Chemistry is good when you make love with it. Chemistry is bad when you make crack with it. (Adam Sandler)

“What about a business proposition?”

I waited.

“What if you… you know.”

“No, I don’t know. What if I what?”

“What if we worked together? You… you know, and I could be like your pimp.”

“Jesus!” I said it more as a “Jesus, just kill me now” rather than a blaming some higher power for Tommy’s stupidity.

“Okay, what if we were pimps together and we recruited girls to pimp out?”

“Oh my God,” I said as if each word were a sentence.

“Honey, pimping is where the money is! Do you know how much money they make? They get more than the girls.”

I took his chemistry book, walked over and whacked him on the head with it. He was an idiot. He didn’t know the first thing about making money. Pimping would take years to master: to get the clients, the girls, to learn how to do it well enough to make a killing, and don’t even start on the ethical conflicts. Okay, I was kidding about the last one but the legal implications were, well, maybe no worse than the legal implications of drug trafficking, but they were a concern nonetheless. I missed the days of the family business. Selling drugs was simple, easy, and God it was lucrative.

Tommy took his chemistry book in his hands and coddled it like a teddy bear. I think he was more hurt that he wasn’t going to be a pimp than he was about the whack to the head.

Then it hit me. It had been in front of my eyes the whole time: chemistry!