Mr. Tartar

As I sat on an awkwardly reclined dentist's chair in the kiddie room, a trio plushies watched me from the windowsill. When I had checked in for my dentist's appointment that morning, I had been told that the system accidentally double-booked one of the rooms, so I'd be getting my annual check-up in the children's room instead. This was a big issue for me, not because of the brightly-coloured walls that threatened to burn my retinas, not due to the multitude of disturbing posters of kids showing off their pearly whites, not even due to the tiny chair and its tight armrests that dug at my sides. No, my problem was with those damn plushies. They were the reason I'd avoided the dentist for so many years while I was growing up.

I was about eight when it happened. Like any kid, I was scared of going to the dentist. Unlike my peers, however, it wasn't because of all the needles and the sharp instruments. I was terrified of the dentist's puppet, Mr. Tartar. The dentist used him to show children how to brush their teeth and floss properly. He was an eerie-looking stuffed giraffe with a full set of humanoid teeth - something straight out of the uncanny valley. His frozen, dead eyes stared at me as the dentist went about poking and prodding at my gums like they were pincushions. Don't get me started on that grin of his.