By: Matthew Duan

My mom would tell me when I was in elementary school to not hang on to my baby teeth. During a time when almost all my baby teeth were coming off, especially during the 2nd and 3rd grades, this advice was meant to be helpful. She told me to just deal with the pain of pulling one out, or the baby tooth could come out unexpectedly and kill me in my sleep. I felt annoyed every time she would mention this, and to be honest, I still didn’t want to go through the torture of getting a tooth pulled out until something unexpected happened in 2nd grade.

It was a regular night, and I was about to sleep. I was biting on apples and watching Youtube and wiggling my loose tooth that was hanging on by a thread, feeling a bit bored and fidgety. I remember feeling a stinging pain when I bit the apple but thought nothing of it, being too lazy to do anything about it, and shook off the small stinging pain, wincing. I thought that I had somehow bit my gums or something, trying to convince myself that nothing was really happening v. I also didn’t care much about the bloody taste, as I had a bloody nose earlier today. I didn’t want to eat anymore after I had bitten onto my gums, and I threw the apple away. My mom told me to go to sleep, so I went to brush my teeth.

I slowly went to the bathroom carrying the computer while watching Minecraft. I rinsed my mouth with mouthwash, and spit it out, as I spit, I noticed that the mouthwash I had spit out was a shade of reddish pink. I quickly called for my mother, telling her to come quickly, saying it was an emergency. I had realized that my tooth had fallen earlier. After the realization, I felt panicked and I started crying, as I couldn’t get the nice five dollars I deserved. My mother told me to go to sleep, saying that the tooth fairy always knew when a tooth had fallen. I didn’t believe her and went to sleep solemnly.

The next day when I woke up, I had found a 20 dollar bill under my bed, with a note saying how brave I was. I felt proud, relieved that I still had gotten the money, and happy that the tooth fairy’s magical powers had known what had happened. I remembered feeling surprised and told my mom about it during breakfast. I had now known why my mom wanted me to pull off the tooth myself instead of making it come off naturally.