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Doctor Billman

Robert Vilums

Doctor Billman

  (A True Story)

  Copyright 2013 Robert Vilums

  ###

  I took a bite of my dinner and noticed a sharp pain in one of my rear molars. I looked up at my mother and was about to complain, but then I came to my senses. "Am I nuts?" I said to myself. If I tell my mother about my toothache, I will surely be seeing Doctor Billman in the morning.

  I was seven years old at the time. The year was 1966. Doctor Billman was a dentist who had retired many years before. He continued to practice dentistry merely as a hobby. He only charged my mother twenty-five cents per filling. Being without dental insurance at the time, my parents took advantage of the opportunity. Little did they know the deep psychological damage and horrifying memories that occurred as a result of visits to Doctor Billman's office.

  His office was also his apartment, but there was a traditional looking waiting room including ten-year-old “Highlights” magazines scattered about. My brother and I loved the hidden picture page in “Highlights” magazines. Unfortunately, all the hidden pictures were already circled with crayon from years of previous victims. The treatment room was behind a typical doctor office door with thick, frosted glass. I will never forget the stenciled "Dr. Billman" on the glass. The glass was just thick enough to make out silhouettes of people moving about in the treatment room. I could just imagine the heinous carnage that was occurring behind the door.

  So the toothache only worsened, and I knew telling my mother about it was unavoidable. There were some fringe benefits of this however; my mother would rub Paregoric on my gums whenever I had a toothache. I always loved the way that it made me feel. I also began to enjoy its medicine-like flavor and even faked a few toothaches to have Paregoric rubbed on my gums. Later in life I learned that Paregoric is an opium extract, which explains a lot.

  The next day I found myself in front of Doctor Billman's office. His office was on the second floor of an old apartment building in the Westside of Columbus Ohio. My mother also brought along my older brother Erik so that he could have a checkup the same day. We walked up the creaky wooden steps to the office. There always was an eerie silence in that stairway. I never heard a peep from any neighbors. The only sounds were the rhythm of my mother’s hard soled shoes against the creaky wood stairs, and me and my brother’s “Keds” tennis shoes shuffling up the steps. My hands were becoming cold, and clammy from nervousness. Upon arriving, my brother and I went straight for the “Highlights” magazines on the floor to keep our minds off of our certain doom. While watching the silhouettes of people behind the treatment door, I saw one coming closer and closer. The doorknob turned, and my heart dropped. The door opened. Doctor Billman peeked his head out of the door. He then said in a stern voice, "Robert, your next." An elderly woman that was the patient before me walked out of the room holding the side of her obviously swollen face, tissues in hand. Was she wiping away tears or slobber? I couldn’t tell. She looked at me as I walked passed her with a concerned expression on her face. She looked at me as if to say “Run.. Run away as fast as you can!”

  I took a deep breath and stood at the frost glass door, keeping it open looking around for the best escape route. My brother looked up at me with great concern. I then heard him whistling "Taps" as I walked into the treatment room. Letting the door close behind me, I swore I heard it automatically lock.

  In the treatment room I could smell a medicine-like aroma mixed with the stench of cheap cigars. Doctor Billman was already next to the torture chair with a stub of an unlit cigar in his mouth. This was long before the time of rubber gloves and smoking restrictions. His smock had stains of victims from years gone by. The chair was a dingy green. There were two prongs sticking up from the back of the chair with small round pads for me to rest my head. I thought to myself that those pads must be for electric shock treatments of some sinister kind. I sat down in the chair and clenched the armrests as hard as I could. I asked him if he was going to give me something to numb my mouth. Doctor Billman replied "You don't need Novocain for baby teeth."

  He took out his assortment of pointy and sharp torture utensils and laid them out in front of me in plain view. He looked in my mouth and put his cigar stained fingers and thumbs into it. He then picked out the pointiest tool he could find and began to poke at the sore tooth and the blister on the gums around it. Judging from my reactions, there was obviously no reason to ask "Does that hurt?" He looked at my mother and informed her "Ma'am, it’s going to have to come out."

  I looked at my mother with tears in my eyes and in a small frail voice asked "What? He's going to pull it?"

  My mother tried to reassure me that everything was going to be all right. I tried to be brave. He then diligently searched for and pulled out the largest needle he had in his office. He held it up in front of my eyes. He pushed in on the plunger letting some of the medicine squirt out and run down over the syringe, and his fingers. The medicine then splattered on the apron he made me wear. As he did this, he wore a sinister smile which I will take to my grave. As I look back now, I swear he must have been having an orgasm of some sort fondling that ungodly large syringe. It was time for me to do something to save myself. I began to clench my mouth and lips as hard as I could. There was no way he was going to take my tooth and stick that needle in my mouth. He told me to "open up", but the only thing he could hear from me was a big fat negative "mmm..mmm."

  My mother walked around behind me, grabbed my head, and began to peel my lips apart so that he could put his enormous needle into my gums. I lost the struggle, and the needle went in. He twisted, turned, and grinded the needle in there. The sound of grinding of bones filled my inner ear. It seemed to last into eternity. He then waited a minute or two and then asked me to open my mouth again. He looked inside and asked if I felt numb. I exclaimed "NO!"

  He didn't believe me. He went to his drawer and started to scratch around in his tools looking for the most painful tooth-puller he could find. I could hear the tools clank around in the drawer like an old messy toolbox full of rusty wrenches. Suddenly the clanking stopped. Doctor Billman had a look on his face as if he had just found the Holy Grail. Out it came, the most hideous, intimidating pair of pliers I have ever seen. There was that orgasm look on his face again. This was a tool undoubtedly forged by Satan himself. It was time to open up again. Again I mumbled negatively, even louder "mmmmmm...mmmmmm!" I had a very determined look on my face this time.

  He looked at my mother and said in a stern voice. "Ma'am, you're going to have to help again."

  Meanwhile, Erik sat on the floor in the waiting room patiently waiting his turn and pondering his own impending demise. He began to hear screams of unimaginable pain coming from the treatment room. Erik had heard my screams many times before. He was very familiar with my screaming since he tortured me plenty, but none ever sounded quite like these blood-curdling noises that were emitting from behind the frost glass door. He noticed other patients hearing them too. They began to raise their eyebrows, drop their magazines, and make their way to the exit.

  Curiosity overtook Erik, and he cautiously headed toward the treatment room door to look inside to see what the heck was going on. Inside he saw Doctor Billman with his fingers in my mouth. Doctor Billman was in fact doing all the screaming as my teeth were sinking into his fingers with the ferociousness of a pit bull. My mother threatened me with the beating of my life. I unclenched my teeth and allowed his bloodied hand free. My mother promised Doctor Billman that I would not do that again. He pulled the tooth, threw it in the trash in disgust and began to yell at me in a strange language. These were not words with which I was familiar. It sounded English, but I've never heard those kinds of words before. Later in life I was able to finally make the translation.

  After that visi
t, I only saw Doctor Billman a couple more times and he was always not very happy to see me. The feeling was mutual.

  Some years later, on a sunny summer afternoon, my mother told me that Doctor Billman was run over by a city bus and killed. I then remembered myself blowing out some candles on a cake just a few months prior. I guess some birthday wishes do come true!

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  About the author:

  Robert Vilums was born in Central Ohio in 1959. He is 1st generation U.S. citizen of Eastern European immigrants that brought with them first hand experiences of the horrors of WWII. Robert was raised under a strict Catholic upbringing attending parochial schools as a child where he was tortured by nuns plenty! However, Robert found that his family strongly encouraged creativity and the arts throughout his upbringing. Robert studied music from the age of 4 until he graduated high school. He was a professional musician where he performed in clubs and venues across the Midwest and Southern California throughout most of his adult life. Robert also attended Ohio University where he studied Theater, and Mount San Jacinto College in Southern California where he studied Computer Networking. Robert has recently written the musical score for an independent film and continues to collaborate with entertainment industry professionals and a video production studio to offer creative and technical consultation in Southern California. Robert has now started to incorporate his creative talents to writing stories and screenplays using his own life experiences as a guide. You can reach Robert via email at [email protected].