by Mitchell Galloway
Saturday morning, with her husband overseas, Mrs. Klein notices her Pond’s Vanishing Cream is missing from her powder room cabinet. Bad enough to have your husband in God knows what danger, but then to have your bathroom cabinet raided…
She sees its companion, the jar of Pond’s Cold Cream, on its side in the cabinet. It’s the cold cream that goes on nightly—face, shoulders, arms—but it’s the light touch of the vanishing cream that goes on by day. A light touch is all that’s needed, and it’s needed now.
She knows it’s her son who rifled through her cabinet. The boy, she calls him. When he’s not at school, he’s locked in his bunker of his at the end of the hall.
She walks the linoleum of the two-bed apartment, enters the kitchen, heats a pot of water on the stovetop. The only way to get the boy out of his room is to serve him Cream of Wheat with a scoop of Squirrel brand peanut butter.
As she waits for the pot to boil, she sees the magazine ad she put on her refrigerator before the war, a time when she thought they’d move out of this hole and buy a house. It’s an ad for Dupont’s nylon high-pile carpet, in grass green. A lady in a summer dress is lying on it, as in a meadow. Mrs. Klein stirs the Cream of Wheat and thinks of lying in a meadow with a Navy officer with a strong cleft chin. Has she ever seen a cleft chin outside of the movies? No, no, mister, I never did marry. She’d marry the chin and get an extra allotment check every month. Two checks and a backup husband. Pond’s galore.
She scoops a clump of peanut butter from its tin. The peanut butter sticks to her cooking spoon. Frustrated, she slings it with a quick motion of the wrist and is dealt a hot splash of Cream of Wheat.
“Jimmy!” she yells. “Breakfast!”
***
That night, before bed, she finds that her cold cream is now missing, but her vanishing cream has returned to its place in the cabinet. Half empty now, damn it all.
She remains calm. Tonight she’ll sleep without applying cold cream. Wrinkles—those pesky dry tension lines, the Pond’s ad calls them—don’t just form overnight.
She will sleep with the vanishing cream in her bed and the cold cream will be returned tomorrow, just as the vanishing cream was returned today. Tomorrow night she’ll sleep with both creams in her bed, if she must. There’s even the safe in the bedroom closet.
***
In the morning the cold cream is still missing.
It has been a week since she corresponded with her husband. His last letter said he was being deployed that day.
She begins to draft a letter.
Mick,
I miss you so. I hope you are safe. While you are fixing problems abroad, at home there’s a boy of thirteen (our Jimmy) who stole my cold cream. Also, before this incident, the vanishing cream went missing but has been returned. May you address this problem in a letter to your son? Be gentle yet not oblique. I’m afraid with you gone Jimmy is becoming more peculiar every day. I will draft another letter to you shortly but wanted to send this out immediately. Have yet to receive the allotment check for your deployment.
Yours,
Mrs. Klein
***
Monday morning and her cold cream is still missing.
With the boy off at school, she can look in his room. She’ll take back her cold cream and in this new letter she has promised her husband, she’ll write of her bravery during her “search and rescue mission.” He’ll get a kick.
But it’s not in the boy’s dresser or under his bed. Not under the clothes on the linoleum.
***
A week passes without her cold cream.
Three letters arrive. Two are addressed in her husband’s handwriting, one to her and one to Jimmy.
The other, she’s opening it now, is her monthly allotment. Well, well. She’ll just replace the cold cream.
She slides Jimmy’s letter under the door, then walks to the kitchen table to read the letter for her.
Mina,
I’ve inquired among the men about cold cream. Rust (his wife sells beauty products door-to-door for ends meet) tells me it’s for removing make-up. Is he wearing make-up? In my letter to Jimmy, I demanded he return the Pond’s. I told him all woman products should be given to you immediately, even if bought with grass mowing money. Of course, there’s also a chance he’s using it for something else entirely. Like a young soldier in training.
A sad note—word reached us that a man I felt kindly toward since meeting him at Basic Training died from an accidental stray bullet to the head. I have not been in direct combat but wanted you to know. Worse, I’ve heard his wife is an allotment Annie!
The Undying Kind of Love,
Mick
Something else entirely...she’ll draft a letter to Mick asking for an explanation. But this can wait, she thinks. She grabs her keys, goes down the elevator, hails a cab to Marshall Fields.
She asks the woman at the make-up counter if they carry Pond’s Cold Cream.
“We’re fresh out of it,” the woman says.
“I’ve got a situation. My skin’s just parched,” Mrs. Klein says.
“I stock up on my creams. I always have at least one unopened jar for each cream.”
“I have a teenage son, see. And it appears he’s got thirsty skin like his mother. My jar went missing a few weeks back.”
“Oh, I have boys myself,” the woman explains.
***
She enters the apartment empty-handed.
“Open your goddamn door!” yells Mrs. Klein.
No answer.
She charges the door. His bedroom is locked. She runs to the kitchen. From the cabinet under the sink, she pulls out a toolbox. From the toolbox, she grabs a screwdriver.
She jimmies open the door.
Her son is in bed, lying on his stomach.
He doesn’t move. His face is turned toward her. He’s wearing a big smile.
His arms, shoulders, and face are radiant.
______
Mitchell Galloway lives in Florida. His work has appeared recently in Forever Magazine, The Panacea Review, R&R (Relegation Books), and Subtropics. He can be found on Instagram @mitchellgalloways and on X @mitchgalloways.
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