Does the tooth fairy come for grown-ups?

I was at the dentist at 8.20 this morning, hoping to be the first emergency patient so as to get on with our school day without a late start, but another lady had beaten me to it. I had a bit of a wait, and when I went into the consulting room I could feel the dentist’s surprise at seeing me again so soon! He was relieved that there was nothing wrong with the tooth he’d worked on. I explained what had happened, and after a bit of prodding he found the cracked tooth, splitting it wide open with his probe. He administered an anaesthetic then sent me back to the waiting room for it to take effect while he saw the next patient. After a longish wait I was called back in, and he gave me another injection on the inside of the gum, then said he would just remove “the bit of broken tooth”. That turned out to be half the tooth – I was horrified when he showed me the big piece he’d removed! He looked at me askew when I asked for the piece to take home, which I wanted to show the boys (something interesting for ‘show and tell’). I was home by about 9.30, so we had a late start to our new term, but managed to get through the first part of the morning’s work quickly anyway, so by 11 am we were all caught up and finished by 12. School was fine, despite my numb face and not being able to read aloud very well. I had to sip my morning tea with a straw. The boys haven’t forgotten much over the holidays, and unfortunately they didn’t magically learn how to sit still during the holidays either.