Ezekiel Kingsbury, Editor-In-Chief

Every day unfurls with the same monotonous routine. I trudge through my classes, loiter with my cronies, devour a dull dinner, and then, under the cloak of darkness, liberate two plain creamed cheeseses from the clutches of Commons. They are the central ingredients to my solitary solace: my sourdough bread egg concoction the following morning. But last week, the shadow of intrigue darkened my daily caper—the Philadelphia Original plain cream cheese vanished. The strawberry remains near the original’s old home, a pitiable substitute. You need honey for a good sourdough bread egg concoction, and honey and strawberry cream cheese clash with my constitution. 

Every couple of days, in the same place the plain cream cheese once was, by the bagels and panini press and toaster, there is white stuff collected into little discs piled on top of each other. Seems like what would happen if somebody squeezed the plain cream cheese out of the little packets. It tastes as it looks, a mimicry of the plain cream cheese’s essence, but lacking the necessary pre-packaged feel and transportation ability. Fact: The plain cream cheese, but not the strawberry cream cheese, is being squeezed out every couple of days. But why? 

“Cream cheese packages that haven’t been opened can be used for up to two to three weeks past their best-by date,” Chelsea Quinlan Edwards, oracle of nutrition and owner of Huntsville Nutrition Collective LLC, says. “Once opened, it’s best to use cream cheese within ten days.” Opening cream cheese accelerates its spoilage. This means that whatever threat Commons faces regarding the plain cream cheese is larger than the operational cost, and waste, of potentially unused cream cheese. Theory A emerges: somebody caught onto my thievery and wanted to put a stop to it (unfortunately, no man can prevent the squeezed creamed cheese from finding its way into a plastic sandwich bag). But Sam Shea’25 spins Theory B: the plain cream cheese is expired, and a clandestine force squeezes it out to mask this inconvenient truth. 

Unfortunately for Shea, when I nabbed a plain cream cheese from Hamilton’s—the sole campus outpost still carrying the little pre-packaged delights—and inspected it very closely, there was no expiration date on the pouch. Theory B crumbled like some feta, and so did Shea.

I had to get more information, so I queried Common’s clientele concerning their consensus on this perplexing plain cream cheese predicament. 

“… where’s the blueberry?” Alex Cambouris’27 asked and while I disagreed with his lack of focus, I couldn’t agree more that “the strawberry kind of sucks.”

“It looks like a pile of curdled [REDACTED]” Ella Diers’24 whispered to me while we stood over the stuff. 

As for Sophia Nitsche’25: “I am so hungry.”

To get to the bottom of this and settle these weary students’ souls, I went straight to the top: Scott Zoellick, general manager of Bon Appétit at Beloit College. We met in the President’s Lounge outside of Commons, with former president Scott Bierman’s disgusting caricature of a portrait leering over us all the while. It was as if the crude drawing of the old man was mocking me. 

“Mind sharing what you know about the disappearance of the Philadelphia Original plain cream cheese, boss?” I asked, my tone as sharp as a switchblade. 

Zoellick, leaning back in his chair, exhaled a cloud of uncertainty before responding. “Great question. No idea. Some guesses: it should be bulk cream cheese regardless, maybe we got the wrong kind in… Sometimes employees will do something on their own.”

“A rogue?” I asked. He nodded.

The room hung in suspense, like the pause before the raindrop drip, drip, drips off the rain gutter onto the cement. I pressed further, aiming to unveil the motives behind the cream cheese caper. “Is this a response to some sort of cream cheese bandit?” I probed. 

Zoellick’s eyes, hidden behind shadows, betrayed a glimpse of unease. “Theft has been more noticeable recently. Things have been walking away. We’re tryin’ to work on that—workin’ with the College.”

The cryptic admission hung in the air, a smokescreen concealing a deeper truth. I wasn’t satisfied; I needed to pierce through the fog and expose the secrets of cream cheese larceny. “Care elaboratin’ on that?”

Zoellick’s response, delivered with a poker face that rivaled the stoic expressions of seasoned detectives, revealed only a void: “No.” 

I swear, I could hear the sweet lilt of the former president’s voice jeering at me from his spot on the eastern wall. Was I being driven mad? Or was I onto something bigger than I ever could have imagined?

The following day, hidden under the moonlight-kissed C-Haus porch, I met junior Eric Seo’25, who shared a chilling tale. Walking out of Commons with a bagel, he was told by the staff that “Bagels are never to-go.” He responded, “Do you want me to throw this away right now?” They held out a trash can, as if waste was preferable to thievery. 

So take this story as a warning, dear readers: perhaps the pre-packaged plain cream cheese disappearance has nothing to do with the pilfering of Commons by starving students, and perhaps the new unpackaged cream cheese is not covering nare-do-welling… but students BEWARE! This gumshoe has learned a harsh lesson: burglars and bandits of Commons must now slink even deeper into the shadows. 

And just like that, this college’s creamy secrets remain shrouded in mystery, as this detective trudges into the night, leaving behind the world to grapple with this enigma on its lonesome.