When I was a little child, and had my first cavity, my father used the gas on me. I did experience the vortex (created by the numb feeling and the sounds of the suction and drill combined). These were called upon to catapult the protagonist of this story to this inner world.
Ironically, when my father read this story, he asked if I had done this. I was able to honestly say, "No." But my older brother, who had previously been my father's janitor admitted he had used the gas on his own. Which is stranger...truth or fiction.
I hope you enjoy..."On the Innerside."
On the
Inner Side
by
Mitchell S Karnes
Eric
wasn’t so much addicted to the Nitrous as he was the place it took him. He was hooked as a child, the first time his
father put him under. You see, Eric’s
father was also his dentist and a gentle one at that. He had no intentions of hooking his son on
the gas; he simply wanted Eric to have a pain-free experience at the
dentist. After all, unlike most kids
Eric had to live with his.
Eric
wasn’t necessarily a rebellious child, but when it came to sweets and his
father’s desire for him to eat healthy foods he was seemingly rebellious to the
core. So, as consequences naturally fell,
Eric ended up with quite a few cavities over the years. Little did his father realize, Eric’s
rebellion wasn’t about the candy at all…he just wanted to make another journey
to the Inner Side.
Eric
was the youngest of three children. His
sister, Katy, was two years older and very popular at school, with her friends
and teachers. His brother, Mike, was
popular everywhere else. It was amazing,
but for his less than average size and muscle mass, Mike was the block
bully. He was a master of intimidation;
he had this way of getting into your head and scaring the pee right out of
you. Not Eric…he was small for his age
and the ultimate quiet introvert. If
given the choice, Eric would choose time alone over time with friends…probably
because he felt he had none. The kids at
school called him a freak and a loner.
He was the butt of their jokes and the target of their constant harassment. Of course, no one teased or bullied Eric in
Mike’s presence. On the occasion
someone was stupid enough to do so, Mike would “rescue” Eric, pound the life
out of the idiot who tried, and then beat his little brother to a pulp anyway,
saying “No one can beat up my little brother but me.” It was lose-lose for Eric, which is why the
Inner Side was so appealing. There he
could be anyone…do anything…there he was a beloved king! There he had friends.
It
all began with Eric’s first cavity at seven years of age. He remembers it well, for he always returned
to that moment before crossing over to the Inner Side. He lay in the dental chair awaiting his
father’s return. Alice, the aging dental
assistant with the old fashioned nurse’s cap, loomed over him. Eric couldn’t tell if she was angry or
happy…her face was hidden behind the white nurse’s mask. She just stared blankly…silently. The only sound in the room came from the
ticking of the cat clock in front of him.
It eyes blinked as its tail clicked back and forth like a
metronome. Its smile devious…like the
Cheshire cat’s in Wonderland. In the
corner of the room, near the only window, a country picture of a field covered
in golden prairie grass, and in its middle, dissecting the field, a small dirt
path with a two-person-wide bridge spanning a small river. It called to him in silent whispers. He watched it intently as Alice slid the
rubber device with the connecting hoses over his nose. He lost sight for only a moment when the
hoses past his eyes, but he never stopped looking for the bridge. He could hear it calling.
Then
slowly…ever slowly…the heaviness pulled at his legs, and they obediently slid
to the sides of the dental chair. He
hadn’t noticed his father’s return, but as the chair tipped back, Eric could
see his smiling eyes. It didn’t matter
that his father wore a mask; Eric could still see his grin. He fought the heaviness and the darkness, but
they won out against his will. And the
sounds…those incredibly weird sounds of the dental office did something strange…something
magical…something he would never forget…something that he would forever long to
repeat. The distorted sounds of the
suction and drill formed a gentle vortex.
It was not like the violent assault of Dorothy’s tornado, but a gentle
twisting and turning like the man’s cardboard tube at the carnival as he made
cotton candy. The gentle spinning and
the heaviness of the gas pulled at him, and, Eric felt himself drifting…drifting…drifting
ever downward. When his feet alighted
softly upon the ground he couldn’t believe his eyes. He was in the painting of the field, in the
middle of the dirt path, facing the bridge.
He could hear the gentle flowing river water licking against the banks
that corralled it onward. But there was
another sound…a sweeter sound…one that beckoned him closer. “Eric,” it whispered. “We’ve been waiting for you. Come and play”
It
was the voice of a man. He should have
been frightened. After all, he was alone
in a strange place, called by a stranger’s voice, but he wasn’t afraid at all. He was at peace. Unlike the world above, this place seemed to
call him closer…to want him. What did he
have to lose? It was just a dream…right? I mean those kinds of things don’t really
happen…do they? He was under the
influence of Nitrous-Oxide. This was all
an illusion…a hallucination. This inner
world was just a visual representation of the last thing Eric saw before he
went under. He had stared at his
father’s picture of the bridge as Alice turned on the gas. That’s all it was.
That’s
what he thought too. But it wouldn’t be
the last time he went there. On his
second journey six months later, he actually braved the bridge. No, he didn’t cross it then either, but he
did touch the rail. It was as solid as
any other bridge he’d ever seen or touched.
So why shouldn’t this one be real?
It was his third cavity two weeks after his ninth birthday…his third
journey to the Inner Side…
“Eric,
we’ve been waiting for you. Come and
play.” He couldn’t tell at the time, but
the voice was a little more insistent, a little more anxious, a little more…
“I’m
coming,” he said. “Where are you?”
“We’re
right here, on the other side of the bridge.
Can’t you see us?”
Eric
looked. He saw nothing but more than the
field and a little deserted shack. “Are
you in the shack?” he asked.
“No.”
“Where
are you?” Eric persisted. Now he was
getting a little nervous. There were
voices, but no bodies with them. Are they ghosts? Eric wondered.
“No,
we’re not ghosts.”
It
was the voice of the man. “Eric, come
and see for yourself.”
Suddenly,
he recognized that voice, but they said he wasn’t real…that he was Eric’s imaginary friend. “Max?
Is that you?”
“Of
course it’s me, Eric. Who else would be
waiting for you on the Inner Side?”
Eric
paused. Was it a trap?
“No,
Eric, it’s not a trap.”
“How
are you doing that?” Eric asked.
“Doing
what?” the voice asked.
“You
answered my questions, but I never said them out loud.”
“What’s
so special about that?” the voice asked.
“Just come over the bridge and you can see for yourself.” There was a long silence. Then the voice asked, “We used to talk and
play all of the time. Are you afraid of
us? What’s happened to you, Eric? ”
“Nothing!”
he shouted defensively. Then in a
defiant stomp, Eric marched out across the bridge, more to prove he wasn’t
afraid than to see the Inner Side. But
something magical happened. The moment
his foot touched the middle point of the bridge, he began to see odd glimmering
shapes…not only of people, but of things as well. He rushed across the second half. Every step made the images brighter and
clearer. As his foot touched the other
side of the field, he seemed to step through some sort of invisible wall. He felt its gentle resistance, like he was
running through Jell-O. His eyes widened
and his smile broadened. A
carnival! And there, looking down at him
was Max, a towering figure of kindness.
Max was Eric’s protector and best friend all in one. And so Eric’s journeys on the Inner Side
began.
For years, Eric returned to the Inner
Side…not only to play, but to escape the lonely tortured world outside. He played.
He rode the carnival rides…rides he was too short to qualify for in the
real world. But his favorite game…the
game he wanted to play most of all…came right out of his comics. The Marvel Comics world gave Eric the same
pleasure, the same escape, the same sense of power he always longed for. His favorite game of all was
“Super-hero.” One day he was Iron Man
soaring through the clouds, blasting away all of the bad guys. The next he was the Hulk smashing and scaring
others as the outside world had smashed and intimidated him. He ran the gamut of the Marvel hero world,
but his favorite of all was Colossus from the X-Men. He couldn’t fly…he couldn’t see through
things…he couldn’t shoot laser blasts…he couldn’t teleport…and he couldn’t get
hurt. Colossus was super strong, but the
best part was he morphed into an impervious form of metal…he was impervious to
harm. Oh, Eric thought, if I could
only be Colossus nobody could ever hurt me again! That was the thought he expressed to me, the
one thought that led me to tell his story and to explain why Eric made the
choice he did.
If
Eric believed things were bad in middle school, he never should have gone to
high school. Our first day of school was
awful. From the start we were bullied,
teased, locked in lockers, and became the laughing stocks of the entire
school. Those few boys who called us
friends abandoned us on day one. We were
left to ourselves…left to survive the cruelest world of all. It didn’t take long for the boys in our P.E.
class to realize Coach Jackson never came into the boys’ locker room, so it
didn’t take long for all hell to break loose.
I call it hell because that’s what I think hell will be like…no end of
torture…no limit to the depth of physical, emotional and verbal attacks…no
escape…and no one cares. Eric always got
the worst of it. They seemed to enjoy
his animated reactions more than my silence.
We tried to tell Coach Jackson, but he laughed it off, saying, “Boys will
be boys. Suck it up.”
His last day at school Eric reluctantly entered the
locker room. I was already duct-taped to
the wall, my mouth gagged with someone’s dirty jock. They pushed him, teased him, and stripped
him. Then the unthinkable happened to
Eric. Putting a handful of Icy Hot on
the end of the plunger handle, they reenacted a scene from Lord of the Flies making Eric the pig. They gagged him with a dirty jock so his
screams couldn’t be heard outside the locker room, tortured him for five long
minutes, and left him lying there sobbing through the gag. All the while I had to watch helplessly,
stuck silently to the wall. We both
remained in those helpless positions until the class returned from PE. It seems Coach Jackson never even missed us. It was probably a better class without the two
“Pansies” anyway. A few of the boys
turned Eric over while others approached me.
Charlie Williams said, “Either of you says a word and I’ll kill you. Don’t think I won’t.” And just to make his point, he took out a
hunting knife and made a motion across his neck. Then he cut the tape and let me down. They tried to help Eric to his feet, but he
pushed them all away.
After everyone left, I said, “Are you okay?” Eric shook his head. “What can I do?” I asked. I was only fourteen years old and scared out
of my life. I wanted to hurt
somebody. I wanted to find Mike and give
him names. I wanted to do a lot of
things. But the image of Charlie’s knife
made me do what I always did best…stay quiet.
I tried to help Eric up, but he pushed me away too. That was the last time I saw him until…
They say Eric walked home and told no one of the events
of the day at school. He sat quietly
around his family’s dinner table, nibbling at his food while his sister, Mom
and Dad all shared stories from their wonderful day. When Eric was asked about his day, he simply
said, “Same ole, same ole.” Never
expecting him to say much, the family went on about their nightly
routines.
Eric waited until everyone else was asleep. He stole his father’s keys and walked the
seven blocks to his father’s dentist office.
Eric had followed his father around enough to know where everything was
and how to even work the instruments.
That too, included the Nitrous Oxide.
So Eric found the tanks, turned them on, and made his way back inside
the main office. Once in a patient room,
Eric turned the dials and set his mixture, adding a little more Nitrous than
usual. He tried and he tried to find Max
and the Inner Side, but something was wrong.
Finally it dawned on Eric that the sounds of the suction and the drill
created the vortex that took him to the bridge.
After several minutes of trial and error, Eric got the devices working
and lay in the chair. He had previously tilted
it to the exact position his father preferred.
Then, unattended and unsupervised, Eric put on the nose piece and lay
back. Inhaling the Nitrous in deep
breaths as he closed his eyes and listened to the distorted sounds of the
drill’s whizzing and the suction’s slurping, Eric slowly but surely drifted
downward. He returned, as always to the
old office and the person of Alice. The
Eric closed his eyes and drifted further down to the bridge to the Inner Side.
This time there were no voices…no pleading…no hesitation. Eric ran across the bridge and came out the
other side as Colossus, the metal powerhouse of the Uncanny X-Men. At his bidding, building-sized robots, called
Sentinels, approached and tried to capture him.
But, unlike the Eric of the outside world, Colossus was ready and able
to withstand their worst. He caught the
giant robot’s foot as it attempted to stomp him into the ground and toppled it
backward. Colossus jumped to the fallen
robot’s chest and in one mighty punch, crushed its chest cavity. Another attacked and then another. This time he was not left alone to
fight. The rest of the X-Men came to his
aid. And when the battle escalated, the
Avengers and Fantastic 4 joined in. All
listened to his command. All followed
his instructions. All stood by his side
while enemy after enemy were destroyed.
The next morning Eric’s father awoke and readied himself
for work. It wasn’t until he grabbed for
his keys that he realized something was amiss.
Not only were his keys missing, but Eric as well. Eric’s mother and father drove around looking
for him. Finally, after hours of
searching, as they happened by the office, they realized that was the one place
they hadn’t checked. They pulled in,
used his mother’s keys, and found Eric unconscious in the dental chair. The Oxygen had run out before the
Nitrous. Both had long since stopped
pumping any gas at all.
How
long had Eric been under? No one
knows. What damage has been done to his
brain? No one is for sure. But even now, years later, I am convinced
that Eric lives on in his Inner Side, living out heroic acts and savors the
praise and admiration of an entire world.
They say he is a vegetable to this day, and the arguments continue as to
whether or not his parents should pull the plug. I still visit him often. Every once and a while, I think he squeezes
my hand. They don’t believe me. They think Eric is oblivious to everything. It’s not true. That’s why I had to write this and let
everyone know why Eric did what he did.
He’s not oblivious. He’s not dead
inside.
He sees…he
knows…and he pities us all.
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