‘We’re going to need a fresh speculum, nurse,’ he says. Then he looks at me and says, ‘Don’t worry, this one won’t be as far back in the mouth. We won’t have it locked open so wide this time. I’ll do what I can to minimise any discomfort.’

‘No.’

‘You have nothing to worry––’

‘I’ll come back another time,’ I say. ‘I promise I will.’

Tears roll down my face.

‘It’s not that––’

‘Please.’

‘You don’t need to worry, Tuva,’ says Julia. ‘The doctor won’t––’

I cry more.

‘Show me,’ I say. ‘Move the chair at least so I can see.’

Tobias shakes his head and then he picks up a hand mirror from next to the laptop. He wipes it with his sleeve and holds it up.

It takes a few moments for me to see what’s reflected back at me. Something on an identical sun lounger. Same striped cushion. Same duct tape.

My breathing quickens.

‘No, please.’

I tense at my taped arms. My hips twist left and right.

‘Oh, God. No.’

61

Emil’s lying out cold on the sun lounger behind me. His full moustache. His small frame. Some kind of liquid pooling under his body and collecting in the tarp sheet.

‘What have you done?’ I ask.

‘The best thing is if you can focus on the main––’

‘Help me!’ I scream.

‘We’re the ones who are here to help,’ says Julia, as she gazes admiringly at Tobias.

Tobias puts down the hand mirror and once again I can’t see behind me.

Don’t notice the paperclip. Do not see it.

‘Speculum, please, nurse.’

She moves closer with the plastic mouth retractor.

My old anaesthetic is wearing off more now. I can feel the pain rising up in my jaw.

‘No,’ I say. ‘Please, Julia. It’s enough now.’

Tobias skips through music on his phone. Chooses some kind of upbeat swing tune, and then he washes his gloved hands again in the washing up bowl.

‘This will be the most important procedure I have completed to date,’ he says.

Julia’s hands hover close to my mouth.

‘Open, please.’

‘No.’

Tobias says, ‘Open wide, please.’

They both loom over me. I can see the capillaries in the whites of his eye. The ice-cold blue around his pupil. A sty developing on his upper lid.

He holds his fingers out in a pincer shape and I open my mouth.

What they don’t know is that the tape around my right wrist is starting to tear. I am stuck down to this chair at every major body joint: head, shoulders, wrists, chest, hips, knees, ankles. But with one more flex of my right wrist I could free that hand. They don’t have that information. Now I have to figure out what I can do with just one hand.

Julia hands Tobias a new tray and says, ‘Doctor.’

He takes it.