everyone sees the rot; no one will name it
the nightmare’s Teddy Schacht wouldn’t even look at, saying he was late for his next appointment, everyone Hal saw seeing Hal’s crumbling teeth and looking at their watch and making vague excuses
Context
The dream stages the theme's collusion mechanic: a whole social circle registers the disintegration and every last one of them silently declines to name it, the dentist himself refusing even to look, everyone checking a watch and excusing himself. The catastrophe is perfectly visible and perfectly unspoken — an open secret held open by everyone's agreement not to confront it, the exact arrangement that will let Hal's real habit run unchecked.