’’ said Dr. Whitetooth.

His lips formed a straight line of wry for about two seconds, and then he went back to his cheery self. Then he started to pick at my teeth and brushed, flossed, cleaned, and shined, like any dentist would. When he finished, he smiled at me. I stared at his giant white, pearly teeth and then passed out.

I woke up with my mother smiling over me with her teeth that were also perfect, but a little coffee stained. “How do you feel, my little Joe-joe?” I hate it when she calls me that. “You were out for two and a half hours!’’ said mom.

“I was?’’ I rolled my tongue across my uneven top row of teeth, expecting them to feel nice and smooth, like they always do after I’m done at the dentist. Not this time.

“Can I see that mirror over there?’’ I asked Dr.Whitetooth.

“What, are you afraid I didn’t do a good job?” He chuckled, then handed me the mirror.

 I looked in the slightly smudged mirror and noticed something terrible. Something horrible. Something absolutely positively terrifying.

“I HAVE BRACES?!” I yelled awkwardly because I couldn’t feel my mouth.

The only thing I was happy about was that my breath smelled and tasted like bubblegum because of the toothpaste he used. “I look like Billy Myers,” I exclaimed, trying to talk normally.

“Billy Myers is a nice young man,” said mom.

There are a few things you should know about Billy Myers: Billy Myers was the most social, cool, fun guy in the fifth grade. At least until he got braces. Except he wasn't that good looking in the first place, but that's just my opinion. Billy Myers really let himself go after he got braces. It looked like his dog did his hair then tried to dress him for church. Billy had the oldest version of game boy, which he played all day during class while picking his nose and eating it. But while doing all that, he still managed to get better grades than me.

-Carli Rathburn