A tooth, and a silver spoon

Written for my Writing Group, when given the two random objects of a tooth, and a silver spoon.

The two words that always chilled me in news reports: 

human remains. 

It conjured up an image of mudded, dirty bones, or 

scuffed limbs: grazed, clotted with old blood, 

turned black on icy white skin. 

All that remained of a life.  

And now here I am with some - 

how did it come to this? 

It's burning a hole in my pocket, 

blooming with DNA, 

threatening to tell. 

He just wouldn't listen. That's what happened. 

The tooth, his tooth, 

is a sick talisman that I have kept about me at all times. 

It was one, crazy moment, one hideous little minute. 

He arrived for his appointment and I knew, just 

knew what he was going to say. 

Ten years in psychiatry can teach you a lot about people. 

The things they'll do. 

He was a patient, naturally, and naturally, 

we got closer. I ended it: 

how could we go on? Even he'd said it to me; 

I was married, I was a professional, I was upper class. 

I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth, he'd said. 

And what was he? A common fuck-up, 

who happened to move me in ways that my husband
couldn't even imagine. 

And now he threatened to tell said husband: 

showing up late at night, looming by our bins. 

I lost it in my office that day: I couldn't get rid of him, 

and I couldn't face the music. No-one must know about the affair.

And there it was. 

My award. Asset to the Community, 2009.
For the drop-in therapy clinics. 

It smashed through his mouth like an oar through water. 

I only meant to threaten him back, not kill him. 

But something about the hard resin of that iceberg-shaped award just...

obliterated him. 

I shoved him under my desk, and led 

three separate therapy sessions that afternoon, 

staying late to clear him up. Bound, gift-wrapped in bin-bags and tape, 

the entire office washed down in antiseptic. Gloves.
A washing line to tie the bundle. 

It's amazing how many devices one learns from
television detective shows. 

I drove out to the lake with Radio 3 lulling my busy brain. 

Some days have passed. It all went on as normal, until I found it. 

The tooth. The tooth I whacked out of him
with the force of my rage. 

Languishing under a pot plant on my desk and emanating
unseen DNA all over me, my room. 

I have to get rid of it. 

I must get rid of it, out of my pocket, out of this building, out of my life. 

Then everything will be ok.