The tiny foil wrapper sat in Tom’s hand, smaller than a 500-shilling coin, smelling of dark cocoa and roasted peanuts.

“Just half, man,” Marvin whispered across the sticky plastic table at the Makerere guild canteen. “It’s not weed. It’s focus for pharmacology.”

Tom hesitated. He was twenty-one, three weeks from final exams, running on four hours of sleep. His phone buzzed—a mobile money transfer from his mother in Jinja: 20,000 shillings for textbooks. Study hard, my boy.

Marvin scored an A on mid-terms. Tom got a C-minus.

Tom let a tiny square melt under his tongue. Within twenty minutes, the brain fog dissolved. Chemical formulas read like simple sentences. He studied six hours straight.

By week three, half-squares became full bars. They were no longer just for studying; they were for getting out of bed.

Then came the tuition deadline: 450,000 shillings due in four days, or the university portal would block his exams. Under his mattress, Tom had that exact cash—scraped from his mother’s poultry farm savings. But he had no money left for the chocolate.

“I don’t have credit,” Marvin said outside the library. “But Kizza needs a delivery run to Kabalagala tonight.”

Everyone knew Kizza. He sat under the mango tree by the gate, selling laptops and connections.

“Baking supplies,” Marvin shrugged. “Two hours. Pays 200k. Covers your exam stash and leaves tuition intact.”

Tom found Kizza by the gate, a heavy black backpack at his feet.

“Two stops,” Kizza said, passing the bag. He held the strap firm. “Your mother brought you here in a hired Premio, remember? She told me, ‘Look after this one, he’s going to be a doctor.’”

“Pharmacy,” Tom corrected, his neck burning.

“Ah. The ones who mix the ingredients.” Kizza pulled a paper bag from his jacket, revealing wrapped cocoa squares. “Franco pays well. Last month, Junior took the bag to pay hall fees. He hasn’t been back to lectures since. Works for Franco full-time now. Makes more than a Ministry officer.” Kizza paused. “His mother thinks he’s in class every morning.”

Kizza let go. “Boda is waiting.”

Tom stood on the pavement.

In his right pocket: the envelope with 450,000 shillings—his mother’s hard-earned money. If he paid the bursar now, he stayed clean, but he’d face exams crashing hard, foggy-headed, and unprepared.

In his left pocket: the chocolate square and his phone. Taking the run meant 200,000 extra cash, top grades, and zero financial strain. All it required was delivering a bag he chose not to open for a network young men rarely left.

A boda-boda pulled up, idling in blue fumes. “Kabalagala?” the rider called out.

Tom reached into both pockets—one hand on his mother’s envelope, the other on the chocolate.

He took a step toward the bike.