71
HUA GU QUAN (The Flower Drum Circle)
Xiao-wu learned what it was to be the “No-blesse Oblige” case—a poor kid recipient of room and board at an elite school of one per-centers. He didn’t want Todd to know any of this.
Luckily, Todd didn’t care about Xiao-wu’s answer. “Diabolus in Animo infected all the plants in the world. Like some sort of evolved defense against picking and eating. Made people funny. Hear things; do things. But it’s not a problem anymore! I overheard my mom talking to her execs about excep-tions and testing D.I.A. free and all that blah blah crap. Plus, my brother’s been selling s**t out of the lab for years as a side hustle. He’s such a scammer. Ph.D Botanist moon-lighting as a peddler. Anyway, I told him he had to give me a few or I’d tell Mom. He might be 99th p
