Week after week, I sold out — all 100 bottles gone within hours.
Since the bottle caps weren’t twist-off, I personally opened each one.
With the precision of a bomb disposal technician, I’d gradually ease each cap off—holding the bottle low, distracting customers with cheerful small talk, and silently praying it didn’t detonate mid-sale (which did happen on occasion).
Then came this college-aged, shaggy-haired customer in a faded tie-dye shirt. He had that confident swagger of someone who’d never met a problem he couldn’t handle.
He insisted on opening his own.
I warned him — repeatedly.
But he wouldn’t listen. “Bro, I got this,” he assured me.
My stomach knotted as I reluctantly handed over what I knew was essentially a soda-bomb and muttered some clumsy instructions about pointing it away from his face. He sauntered off toward a side alley.
I got back to selling, but a sense of impending doom sat heavy in my chest.
Twenty or so minutes later, there he was, coming back.
Hair plastered to his forehead like seaweed.
Shirt clinging, drenched and dripping.
He kept shaking his head, and sputtering and spitting every few seconds. He looked like he’d just been in an epic battle with a garden hose — and lost.
I braced myself.
But his grin was absolutely undefeated.
“Dude, that was SICK!” he yelled through the crowd, pumping his fist in the air. “I popped it, shoved it in my mouth, and there were three gushers going at once: one from each nostril and one straight out of my mouth. That’s some serious rizz, bro.”
I didn’t know what “rizz” was, but somehow it all made sense.
