There was nothing to do but leave. Beth’s head was really throbbing now, and the anesthetic was wearing off enough that she was starting to feel spasms of agony from individual points in her gums where old teeth had been pulled out and the silver posts had been jammed in. She kept a bottle of Tylenol in her purse, but she’d already taken two doses and the acetaminophen did not seem to be working, so before heading home, they stopped by the offices of Beth’s regular GP, Dr. Panjee. It was getting late and she didn’t have an appointment, and the way things were going, neither of them would have been surprised had the doctor and his staff told her to go to the emergency room of the hospital. But she looked pathetic and needy enough to rouse their sympathy, and the office manager was able to fit her in before a late patient arrived.
Dr. Panjee was appalled by what had happened, but after a careful examination, he had to admit that technically the dentist had done a good job. He applied a topical clotting agent to her gums to stem the bleeding, and gave Beth a prescription for some heavy-duty medication that he said would numb the pain and not interfere too much with ordinary day-to-day living. He told them to have the prescription filled tomorrow, and gave her several samples of another painkiller for the evening. That was quite a bit stronger and would knock her out for most of the night.
“Thank God,” Beth said.
“You’re going to be okay,” Dr. Panjee reassured her.
“Yeah. Except for my silver teeth.”
By the time they got home, it was not yet five, and after making sure Beth was comfortably ensconced in the couch in front of the television, Hunt took her insurance card and immediately headed for the phone. Their DentaPlus Plan was part of the larger HealthPlus, a company with headquarters on the West Coast. That meant they were still open, and he dialed the customer service number on the back of the card.
“I hate dealing with those insurance company people,” he told her.
“Who doesn’t?” She paused. “Give ‘em hell.”
“Oh, I will. I will.”
After an uncharacteristically short wait, he was rescued from the endless loop of the automated phone system by a flesh-and-blood customer service rep. “Hello, DentaPlus. How may I help you?”
“Hello,” Hunt said curtly. “To whom am I speaking?”
“My name’s Tim,” replied the young man at the other end of the line.
“Listen, Tim. My name’s Hunt Jackson. My wife Beth called this number three weeks ago to find the name of a dentist in our area that is part of our HMO and would take her insurance—”
“Could I have the group number and member number off her insurance card?”
“No,” Hunt snapped. “I’ll give you that information afterward. First, you’re going to sit there and listen while I tell you what happened.”
“Sir—”
“Listen! She went to this dentist, Dr. Blackburn, and I know it sounds crazy but he yanked out all her teeth and replaced them with silver dentures or caps or whatever they’re called. Fake teeth. Now her mouth’s all swollen and bloody and she has these silver teeth that she didn’t even agree to. Basically, she was drugged and mutilated. Now the dentist’s disappeared. I want some information on this guy, and I want some satisfaction. You recommended him, so obviously he’s part of your HMO, and I want him taken out of there. I want him prosecuted and disbarred—or whatever they do to dentists.”
There’d been no response on the other end of the line, no acknowledgment of understanding or even a courtesy “Uh-huh.” Only silence. Hunt didn’t like that. He wasn’t sure if Tim was still there, but he kept talking anyway.
“I also expect you not to pay him for this travesty of a procedure that was done to my wife and to find someone to fix it. I don’t care what you have to do or how you have to do it, but she’d better have normal-looking teeth again instead of the metal mouth that monster gave her.”
“These are serious accusations. I’ll need your wife’s name, and the group number and member number off her card.”
“Her name is Beth Jackson. J-A-C-K-S-O-N. The group number is 44135. Her member number is A476B3588.”
“Can you tell me the time of the visit?” Hunt heard the man’s voice slide upward into a twangy Southern accent and suddenly felt cold. “That’s okay,” he said. “I know.” Hunt heard the tapping of computer keys. “Half past a monkey’s ass, a quarter to his ba-wuls.”
Hunt hung up quickly, filled with a wild rush of unexplainable fear. Everything that had happened suddenly seemed a lot less random, a lot more interconnected.
“What is it?” Beth asked. “What happened?”
His heart was still pounding, but he immediately called back. He expected to get a normal customer service rep after going through the automated phone system, a person on the line to whom he could logically and comfortingly make his complaint. But the same man answered on the first ring, and before Hunt could even get a word out, he was shouting. “I told you not to call me here! Stop harassing me!”
“I’m—” Hunt began, flustered.
The man laughed. “Moron,” he said. “Half-wit.”
“Get me your supervisor,” Hunt ordered.
“No.”
“What?”
“I know what you look like when you’re taking a shit,” the man said nastily. “There’s a photo in the file of you wiping your ass!”
Anger, white-hot and pure, blew away any leftover shred of fear. “I want to speak to your supervisor right now!” Hunt demanded. “I’m not going to put up with—”
“I’m sorry. We’re closed.” There was a click and a dial tone.
Hunt tried to call back, but three times in a row, the line was busy. Finally, it rang, but a recording stated: “Our office is closed. Hours are eight A.M. to five P.M. Pacific time. Please call again.”
He hung up the phone and stared for a moment out the living room window at the house across the street. A photo of him wiping his ass. It was such a bizarre thing to bring up, a strange thing even to think. He knew the man was just trying to get to him, just trying to rattle his cage, and he didn’t believe it, but…
On an impulse, he reached for the white pages next to the telephone. He turned to the Hs and flipped through the tissue-thin pages until he found what he was looking for.
Berths medication was already starting to take effect. “What’s going on?” she asked groggily.
“They’re closed.”
“So what are we going to do now?”
“We’re going to the HealthPlus offices here in Tucson. We’ll confront them in person.”
“Now?”
“Tomorrow,” he said.
She leaned back in the couch and closed her eyes. “Good,” she said. “I’m too tired today.”
The HealthPlus offices were not in a downtown high-rise as he’d expected but in a single-story pink stucco building located between an art gallery and a resort on Ina Road. They pulled up next to a green curb in front of the building where stenciled letters read: 20 MINUTE PARKING.
“It better not take us any longer than that,” Hunt said. “And if it does and we get a ticket, they’re paying for it. We wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for their incompetence.”
Beth took his hand and tried to smile. “I like that attitude. Go get ‘em, tiger.”
The sprawling structure had several entrances, and they followed a sign with an arrow to a wing marked ADMINISTRATION. Hunt demanded to see whoever was in charge—CEO, president, district manager, whatever they had—but the secretary at the front desk pawned them off on a man named Ted Peary who was identified to them as the HealthPlus “Customer Liaison.” Hunt made short work of him, and they moved up the ladder to Bill Chocek, head of the Customer Services division, before being transferred to Vice President Kenley Cansdale’s office.
Luckily, Beth’s lips were still swollen, the gums above her silver teeth raw and red, and it made everyone very uncomfortable to face her while discussing her problem. They all kept passing
the buck upward until finally the two of them were in a boardroom, meeting with a group of upper-echelon managers headed by HealthPlus’s Southwest Regional Director, Ryan Fielding. Hunt and Beth stood at the foot of a very long cherrywood table and explained for the fifth time what had happened, emphasizing that the psycho dentist had been recommended by someone at the insurance company and was a member of the DentaPlus network.
“Now, I know you’re in a position to make decisions,” Hunt said, “and I want that dentist found and punished.”
“And I want my teeth fixed,” Beth told them.
“Well, it’s not our policy to second-guess the opinions of our highly qualified doctors and dentists,” Fielding explained. Around him, the other men nodded.
Beth slammed a fist down on the table. “What?”
“We trust the experts in regard to specific procedures and treatments. We do not make medical or dental decisions. Those we leave up to the doctors and dentists.”
“Look at my teeth!” she cried.
“It is not our fault that you’re dissatisfied with the results of your dental work.”
“ ‘Dissatisfied with the results’?” Hunt shook his head incredulously. “Are you blind?”
“I’m a freak!” Beth screamed at them.
Mr. Fielding nodded sincerely. “I understand. And we’ll do everything in our power to rectify the unfortunate outcome of this misunderstanding. But I must reinforce the fact that we have done nothing wrong. I’m not implying that you’re litigious people or that you have any hidden agenda, but our agreeing to pay for a new procedure, in essence paying for the same procedure twice, in no way implies that we are in any way liable or responsible for mistakes that may or may not have been made by your original dentist.”
Hunt took her hand. “Then you will pay for her teeth to be fixed?”
“Of course.”
“What about Dr. Blackburn?”
“There will be an investigation, and if it is determined that he acted unethically or illegally, as you suggest, then he will be dealt with in the appropriate manner.”
“ ‘Dealt with.’ That’s kind of vague.”
“He will face disciplinary action from a peer review board. If the offense is grievous enough, he will lose his license, and, if warranted, criminal charges may be filed against him. I trust that you will find that satisfactory?”
Of course it wasn’t, but what did they expect? The past could not be undone, and the best they could hope for was that the problem be remedied.
There was no graceful way for them to exit. If they said thank you, it implied that they had been granted a favor, that they were in the board’s debt. If they showed no gratitude but simply acquiesced to Fielding’s proposal, they were effectively cutting off the possibility of any future legal action. If they turned the director down, the insurance company would not pay to fix Beth’s teeth. It was damned if they did, damned if they didn’t.
“Fine,” Hunt said tersely, and still holding Beth’s hand, the two of them walked out of the boardroom, back through the corridors and out of the building to where their car waited in its twenty-minute space with a parking ticket fluttering on its windshield.
2
The man who stood in the doorway of Joel’s office was of average height and build, with the forgettable features of a career bureaucrat, but the fact that he suddenly just appeared out of nowhere caused Joel to start. He regained his composure almost immediately, however, and looked at the stranger with what he hoped was an expression of authority. “Hello. May I help you?”
“May I help you?” the man said, and walked uninvited into the office. “I was wondering if you had a chance to look over the information I provided regarding employment insurance.”
Was this a joke? It had to be, but the man was not one of his students, indeed did not look like a student at all, and there was about him an air of experienced professionalism that led Joel to take him seriously. “I thought that was a prank by one of my students,” he said.
The man looked offended. “You thought our employment insurance was a prank?” He shook his head in annoyed disbelief. “If you had bothered to read the provided information, you would have learned that this new and innovative coverage was created in order to provide career security in this highly unstable work environment, a security that every American was once able to count upon but that has become increasingly scarce in our current economy.”
Joel still found it hard to believe that this was real, but the man’s earnest demeanor seemed to indicate that it was. “I have tenure,” he said, going along. “I wouldn’t have any use for such insurance.”
“Perhaps you have other insurance needs that I would be able to help you with.”
“I’m sorry,” Joel said.
“Come on. I know you’re not happy with your automobile insurance. You’re with UAI, correct?”
Joel grew suspicious. “How do you know that?”
“A good insurance agent gets to know the needs of his clients,” the man said. “That’s the only way to effectively provide the type of tailored coverage that suits your individual needs. Now, if I may be so bold as to make a suggestion—”
Behind the insurance salesman, a shaven-headed kid in dark baggy clothes had walked up and was milling around the corridor outside of the office. Luis Monteros. A sullen gang-banger who sat in the back of his Tuesday/Thursday class and was headed straight for the probation list, Luis was ordinarily the last person Joel would want to see on his office hour. But right now he was a savior, and Joel motioned him in, grateful to have an excuse to kick out the insurance agent.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but I have a student conference right now. Why don’t you just leave your card, and I’ll get back to you.”
The expression on the man’s face was cold and hard, and for a brief, wild second Joel was actually afraid of him. The agent seemed filled with an irrational hostility toward Joel and more than capable of doing something about it. Then the moment passed, and with the plastic smile of the practiced salesman, the man took out a card and handed it over.
QUALITY INSURANCE, the card read.
A phone number was listed, but that was it, and Joel was about to ask the man his name, when Luis pushed his way into the office. The agent slipped back out into the corridor. It suddenly seemed important that Joel find out who the agent was. “Who should I ask for if I call?” he shouted.
The agent smiled, waved.
And was gone.
3
Beth refused to look at herself in the mirror as she fixed her hair. She brushed it intuitively, by rote, doing everything she could to avoid looking at her mouth.
It was possible to forget for brief periods of time that she had metal teeth, particularly when she was around Hunt or her friends. But such respites were short-lived. Any deviation from the routine of her daily life, even so small a detour as a simple trip to the store, turned out to be a horrific disaster. She felt like Quasimodo, a monster among men, an object of gossip and ridicule, and she was acutely conscious of the stares—and the avoidance.
The swelling in her lips had gone down and the pain in her gums had settled into a low-level discomfort, but according to Dr. Mirza, her new oral surgeon, it would be at least another month or two before she had healed sufficiently for him to extract the silver teeth and replace them with more realistic-looking enamel facsimiles.
As it turned out, they were having to pay a good deal out-of-pocket for the upcoming operation. The insurance company was willing to cover only the cost of a procedure equal to or less than the original. As if anticipating that this would occur, Dr. Blackburn had charged a ridiculously low amount for the first removal and replacement, and Dr. Mirza’s estimate could not come close to that price. She and Hunt were still fighting DentaPlus on this, but they both knew that the result was a foregone conclusion, and they’d resigned themselves to making up the difference. Once all appeals had been exhausted, she suggested that they sue, and Hun
t thought that was a good idea, too. At the very least, a lawsuit might encourage the company to settle and pay up what they owed rather than risk the bad publicity.
She finished combing her hair and quickly put on some lipstick. She had to look at her mouth for that, and while she chose a color that would de-emphasize her lips and applied it carefully, she still did so as fast as possible. Grabbing her purse, she walked out of the bedroom, shouted out a quick good-bye to Courtney, then locked up the house and walked out to her car, preparing to leave for work.
It was early in the morning, most people were inside their homes getting ready for work or already gone and on their way, but next door Ed Brett was hosing off his Lexus while his youngest boy sat on the curb, throwing gravel into the street.
Beth was on pretty good terms with most of her neighbors. The family on the right had been there since the subdivision had been developed, and they had welcomed her to the neighborhood by throwing a party shortly after she moved in so that she could meet some of the people on the street. They weren’t friends, but they were friendly, and she fed their dog when they were away on vacation. They watered her plants and watched out for her place when she was gone. The two old Molokan sisters across the street often stopped by to chat while she was pulling weeds or trimming her plants in the front yard, and at least every other weekend, she went over to their house for tea. The young man in the house next to them, a mechanic who spent most of his spare time working on a motorcycle in his garage, was always nice to her, although they’d never socialized.
But she had never liked the neighbors on her left, the Bretts. They’d moved in about a year ago, buying the house from Tom and Jan Kraal, who’d been her closest friends on the block and who had moved to Tarzana, California, when Tom’s company had transferred him. She’d tried at first to make friends with them. Everyone on the street had. But Sally Brett was a harried housewife who seldom left the confines of her home, and her husband Ed was a rude and belligerent boor who soon alienated most of the people on the block. Their two sons were spoiled brats with a powerful sense of entitlement.
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