The Credit Gamble
Impossible! Hand over the goods first? That violates my ironclad rule! What if something goes wrong and I never get paid? I can't exactly march into court and tell the bailiff, "Your Honor, this guy stiffed me on my merchandise—make him pay up!" Still, the idea was tempting. After all, my brother had started me off on credit too. I suddenly wondered what he'd seen in me. Was it just me? My value, my reliability, my expertise? I chuckled. So did that mean the 36.5-degree kids on our board had any value? Obviously not. They were good at one thing, though—spitting curses and throwing tantrums. My thoughts swung back and forth like Galileo's pendulum. Should I try it or not?
Truth was, I'd already whined to my brother about it, but over the past three months I'd moved a few grams here and there—mostly one or two at a time—to a handful of people. Always prepaid, of course, using our Skylight app. Alright, decision made. Let's give it a shot.
Typical—he wasn't a heavy user. The only people who answered right away were the same classmates who'd cursed me out before.
I sent the same message to about six people. There were a few more I could have tried, but I didn't want the abuse, and I wasn't about to deal with kindergarten or daycare teachers. Then Taxandcar actually replied.
Damn. He shut that down fast. My brother had said it himself—high return. Time to sweeten the deal.
That changed the game. Out of the six people I approached, three never showed and three actually came to the table. All three agreed on the spot. I sent each of them ten grams via courier. Better write this down so I don't forget:
— Taxandcar
— Guampeople
— busanman
A week later, I finally understood how convenience-store owners felt running their own lottery machines. Having people to help made the whole operation smoother. Only Guampeople managed to move all ten grams, but I'd found something more important—proof that the idea actually worked. I thanked Taxandcar and busanman for their trouble anyway. When I tallied the results of my little experiment, Guampeople had sold everything and wired me 1,200,000 won. Taxandcar and busanman had moved some as well and sent 600,000 and 120,000 won respectively. The two who still had stock asked what to do with the rest. I told them to keep it and sell it whenever they could, or just use it themselves. No point in me taking it back—the shipping costs would eat any profit. I left the door open: pay me when you remember. And with that, I wished them well and signed off.
On a bright afternoon I stood staring at a reservoir the exact color of the sky, standing beside my brother.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. How did they find out?"
"An anonymous tip."
"What? Who? Did they catch them?"
His eyes that day were something I'd never forget. I didn't ask anything else. We just watched the water together. After the meeting I went home and prepared another withdrawal, same as last time.
A few days later I received another real diamond and cut it. Looking at the curious faces of those high-school boys and the 36.5-degree residents of the Skylight board, I felt a strange pang of pity. Then I took another shipment on credit. While the good weather held, my sales game stayed sharp as a golfer obsessed with the range. One of those three risky proposals I'd made suddenly came back to me.
What did he mean by twice as much? That reckless confidence made me nervous. Still, I decided to trust him one more time. My brother had said it—high risk, high return. A week later, 2,400,000 won arrived from Guampeople.
After that I cut contact. Why? Because he'd moved the product so fast I had to ask how. No way a 36.6-degree newbie clears thirty grams in two or three weeks without serious connections.
My first "marriage" had ended in a broken engagement. If you go around bragging to everyone that you're in this business, you'll get caught eventually. And the worst part of his method was that it made enemies. Even friends get jealous when you do well—imagine how much worse it gets when you deliberately piss them off. One day they'll come back to bite you.
In the end, the results of my brother's quest were mixed: three attempts, fifty grams moved, and a small financial loss. Still, the method he'd shown me seemed effective—if it actually succeeded. After wrapping up the business side, I returned to my regular work on the board, feeling the normal body temperatures of ordinary people, when I remembered how to contact my brother again. I tried once more, hoping my classmates had the memory span of goldfish.
I posted the listing and the replies came flooding in immediately. Of course—my classmates again. And I realized they weren't goldfish after all.
At least one classmate treated me like a human being.
His temperature was strange. I wondered why some people ran so low. Time to gather information.
Here's the story: Candlelight was a cultivator. He ran vinyl greenhouses and had gotten hold of some seeds by chance. Even now, if you went to Andong you'd find farms still growing cannabis—sometimes a few plants slipped through poor management. He'd taken those, turned them into his crop, and for years had been growing small amounts and selling them raw. His volume had grown and his rating had climbed all the way to 36.8. Lately, though, every harvest kept getting returned. People said the taste was off. He couldn't bring himself to smoke his own product while trying to sell it, so he was stuck. On top of that, his real farming business had collapsed and left him in debt. So what did he do? He sold what he had and got reported. After a few returns his rating dropped 0.1 at a time; once the report hit, it crashed another 0.5 all at once. His regular buyers vanished, and even his steady customers stopped trusting him.
Was this guy asking me to buy or telling me not to? Either way, I'd succeeded in my mission—information acquired. Note to self: watch out for returns. A report is basically game over. Straight to the bottom.