One year. Today marked the one year anniversary of the opening of my clinic. And after a few stops and starts, what a great year it had been! Even my father, stingy with praise as he could be, had to admit that I'd pulled it off. Not only had I managed to finish dental school, following in his footsteps and those of his father before him, but I'd formed a successful practice and shown that I could manage the business side of things, as well as the medical.
It hadn't been an easy sell at first - in fact, I'd had to mortgage against my own future, when it became clear that my family wouldn't support me in my venture. See, it was an easy decision for me to decide to be a dentist, even though my father assumed I'd aspire to nothing more than a wife. All the years that he saw me as nothing more than just a pretty daughter, I'd aspired to prove to him that I could carry on the family tradition.
But I also had a rebellious streak, and that rubbed the family the wrong way. They would easily have put their money behind me if I'd decided to marry myself off to a handsome lawyer or doctor - or even if I'd taken over my dad's practice when he retired. But setting up my own clinic, with modern ideas? That was just too much.
See, for years, I'd developed my own ideas about how things should and could be done. I'd watched my father's patients arrive for their appointments. As beloved as he was in our town, his patients still dreaded their visits to the dentist. As good a doctor as he was, he still didn't bring in the same income, the same respect, as the general practitioners, the orthopedists, the surgeons.
My clinic would change all that. I would take advantage of the most recent technologies, cater to the urges of each group of patients, until I'd built up a solid clientele, a steady stream of referrals. As I walked into work this morning, I looked up at the sign on the door, "Grin and Bear It," and chuckled as I remembered the day I'd come up with that.
It was an acknowledgement that going to the dentist probably didn't sound like fun, but that with a smile, my staff and I would do our best to make it as enjoyable as possible. Stuffed toy bears for the kids. Friendly, professional customer service for the adults. Flat screen TVs mounted on the ceiling above each chair, with ESPN for the guys, soaps for the women, and cartoons for the kids.
And, in an extra attempt to woo guys in the 21-49 demographic - the population most likely to ignore the health of their teeth and gums - I'd made a special effort to hire hygenists of a certain body type and outfit them appropriately. Don't get me wrong, there wasn't anything indecent taking place in my clinic, and the women and kids didn't seem to pay particular attention. But let's just say that guys did seem to make a habit of showing up for their follow up appointments once they'd met my girls.
I didn't need to mention physical appearance in the job ads, and I didn't discriminate based on things like height or hair color. Fortunately for me, there are enough qualified hygenists out there, most of them young and female, that it wasn't hard to hire a staff which was made up of beautiful young women eager and capable of filling out the uniforms I'd chosen. And once they arrived for their interview and saw that I was also a woman, they didn't think twice about taking the job - no worries about being chased around a desk by a dirty old dentist.
The uniforms came in white or baby blue, and were basically a button-down cotton dress, carefully fitted to each hygenist. The top was low-cut, hugging the breasts and showing off the cleavage of each young woman. The skirt came to rest at just above the knee, perfectly decent, but prone to riding up the thigh when sitting down. My receptionist had a uniform of sorts as well, asked to always wear fitted short suit skirts and pumps, and either a fitted blouse or a clingy sweater.
Being in charge, of course, I could wear whatever I liked - but I tended to stick with a wardrobe that I knew would appeal. If in surgery or working with a child, I could always button up my lab coat. But if checking in on a 30-something male patient - or female for that matter - I knew that an attractive doctor would make a positive impression.
Today, for example, I was wearing an impeccably fitted black suit, with a silk blouse in red which was cut just low enough to give a hint of cleavage. A matching red headband held back my long blonde hair, and a pearl necklace completed the professional ensemble.
But I should get to the focus of the day - unfortunately, after the successful year, with profits skyrocketing, I was worried that I had a problem employee. It had been brought to my attention by the receptionist that one of my hygenists, Heidi, had seen the same patient twice in the past week, and he would be returning again today.
Apparently, while waiting for a crown, he'd had a temporary which had fallen out not once, not twice, but now three times. Heidi's work was normally quite good, so I suspected one of two things - either the patient was deliberately chewing on things he shouldn't in order to get another chance to see Heidi, or she was intentionally doing sub-par work so he'd be obligated to return. Either way, this wasn't something I could allow to continue.
After making my rounds through the clinic, saying good morning to everyone, and pouring myself some coffee, I made my way to my office, where I sat down to peruse two files - that of the patient, a 42-year-old named Jeff, and Heidi's employee file. There was nothing about Jeff to suggest he had many dental issues in the past, and there was nothing about Heidi except the highest praise from her previous employer.
She was 21 when she started working for me, just turned 22 in the past month. She was an 'A' student, graduated from her hygenist training program at the top of her class, and was an excellent employee. She was also my favorite of the 'hot hygenists', as I called my team, in that she filled out her uniform spectacularly, and was a hit with the patients, but wasn't at all self-conscious about her appearance. She just came to work and did her job.
Well, I thought to myself, maybe there wasn't anything fishy here after all. There was one thing I'd learned from my dad, though, and that was to never be too careful when trusting one's professional livelihood to one's employees. So, in designing my clinic with care, I'd set up hidden cameras in each of the exam rooms. To date, I'd seen nothing but young women with ample bosoms pressed against patients, working away on a stubborn bit of plaque or demonstrating the proper way to floss. But for today, it'd be a subtle way for me to check up on a questionable situation.
When the time for Jeff's appointment arrived, I turned on the TV in my office and flipped through the closed-circuit channels until I had a view into Heidi's room. For a few minutes, she was the lone figure in the room, and it looked as though she was laying out her implements just as she should be for the appointment. Before long, I watched as she left, and then returned just moments later with Jeff, closing the door behind them and motioning for him to sit down.
For a time, the video was quite dull, especially as there was no sound, and my attention began to wander to other work that was awaiting me on my desk. As I checked back now and then to the TV screen, I saw Jeff open his mouth wide, pointing to the tooth in question, then saw Heidi begin to work.
It wasn't until a few minutes later that something out of the ordinary pulled my attention immediately back in to the video. Jeff reached up a hand and quickly squeezed one of Heidi's breasts through the thin fabric of her uniform. She smiled, pulling her hand away from his mouth and placing the tool she had been using back on the tray next to her.
Her hands now went to the top of her uniform, which she slowly began unbuttoning while Jeff watched. I was shocked at her behavior, but something kept me from leaping up to march down the hall and confront her, curious as I was to see what would happen next. Once her uniform was unbuttoned down to the waist, Jeff's hands began exploring Heidi's breasts, massaging them as he continued to lay back in the exam room chair.
