His right cheek was free of band-aids now and lined with a meaty white scar. There was still a bit of pink where the wound hadn’t completely healed, but he couldn’t make himself wait any longer. He’d just been sitting around thinking about it for days. He knew more about mathematics than he ever had before. He tongued at his cheek. There were a dozen hairs growing on the inside. When the wound healed it healed with hair follicles in the pink interior of his mouth and they had begun growing hairs that made the lining of his cheek itch. He tongued at the centimeter-long hairs as he stepped from his car, and then slammed the door shut. He had become aware of the hair growing in his mouth six days ago, but on the drive over it had become an obsession, despite what he was doing here this morning. He reached into his mouth with his left hand and grabbed one of them between his thumb and index finger – pinching it against the pad of the finger with the thumbnail – and yanked.
