SKINCARE QUIZ: YOUR PERSONAL BEAUTY ROUTINE TO REPAIR DAMAGE FROM A TOXIC MEMORY

A Flash Fiction by Mandy Lange

First Place: 2025 Hermit Crab Prize

Photo by Hanna Postova on Unsplash

How Long Have You Been Experiencing Breakouts?

a) Since 14 when you decided Heathcliff was ‘sexy’

b) Since the Tuesday Robbie pressed another Long Island to your chest, and you drank it

Which Skin Type Are You?

Select all that apply.

Oily: Are you prone to whiteheads? How about white lies?

You lie to:

a) Your manager (about why you were late Wednesday morning)

b) Your Mum (about why you didn’t call back that week)

c) Your coworker Shaina (about hooking up with Robbie from Claims, who seems so nice)

Dry: Have you been called ‘flaky’? Does your skin itch at every social invitation?

You force yourself to attend:

a) The smutty book club Mum pesters you to join

b) Happy Hour at Slinky’s with Shaina

c) A grocery trip where the soup aisle becomes so constricting, you abandon your cart and flee

d) Nothing

Which excuse do you make about skipping Fun Friday?

a) You’re ill

b) You’re behind on Q3 reports

c) The sound of laughter makes you want to tear the cracked lips off your face

d) Robbie’s going

Sensitive: Does your skin (or nervous system) react irritably to seemingly normal sensations?

You freeze when you sense:

a) Hands on your shoulders

b) Robbie’s frostbite eyes

c) Tea-sweet bile slithering through your teeth

d) A hiss of breath in your ear

You flee when you see:

a) The stretched-out sweater at the bottom of your work bag

b) Your manager holding the elevator door for you like a pried-open jaw

c) Robbie’s smirk, a dimpled gash, as he hands coffee to Shaina

You fight when:

a) Mum texts you “Everything OK?”

Aging: Are you prone to early wrinkles?

At which point did your skin begin to wither?

a) the flicker of doubt when Robbie pilled you behind the bar

b) the grit-out murmur “Come on, be fun”

c) the rupture of threads on your sweater

d) the clench of fear in your stomach

e) the choke of the word please before the word stop

f) the splatter of vomit on tile

g) when only one pink line materializes on a plastic stick

You shake from:

a) Relief

b) The realization that you are completely alone

Combination: After reading these questions, do you feel:

a) Everything, deeply

b) Vacant

Your Skin Type Result: Combination

Follow these steps to treat your skin’s damage:

Step 1: Exfoliate

Use a dry brush. Scourge away the impurities, the feel of his fingernails, until the tissue wrapping your body is rage-red. If it hurts, revel in the fact that this pain is outside of you, and you can define it.

Step 2: Toner

To clean your skin thoroughly, douse yourself. Remain underwater until your lungs swell through your ribcage. Gulp air. (Note: Alcohol-based toner is discouraged: it will not produce the lasting glow you think it will.)

Step 3: Serum

Climb into your bed, build a cave of covers. Crawl to the depths. Slather yourself with what ifs, should haves, whys. Let them seep in and coat your guts until you uncover what’s missing, what was taken that you never gave. Do the unthinkable. Call Mum.

Step 4: Moisturizer

Cry. Weep. For fuck’s sake, stop pushing Mum away. (Note: even for oily types, apologies aren’t necessary, or even expected, by Mum.) Let her soft words soak in–she’s angry for you, not at you. Pat skin with your fuzziest blanket.

Step 5: Mask

Slither out of bed, slip on a hollow smile. Test it on your manager, the grocery store cashier, the therapist. Clean out your work bag and offer truth to Shaina, who knocks over your soup bowl when she leans to hug you. Swear off Heathcliff for good.

Peel off the mask like picking a webbed rind from a blister. Touch tougher skin that has grown underneath. Giggle at Mum’s lewd account of the male lead during book club. Let meaning resurface, and recognize that scabs and scars can never mar what’s beautiful about you.

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Author: Mandy Lange lives and writes in Michigan. She recently won the Writer’s Playground Ninth Short Story Competition. Her work has been published by The Washington Post and is forthcoming in The Keeping Room. When not writing, she’s chasing her children through the woods on their fixer-upper farm.

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