Open Wide

The sounds reached her before consciousness did.

Metal against metal. A soft clink, then another. The muted scrape of instruments being arranged on a tray. Somewhere close, water running in short bursts, then stopping. The faint squeak of rubber gloves being pulled tight.

Lauren surfaced slowly from the fog, her thoughts thick and sluggish, moving through her mind like something half-frozen. Her eyelids felt impossibly heavy, weighted down by an exhaustion that seemed to have seeped into her very bones. She tried to open them, managing only the barest flutter before they fell shut again. The effort left her breathing harder than it should have.

The chair beneath her hummed with a low, mechanical vibration. Its leather surface had warmed under her body, molding to her shape in a way that felt less like comfort and more like containment. She became aware of her position: reclined so far back her head tipped lower than her feet, her neck cradled in a cushioned rest that held her skull firmly in place. The position sent a dull ache spreading across her shoulders and down her spine. She tried to shift, to ease the building pressure, but her body wouldn't cooperate. Her arms lay pinned at her sides, dead weight against the armrests, her wrists twisted slightly inward in a way that made her hands tingle and go numb.

Then she felt it. The cool brush of air against her upper thighs.

Her stomach dropped. The sensation was unmistakable: bare skin exposed where fabric should be. Her skirt had ridden up. High. Too high. She became suddenly, acutely aware of how the bunched material sat gathered somewhere near her waist, leaving her legs completely uncovered. The thick cotton panties Damien had dressed her in that morning were fully visible now, pulled taut across her hips, the childish fabric on full display.

Heat flooded her face. She tried to reach down, to tug the skirt back into place, but her arms refused to move. They lay slack and useless, fingers barely twitching against the armrests. Her thighs pressed together instinctively, trying to close the gap, but the chair's contoured shape prevented it. The position was locked. Fixed. She couldn't adjust herself even slightly.

Panic flickered weakly through the fog. She was exposed. Vulnerable. Positioned like this. Legs slightly parted by the chair's design. Skirt hiked up. Panties showing. She must look...

She couldn't think about how she looked.

Every small discomfort built on the last. The crick in her neck, the numbness in her wrists, the humiliating exposure of her lower half. Together they pressed in on her until her whole body felt wrong, positioned for someone else's convenience rather than her own.

She could Damien telling her to close her eyes. Barely. His voice had been so soft, so close to her ear that she could feel the vibration of his words. "Just close your eyes for a few minutes. It'll help you relax. I'll wake you when the doctor arrives." She'd obeyed without thinking, her lids falling shut at his gentle command.

What she couldn't was when she'd fallen asleep. Between the weight of his hand on her shoulder and the steady hum of the chair beneath her, consciousness had simply... slipped away. One moment she'd been awake, listening to the receptionist's fading footsteps. The next, nothing. Just this thick, dissolving fog and the disorienting awareness that time had ed without her permission.

How long had she been out?

A shadow moved across her closed eyelids, blocking the overhead light for a moment before ing. Footsteps circled the chair, deliberate and unhurried. Two sets, maybe three. She heard the rustle of fabric, the faint whisper of Spanish exchanged in tones too quiet to parse.

Someone's gaze must have swept over her during that lost time. Over her exposed legs, her hiked-up skirt, the plain cotton underwear stretched across her hips. Had they adjusted her position? Moved her limbs into this uncomfortable arrangement? She had no way of knowing. No one said anything now. No one offered to adjust her clothing or drape a blanket over her lap. They simply continued their conversation as if her undignified position was entirely expected, unremarkable, perhaps even intentional.

"¿Lista?" A woman's voice, clipped and professional.

"Sí. Procede." That was Damien. Close. Right beside her.

Lauren tried to speak, her mind forming words that never reached her lips. What emerged instead was a low, slurred mumble, shapeless and incoherent. "Mmnh... wha..." Her tongue lay heavy and useless in her mouth, refusing to form consonants. She tried again, pushing harder, but all that came out was a soft moan, the kind of sound someone makes in the confused space between sleep and waking. "Nnngh…"

The sounds were barely human. Certainly not words. Her vocal cords vibrated weakly, producing nothing intelligible, nothing that could be understood as language or question or protest.

"Hush." Damien's hand found her forehead, the touch feeling indifferent rather than comforting. His fingers brushed back her hair with rough strokes just enough to still her weak attempts at movement. "Stop trying to talk. Just stay quiet and relax."

The warmth was gone from his voice. The gentle patience she'd grown accustomed to had been replaced by something clipped and efficient, as if he were handling an inconvenience rather than comforting his girlfriend. There was no "beautiful," no soothing reassurance. Just instruction, delivered with the kind of detached authority that expected immediate compliance. The shift ed somewhere in the fog of her awareness, unsettling in a way she couldn't fully process. When had he started speaking to her like this? Or had he always, and she'd simply been too dazed to notice?

The question dissolved before she could chase it. Whatever the answer was, it didn't matter now. She couldn't change what was happening, couldn't stop any of this with words she could no longer form properly.

Gloved fingers touched her chin, tilting her head back slightly, adjusting the angle with impersonal precision. Then her jaw, pressing down with firm, clinical pressure until her mouth fell open. The position felt vulnerable, exposed. Air rushed across her tongue, cool and sterile, carrying the sharp tang of antiseptic and something metallic underneath.

"Buena," the woman murmured. "Mantén eso."

Something cold and smooth slid between her teeth. Metal. A dental prop, she realized dimly, wedging her mouth open wider than felt natural. The device locked into place with a soft click, and suddenly she couldn't close her jaw even if she wanted to. Her mouth was held open in a fixed, undignified gape, her tongue pressed flat, saliva already beginning to pool at the back of her throat.

Panic flickered weakly through the fog. This was wrong. She needed to stop this, needed to—

"Through your nose," Damien said. There was no comfort in his voice, only expectation. "Slowly. Do it now."

The command was sharper this time, leaving no room for hesitation or negotiation. She obeyed without thinking, drawing air in through her nostrils in shallow, rapid pulls. The panic receded slightly, replaced by a dull, helpless acceptance. Her body had learned to respond to his instructions before her mind could intervene. Even now, even as something in her sensed the wrongness of all this, her reflexes bent to his will.

The overhead light blazed brighter, repositioned to shine directly into her open mouth. She could feel its heat on her gums, her inner cheeks. A shadow leaned over her, blocking the glare. The woman, some Dr. whose name she'd heard the receptionist mention earlier, peered down at her with dark, assessing eyes above a surgical mask.

"Dr. Ruiz is going to examine you now," Damien said. "She needs to check a few things. Hold still and don't move."

No reassurance that it was routine. No promise that she wouldn't feel anything uncomfortable. Just the bare statement, delivered like an order she was expected to follow. Like she was equipment to be serviced, not a person to be comforted.

Something twisted low in her stomach, a flutter of something that might have been doubt. But the feeling had no name, no shape she could hold onto. It was just a small knot of unease, physical and unreasoned, that she pushed away without fully acknowledging.

A gloved finger entered her mouth, tracing along her gum line with methodical precision. Lauren's tongue tried instinctively to push it away, but the prop held everything immobile. She could only lie there, ive and open, while the dentist explored. The finger pressed into her inner cheek, stretching it outward, then moved to the other side. Clinical. Impersonal. Thorough. And Damien stood beside her in silence, watching, his expression unreadable.

"Hmm." Dr. Ruiz made a considering sound, low in her throat. She withdrew her finger and reached for something on the tray. Metal scraped against metal.

Lauren's heart rate spiked. She wanted to see, needed to know what was coming, but her eyes refused to open. The fog wrapped tighter around her thoughts, muffling her fear into something distant and manageable.

"¿Está seguro de que quiere proceder con esto?" Dr. Ruiz asked, her tone slipping into something more clinical. "No hay vuelta atrás. La sonrisa de ella nunca volverá a ser la misma."

"Lo sé," Damien replied. "Haz lo."

The words meant nothing to Lauren, but the tone carried weight. It wasn't a conversation. It sounded like permission. A question asked. An answer given. Whatever had just been decided, no one had asked her. She could only lie there with her mouth forced open, saliva gathering beneath her tongue, while the room moved quietly forward without her.

Before her next thought could gather, something cold and sharp touched the surface of her back molar. A probe, maybe, or a pick. It dragged slowly across the enamel, pausing at the edge where tooth met gum. Pressure built there, steady and insistent, testing. The tool moved to the next tooth. And the next. Each examination felt invasive, as if the dentist were catag her flaws, marking every imperfection for correction.

A new sensation, a cold liquid dripped onto her tongue, bitter and medicinal. It spread across the roof of her mouth, coating her teeth, her gums, the inside of her cheeks in a thick, syrupy film. Her taste buds recoiled, but she couldn't spit, couldn't swallow properly with her mouth propped open. The liquid pooled and overflowed, trickling toward the back of her throat until she gagged reflexively.

Dr. Ruiz dipped a stiff brush into a small glass vial and began coating Lauren's tongue with methodical, deliberate strokes. The liquid was thick, almost viscous, clinging to every surface it touched. Bitter didn't begin to describe the taste. It was caustic, acrid, coating her tongue in layers that seemed to multiply with each brush stroke. The viscosity made it impossible to clear from her mouth. It clung, spread, deepened.

"This…numb… mouth," Dr. Ruiz said in clipped English, before turning to an assistant.

"Succión," Dr. Ruiz commanded.

A thin tube appeared, its tip pressing into the corner of her mouth. The sudden vacuum pulled at her cheek and her tongue, slurping up the excess liquid with a wet, undignified sound that echoed in the small room. When it withdrew, her mouth felt raw and strange, as if the protective layer of saliva had been stripped away, leaving everything exposed and tender.

But the suction was only temporary relief. Within seconds, fresh saliva began to pool again in the depths of her mouth, accumulating beneath her numb tongue, which lay flat and useless like something dead. She couldn't swallow properly anymore. Couldn't control the flow. The drool began to overflow, warm and humiliating, trickling down the sides of her mouth and into the hollows of her cheeks.

Damien stood beside her, watching this happen without comment. He didn't wipe her face. Didn't offer comfort. Just watched as she lay there, helpless and drooling, as if this was exactly what he'd anticipated. Exactly what he wanted.

Then the deeper numbness began. It crept in slowly at first, a tingling at the edges of her gums that spread inward like frost across glass. Within seconds, her entire mouth went slack and foreign. She couldn't feel her tongue anymore, or rather, she could feel it, but it was disconnected, heavy, belonging to someone else. She couldn't feel her lips or the roof of her mouth. The sensation was profoundly disorienting, as if her face had been replaced with something that no longer quite belonged to her. When she tried to swallow, the muscles responded sluggishly, disconnected.

More drool pooled. No sensation to warn her. No control to stop it.

"Perfecto," Dr. Ruiz said with satisfaction. "Ahora podemos comenzar."

The sound of the polishing tool started with a high, aggressive whine. It wasn't a drill. It was something else. Something meant for roughening, for stripping away the smooth surface.

Dr. Ruiz activated the polishing instrument and brought it to Lauren's upper right molar.

The sensation was completely different from what she'd anticipated. There was no pain, no sharpness to signal where the instrument touched her tooth. Instead, a harsh vibration rattled through her jaw and echoed deep inside her skull as the tool pressed in and began to move. She couldn't feel the harsh, abrasive scraping, but she understood enough to know what was happening. Each stroke was deliberate, designed to remove the smooth, polished surface on her enamel that had made her smile so defined and brilliant. She could feel a slight pressure but the absence of feeling somehow made the work seem even more alien.

Back and forth. Back and forth. The polishing head worked in coarse, grinding es, each movement ing only as a deep mechanical buzz through her bones. She couldn't feel the polishing tool stripping away the gloss and shine that had cost her thousands of dollars to maintain, only the relentless certainty of it. All she could do was lay there motionless beneath the light, unable to see, unable to react.

The polishing tool moved to the next tooth. Upper right first premolar. The same harsh vibration, the same deep mechanical buzz that resonated through her bones while her mouth remained utterly numb. One tooth after another, Dr. Ruiz erased the flawless finish she'd spent years and thousands of dollars maintaining.

Upper right second premolar. Upper right canine. The instrument worked with quiet precision, lingering only long enough to scour away the polished enamel before moving on to the next, aggressively removing years of professional maintenance in minutes.

Then Dr. Ruiz crossed to the left side. Upper left molar. Upper left first premolar. Upper left second premolar. Upper left canine. The vibration never changed. Every tooth received the same coarse treatment, until the entire upper arch had been reduced from smooth, gleaming perfection to a uniformly rough surface.

Her beautiful teeth. The ones she'd had professionally polished and whitened until they gleamed like pearls. They once reflected the light whenever she smiled. Now that immaculate finish was being stripped away for some unknown reason.

Then Dr. Ruiz moved to the lower arch. Lower right molar. Lower right premolars. Lower right canine.

She could already sense the difference. The smoothness was gone. Her tongue, numb as it was, could sense the change. Her teeth felt different now. Raw and dull.

Her lower left teeth received the same treatment. Each one was methodically stripped of its gloss by the harsh polishing tool.

When it finally stopped, the silence was almost more overwhelming than the sound had been. Dr. Ruiz set the polishing instrument aside with a soft click.

"Succión," she commanded once more.

The suction tube cleared away the accumulated debris and drool. When it withdrew, Dr. Ruiz opened a sealed package containing the brackets. Small metal squares glinted under the overhead light as she arranged them methodically on her tray.

She reached for a bottle of adhesive. The liquid was clear and viscous, with a faint chemical smell. Working with practiced efficiency, Dr. Ruiz began applying the adhesive to the back of each bracket before positioning them on Lauren's roughened teeth.

Starting with the upper right molar, the bracket was pressed firmly into place, held steady while the adhesive set. Then the next tooth. And the next. Each bracket was positioned with clinical precision, a small metal square anchored permanently to enamel.

The rest of her teeth received the same treatment. Bracket after bracket, Dr. Ruiz worked across Lauren's teeth with the efficiency of someone who had done this thousands of times.

Lauren tried to make sense of what had been happening, but the edges of her awareness kept slipping away. The chair, the light, the constant handling of her mouth all blended into something distant and unsteady, as if she were only partially anchored in the room.

There should have been resistance. The thought surfaced dimly, but it never found traction. Her body felt too far removed, too heavy and unresponsive, as though whatever control she had slipped away along with everything else.

But Dr. Ruiz wasn't finished. She applied adhesive to additional brackets, smaller ones that she positioned on the inner surface of Lauren's four upper front teeth, ensuring the teeth that currently defined her smile would be marked for change.

The brackets caught the overhead light, glinting silver against the now-roughened enamel.

Dr. Ruiz threaded the wire through each bracket with careful precision, creating a structure that locked everything into place. When the wire was fully threaded, she reached for a pair of specialized plier-like tools. . The metal handles were cool in her gloved hands as she positioned them on the wire at the end bracket.

She began to tighten.

Immediately, Lauren felt it through the numbness. A pulling sensation. It was like her teeth were being drawn in ways they had never moved before. The pressure was subtle but unmistakable. She could feel each tooth responding to the tightening wire, being coaxed into a new position.

Dr. Ruiz worked methodically down the arch, using the pliers to tighten the wire segment by segment. Each turn of the pliers increased the pressure slightly. Each tightening pulled her teeth a little further from their natural position.

The front teeth, with their double brackets, felt the pressure most acutely. The inner brackets worked in conjunction with the outer ones, creating forces that Lauren could distinctly feel pulling and shifting. Her upper front teeth were being forced forward, creating an overbite that felt completely unnatural.

"Terminado," Dr. Ruiz announced. Finished.

But it wasn't finished. This was just the beginning. Soon, the pliers would tighten the wire again in three weeks. And again. And again. Each time moving her teeth further into their new, wrong position.

Damien's hand appeared in her field of vision. He reached down and gently squeezed her hand, his touch surprisingly tender. For a moment, it was almost like before. Almost like he cared.

"You're doing so well," he murmured softly. "Just a little longer."

Dr. Ruiz moved to release the dental prop. She carefully unhooked it, and Lauren's jaw fell slightly open without the rigid . But it didn't close. Her teeth, now bound by brackets and wire, couldn't achieve their natural bite. The brackets created interference. The wire held everything in a new, wrong position.

But worse than that, her whole mouth remained partially numb. Her lips felt thick and foreign, unable to respond to her commands. She tried to close her mouth, willing her jaw upward, but the muscles were stiff and resistant. The numbness made it impossible to feel whether her lips were sealing properly anyway. And her jaw itself was tight, aching from being forced open so wide for so long. The t felt strained, almost locked. Every attempt to close it sent a dull, throbbing pain radiating through her face.

Her jaw hung slack, suspended in the half-open position the braces now dictated, trapped between the resistance of her tight, aching muscles and the numbness that left her no .

She couldn't close her mouth.

Immediately, saliva began to overflow. She couldn't control it. Couldn't stop the drool that spilled down her chin and began to drip. One thick strand traced down her neck, darkening the collar of her polo top. Another followed, soaking into the fabric at her shoulder. Her numb lips provided no barrier. Her stiff jaw refused to cooperate.

Dr. Ruiz activated the chair's motor. It began to rise, tilting upright from the reclined position. As it moved, gravity worked against Lauren, and the drool accelerated. It ran down her chin faster now, pooling at the hollow of her throat before spreading across her chest, leaving wet, dark stains blooming across her pale polo top and blazer.

She raised her hand to her mouth, trying to stop the flow, but the numbness made it impossible to feel if her lips were even responding. The brackets prevented any possibility of her closing her lips properly. The wire held her jaw in this open, vulnerable position, and the soreness in her jaw made even the attempt to move it painful.

Damien appeared with tissues, but even as he dabbed at her chin and neck, more drool accumulated. The damage was already done. The front of her clothes was wet and stained, evidence of her complete lack of control.

"The numbing will wear off soon," he said softly, his voice carrying that note of false comfort. "Your jaw will loosen up."

But not before everyone sees. Not before she's marked by this.

He guided her to a standing position as the chair settled fully upright. She swayed slightly, the sudden change in position making her dizzy. Her hand went to her neck, feeling the dampness there, the cold stain spreading across her skin. She tried once more to close her mouth, and this time the effort sent a sharp ache through her jaw.

The numb lips remained parted.

There was a mirror mounted on the wall near the door. Lauren moved toward it slowly, still unsteady on her feet. Her tongue moved carefully, exploring this new landscape inside her mouth. The brackets were rough. Impossibly rough. Every surface felt weaponized, the edges of the brackets catching on her gums, the wire creating sharp points that pressed into her tongue.

She reached the mirror and stopped.

The woman staring back at her was unrecognizable. Her mouth hung slightly open. Silver brackets glinted across every tooth. The wire ran in a thin metallic line, creating a grid. Her lips couldn't quite close over the hardware, and the numbing made them hang slack and shapeless.

Is that what she looked like now?

She moved her tongue more deliberately as the numbness slowly began to wear off. Her lips still felt heavy, and while her tongue remained awkward, it no longer felt completely beyond her control. She could finally guide it with some intent, mapping each bracket on the outer surface of her teeth before discovering the additional brackets hidden on the inner surface of her upper front teeth. The double brackets created an unfamiliar landscape of metal and sharp edges. She traced the wire as best she could, feeling where it bit into her gum line and where the sharper bends promised to scrape once the feeling returned completely.

She moved her tongue across the back of her upper front teeth, where the brackets on the inner surface created a ridge she couldn't ignore. Sharp. So sharp. She could feel exactly where the wire would cut if she wasn't careful with each movement.

She pressed her tongue against one of the sharp edges experimentally, wincing as it pricked the soft tissue. A small bead of blood pooled on her tongue as she tasted a hint of the metallic tang. She pulled her tongue back quickly, exploring more gently now, but each bracket seemed designed to catch and cut. She moved her tongue across the outer brackets, then back to the inner ones, occasionally pricking herself again as she miscalculated the position of the sharp wire.

Behind her, Damien had moved quietly to speak with Dr. Ruiz. Their voices, low and conversational, blended into the background as they spoke softly in Spanish. She was too preoccupied exploring the braces with her tongue, testing each bracket and the tight wire that bound them together. Even if she had been listening, Lauren wouldn't have understood the words.

Lauren continued to explore her mouth in the mirror, watching her own tongue move around the brackets. It was mesmerizing and horrifying in equal measure. This was her mouth now. She tried to lift the corners of her mouth upward, attempting to recreate the graceful smile she'd perfected over decades. The smile that had graced magazine covers and billboards. The smile that had made her recognizable.

Immediately, sharp pain shot through her teeth and gums. The brackets dug into the tender tissue inside her cheeks. Her upper lip caught on one of the outer brackets, and the movement sent a jolt of discomfort radiating through her jaw. The inner brackets on her front teeth created additional resistance, preventing any natural movement of her lips.

The expression that came out was twisted. Asymmetrical. Painful. Nothing like the flawless crescent she'd grown accustomed to seeing.

She dropped the smile, wincing, and turned back to Damien. "The bracketh are too tharp," she tried to say, but the words came out thick and unarticulated. Her tongue snagged on the wire. "They're cutting my tongue and…" She stopped with an irritated breath, unable to finish the sentence cleanly.

Dr. Ruiz met her eyes with a cold, withering stare. That was supposed to be Lauren's look. The one that made underlings wilt and competitors second-guess themselves. The one she'd effortlessly used for decades in boardrooms and on screens. But here, in this small clinic in Mexico, Dr. Ruiz wielded it like a weapon, and for the first time, Lauren found herself the one shrinking back.

"You complaining discomfort?" Dr. Ruiz questioned flatly. "This how correction."

Correction. As if Lauren's teeth needed correcting. As if her smile had been wrong.

"But the wire, it'th…"Her tongue slipped against the metal again, instead of finding its place. "It'th tharp. M-my tongue…" Another stumble. "...It keepth cutting it."

"You'll adjust," Damien said, already checking his phone. "In a week or two, you won't notice it."

But she would notice it. They were already interfering with every word she tried to speak.

"But why do I…" Lauren started. "Why do I need bratheth? What'th the purpoth of…" She grimaced, her tongue struggling to navigate around the wire. The brackets dissolved each syllable into an unintelligible mumble.

"Bite correction," Damien said casually, already checking his watch. "That's what it's for."

But her bite had been perfect. She'd never had a problem with her bite in her entire life. The question rose in her throat, but looking at Dr. Ruiz's cold expression and Damien's disinterested face, Lauren swallowed it. No one wanted to hear her confusion. No one wanted to acknowledge that this made no sense.

"We should get going," Damien said, his hand appearing at her side. He placed his palm against her back, steady and possessive. "The next doctor is expecting us, and we don't want to be late."

His tone had shifted. It was no longer the voice of someone performing tenderness. It was the voice of someone managing logistics. Managing her.

Dr. Ruiz had already begun removing her gloves, peeling them off with practiced efficiency before dropping them into the trash. She turned to Damien and spoke to him quickly in Spanish.

Lauren's eyes moved between them blankly, searching for context that never formed. Both of them seemed to ignore her, leaving her more confused and anxious.

"Perfecto," Damien replied. "Gracias, Dr. Ruiz."

Dr. Ruiz gave a brief nod, already turning away as though the matter was closed.

Damien’s hand returned to Lauren’s back, guiding her gently toward the door.

As they stepped out, Damien leaned slightly closer to Lauren, his voice calm and matter-of-fact.

“She wants you back in three weeks,” he said. “First adjustment then.”

No further explanation followed. Just that.

Lauren followed him out into the hallway. The numbness was almost completely gone now, replaced by a dull, persistent ache in her jaw and increasingly sharp stabs whenever she accidentally pricked her tongue or gums on the brackets.

They walked down the narrow corridor back towards the elevator of the medical centre. The bright LED lights were intense, making her squint. Every facial movement, even squinting, sent reminders of the braces throughout her entire mouth.

"The full body checkup is just routine," Damien said, pressing the button. "Establishing a baseline for your overall health."

Baseline? The word lingered uneasily in her mind. She didn't understand why she needed one. She wasn't sick. She'd already had a complete checkup with her own doctors back home a few months ago. They hadn't found anything wrong. No one had suggested she needed additional testing.

The elevator door slid open before she could ask. Damien guided her inside, his hand now tightly grabbing hers. The elevator descended slowly, each floor taking them deeper into the building.

What else had Damien scheduled today? The question surfaced with a sharp, unfamiliar knot of anxiety that she was beginning to feel more frequently. Lauren wasn't a woman who became anxious. She directed conversations, decided where things went, and expected others to answer to her. People waited for her approval, not the other way around.

Yet somewhere in the last few days, without quite noticing, she'd handed over every decision to Damien. The trip to Tulum, the appointments, the doctors, even the paperwork. She had simply followed, obedient, from room to room.

The elevator dinged softly. Basement level.

The doors opened to a dimly lit hallway. No signage. No indication of what happened down here, yet Damien moved through it without hesitation, like someone who already knew the way. He simply walked, pulling Lauren gently along by the hand, turning left at a corridor junction.

Lauren's mind was too fractured, too focused on the aching in her jaw. She simply followed, too preoccupied with her own increasingly unsettled thoughts to the ease with which he moved through the unmarked hallway.

She thought about three weeks from now. The next appointment. Dr. Ruiz with those pliers again, working the wires tighter. She didn't understand any of it, only that apparently it needed to be done.

Her teeth had always been one of the few things she never had to question. Straight. Symmetrical. Exactly what it was supposed to be. And yet they kept talking as if something about it needed to be changed.

They stopped in front of a door. A brass plaque read "Dr. Soria" in a simple script.

Lauren's heart rate accelerated, unease tightening behind her thoughts. "What ith thith doctor going to do?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Damien didn't answer. Instead, he raised his free hand and knocked twice on the door.

"Just baseline documentation," he said finally. "Measurements. Height, weight, and some standard health information."

Documentation? Measurements? Why would they need that?

"Oh and she'll probably want some photos as well."

Photos? The phrase landed heavily. Why would they need photos?

Lauren looked at Damien, expecting some explanation, some clarification from the man she loved. But his face remained calm and composed.

The door swung open, and she followed, her body moving on its own accord, while her thoughts lagged behind in reluctant understanding.