PSYRAW FLUX

The orthodontist’s office smells like burnt milk. She sits in the chair. He doesn’t ask her to open her mouth. She opens it anyway. He looks inside for a long time. Doesn’t touch, just looks. When he finally speaks, the words are in the wrong order. She understands anyway. “These aren’t yours.”

She is at home. The bathroom mirror is fogged. She hasn’t showered. She wipes it. In the mirror her mouth is closed. In reality her mouth is open. She tries to close it. It doesn’t close.

At the dinner table, someone sits across from her. Could be anyone. They are eating fish. The fish is looking at her. Its mouth is open. Inside: teeth.

The orthodontist is installing the braces. Metal against enamel. The sound is what drowning sounds like. Her mouth is full of his hands and water. He doesn’t notice. Each bracket a small anchor. She is sinking while sitting still.

The right incisor. She touches it with her tongue. Not loose, but moving. Like something swimming.

She bites an apple. The tooth flies out across the room. She picks it up. It’s not her tooth. Too small, wrong shape. She looks in the mirror. The gap in her smile. But in the mirror there is no gap. Her tooth is still there. She touches the space with her tongue. Empty. But in the mirror: full.

Someone sits across from her in a café, or her kitchen. They have her mouth. Not similar. The same. When they smile she feels it in her own jaw. They speak. “It’s deeper than teeth.” She tries to ask what that means. When she opens her mouth, water comes out. A thin stream. They don’t react.

She’s kissing someone, a man. Their teeth collide. The sound inside her skull: click. She pulls back. Tastes copper. His lip is bleeding, or hers. He looks at her like she did something wrong. The teeth just… the teeth have edges. That’s what teeth do.

His cock in her mouth. She’s trying to be careful. Lips over teeth. But her jaw aches. The braces cutting into her cheeks. Her teeth scrape. He flinches. There’s blood. She didn’t mean to. Or did she.

She spits into the sink. Pink. She looks in the mirror. Are they sharper, the canines especially. She runs her tongue over them. They cut her tongue. More blood. More salt. More ocean.

They’re in bed. She takes him in her mouth again. This time she’ll be careful. But the teeth have ideas. She feels them, sharp and ready. She bites. He screams. Puncture marks where her teeth wanted to be.

She wants to say sorry, but she’s not sorry. It felt right. The give of flesh. That’s what teeth do. The braces are teaching her to remember.

In the bathroom, spitting. A tooth. The right incisor. It came out because she bit. She picks it up. Blood on the root. His or hers. Both. She holds it to the light. The edge is serrated, like a knife.

She looks in the mirror. The gap, blood on her lips. She smiles. The smile is wrong. The smile knows something she doesn’t.

The water turns pink, then clear. But the taste remains. Salt, copper, him, her, something older. The ocean has been in her mouth the whole time, waiting to taste blood.

The other person opens their mouth. Inside: her teeth. But also scars. Old bite marks made by her teeth, or teeth that are now hers. The teeth remember every surface they’ve touched, every person they’ve tasted.

She wakes up. The braces are tighter. She hasn’t been to an appointment. They tighten themselves. Her teeth are moving. The pressure is a direction, but the direction is not spatial.

She’s spitting them into her hand. Small, white, too many to count. She lines them up on the counter. Every tooth identical. Every tooth wrong. She looks in the mirror. Her mouth still full.

The other person’s apartment. In bed. The light is wrong, too blue, like underwater. They open their mouth. She looks inside and sees her own face looking back. They close their mouth. She feels it close inside her own mouth.

The orthodontist again. He says, “Open.” She opens. “Wider. All the way.” He reaches in. His whole arm, down her throat. There’s room. He pulls something out. Wet, moving. “See?” She doesn’t see. He puts it back in. When he pulls his hand out it’s empty.

They’re eating, she and the other person. The food is white, small pieces. She doesn’t ask what it is. She knows. The texture is familiar. Hard outside, soft inside. She stops chewing. They don’t stop. They smile at her with her teeth. She smiles back with their teeth.

The pressure. Not the braces anymore. The braces are gone, or were never there. The pressure is from inside. Her teeth want to leave, or something else wants to enter. The teeth are the gateway. The teeth are the bars.

She’s in bed, or in water. Both. She opens her mouth. Water rushes in, or out. She can breathe it. She’s been breathing it the whole time. The braces were just teaching her how.

She’s standing in front of the mirror, mouth open. How far down does it go. She can’t see the back of her throat. Only darkness and movement. Something swimming. She reaches in. Her finger touches something cold and smooth. Not tongue, not tooth. Something else. She reaches further. Her whole hand in her mouth now. The inside of her mouth is larger than the outside. She pulls her hand out, wet. Looks in the mirror again. Her mouth is closed. She didn’t close it.

They’re facing each other. No table between them. They open their mouth. She opens her mouth. The distance stops existing. Their mouth and her mouth are the same mouth. Her teeth in their mouth, their teeth in her mouth. Whose teeth.

They both bite at the same time. Into each other, or into something else.

She’s in the chair. The orthodontist removes the braces, one bracket at a time. The pressure remains.

She is at home, or somewhere that used to be home. She opens her mouth in the mirror. Wider. Wider. All the way. And sees?