Eliza's Smile Transformation Story

Eliza Dawson was sitting on the edge of the courtyard, a chipped thermos of tea propping up her elbow and a tattered paperback in her hands. She had taught herself by now how to fold away in silence, to be a shadow in a place that valued brightness. The girls at the other table across from her knew only how to shine in the fluorescents.
“Did you see her teeth?” Paige Lister whispered and did not even bother to lower her voice. ”A piano that fell down the stairs.”
Her friends laughed loudly and high. “It’s the lisp for me,” laughed Marcy. “It is as if someone’s standing on her tongue.”
“She sounds like she’s chewing marbles when she talks,” Paige said with a grin.
Eliza fixed her eyes on her book. It didn’t help. The sting settled low down in her side. The heat of shame rose on her neck, but she did not flinch. Not anymore. The cruelty no longer shocked her; it became a background noise – like the buzzing lights or the creak of rusted lockers.
She only had six months at Ridgewood High when the taunts welcomed her on the first day. Her mother’s illness, the move to Aunt Rose’s house in the next town, and the evening shifts Eliza worked to pay for expenses – none of which allowed for teenage drama. But that didn’t matter. In high school, the difference is a crime and Eliza’s teeth being the evidence.
Paige Lister, on the other hand, was a Ridgewood royalty. Captain in the girls’ soccer team. Yearbook editor. Her laughter bounced down the halls like a siren, bringing in her followers. Teachers loved her. Parents admired her. Girls wanted to be her. Boys were queueing to revolve around her.
Paige never saw Eliza ever – until there was something to mock at.
That Thursday afternoon, while Paige was running across the field during some soccer drills, she missed the stray ball bouncing off one of the posts. It flew exactly as she turned around to yell to her teammate.
The impact was immediate. The sound of the rubber smacking into bone. Then blood.
A scream rang out. Paige crumpled, clutching her face.
Coach Moreno ran in a short scream across the field with frozen teammates forming a ring around her. Paige’s hands were shiny and red. She could not feel her top lip. When she finally opened her mouth, she spoke in a distorted, thick, and incoherent voice. Panic bloomed in her chest.
In the hospital, the news was not good. Three teeth shattered. Several more loose. The oral surgeon, a grim figure in scrubs, told her she had a long recovery. Multiple surgeries. Temporary implants. Speech changes. Soft food diet. There was no soccer for the remaining part of the season.
When she returned to school two weeks later, her swollen mouth and the plastic retainer attracted stares. There was no one laughing, but this was worse. It was the silence, she realized, that could be very cutting.
She used to eat alone by the windows.
Meanwhile, Eliza’s world tilted quietly.
One evening after her cleaning job at Rose Dental Associates one evening, Aunt Rose hummed home with news on her face.
“Eliza, I reported you to Dr. Hamid,” – I told her. He had been in the hospital last night – emergency dental trauma. I told him of your teeth.”
Eliza blinked. “What did you say?”
“That you’re bright and hardworking. That you deserve a smile to your face. He wants to see you. Just a consultation.”
“We can’t afford that.”
He said that he was on it. Pro bono.”
Eliza’s breath caught. “You’re serious?”
Aunt Rose nodded. “You’ve been through enough. It’s about time for something to go your way.
On the following Tuesday, Eliza sat in the examination chair of the same office, this time only scrubbing the floor on weekends. Dr. Hamid was mild, gentle, and friendly.
“I will have to remove two molars and make you some braces,” he said. It will not be easy, but we can make it bearable. You picture a beautiful smile, Eliza”.
Her voice trembled. “We really can’t pay—”
“You don’t have to.”
She was lost as to what to tell her. Instead, her eyes welled. He gave her a tissue and then a future.
The months that came after were tough. There were mornings when Eliza woke up with her jaw aching so bad that she could shift her jaw a little, and the pain would spread to her eyes. Adjustments hurt. Wax peeled. However, every wire dragged her into a new thing.
She started smiling more. Just slightly, at first. Then, more openly. She found herself laughing in class. She even enrolled in the photography club of her school. And after a while –sotto voce – people started paying attention to her for some reason other than teeth.
At the same time, Paige’s way went backward. Everything that was done made her even more withdrawn. She then misses practice and then the prom committee. Her speech – addled with plastic and pain – was becoming an object of self-consciousness. Her friends drifted. She became the girl in the corner booth with a smoothie and a sullen look.
“Why me?” she whispered often. “What have I done wrong to have received this?
And then came graduation week.
Eliza had just taken her braces off several days ago. She looked at herself in the mirror every day, her fingers tracing the new smile. She had saved enough from her part-time job to purchase a second-hand cream dress and heels. Her mother, sick but dignified, had wept when she had seen her.
The day before the ceremony, Eliza returned to the dental office for the last time, carrying a tin with homemade cookies for Dr. Hamid and the hygienists.
As she waited, the doorbell jingled.
A girl entered the room with a long cardigan and a tired hunch back. Her lips were a little open to avoid touching the retainer behind them. The receptionist received her with a name.
“Paige Lister?”
Eliza turned, startled.
Paige looked back at her with some recognition. “Hi, do I know you?”
Eliza smiled gently. I believe that we are schoolmates. Ridgewood?”
“Oh… yeah, maybe. Sorry, you look familiar, but—”
I have changed a bit and look a bit different now. I had my braces taken off last week.
“Right,” Paige said, narrowing her eyes. “What year are you?”
“Senior,” Eliza replied. “I’ll be graduating tomorrow. You?”
Paige hesitated. “Same. Though I’m dreading it. My mouth’s still a mess. It’s awful.”
The nurse called Eliza’s name.
Standing up, Eliza gave a parting look over her shoulder. “Hey,” she said softly. “You’re not awful. You are just in the middle of something. It gets better.”
The door was clicked shut behind her.
Paige sat alone in the waiting room; something twisted in her chest. The girl… the voice. Was that Eliza Dawson? The same girl she used to mock in the cafeteria?
She looked at the tray of magazines not touched on the coffee table.
Funny, she thought. The only human being who’d been nice to her when she was down… was someone she hadn’t given the time of day—to be mean to.
And now she could not get her smile out of her mind.