Celia

37 Punish Me. Now.

Celia

I strut towards Gio's truck after class, sending him a quick text.

"The guy from last night is coming with me. Please, sir, don't lose thy shit."

Gio lowers his head to read my message, then glares at me, getting out of his car.

"Gio, this is Patrick, my classmate..." I say with a sheepish smile. Please, don't murder him. "Patrick, this is Gio, my boyfriend."

Gio quietly stares at my skinny, blonde-haired classmate for what feels like eternity.

Patrick nervously chuckles. "Sorry, man." He offers a handshake. "Celia explained you two are dating, I didn't mean any disrespect last night. We're just friends."

Gio raises his brow then gives me a subtle scowl as if to say 'you couldn't do better than this?' Such a drama queen.

"Don't sweat it, Patrick." I smirk at Gio. "Anger looks good on him."

Patrick awkwardly laughs while Gio sighs, crossing his arms. 

"Pst." I glance to Pat. "Ey. Get to the point."

"Oh!" Patrick pulls out his phone and opens his Instagram story from last night.

It's a boomerang video of my masterpiece.

A white, pocked-sized bible with carved out pages, leaving a hollow square. Inside are three thin glasses of our products— sativa, indicate, hybrid. The text 'Holy Bible' switched to 'Holy Trinity.'

My dad would be so proud.

"People want it. I've been getting nonstop requests. Asking where I got it from, what's your contact info, how they can order some." Pat smiles with money eyes. "I told Cel you should go legal. Make a brand out of it before someone steals the idea and makes a buck out of it."

Gio's laughs humorlessly. "You think I want to run an official weed business?"

"Gio, listen," I say. "We can either sell for another year and panic every day about getting caught or we can start a warehouse in a town that permits it and get a license. The answer is obvious."

He opens his mouth then closes it, taking another deep breath. "It was nice to meet you, thanks for the suggestion." He shakes Pat's hand.

"No problem, man. Hey, take my business card," Pat pulls out a black card from his wallet. "I'm a licensed distributor. If you go legal, I'd love to work with you."

I wave bye to Patrick. No hug. He seems to be on the same page. Wonderful, I've always wanted a human-sized repellant.

"You didn't have to be so rude," I pout on our way home. "I worked really hard on this opportunity. You better not get on his bad side!"

"I don't need a stranger to tell me what to do," Gio drawls, keeping his eyes on the road. "It's none of his business."

"It is his business," I laugh. "He's a distributor. He wants to distribute original, popular products. He was being nice! He could've just sold the idea to one of his many, respectful connections."

He rolls his eyes. "I'm not going to run an official grow house."

"Why? Because it's a dishonorable business? You and I both know that's an ignorant excuse, the amount of evidence contradicting it is suffocating!" I lean closer and point at him. "This is about something else."

"Yeah? What's it about."

"It's about you being afraid."

"No," he says slowly. "You don't say."