Madrona Falls used to be a nothing town. Now it has a farmers market with a waitlist and property values nobody who's lived there longer than a decade can explain. Somewhere in the middle of all that sits Stone & Fern, a dispensary that's been here longer than most of the people complaining about it.
I'm Roz Stone. I run the place with my business partner, Berny Fern, which the name might have already given away. Berny handles the parts of this job that involve caring about people's feelings. I handle the parts that involve being right. It works out most weeks.
People bring us their problems. Not always cannabis problems, though those come up plenty: mislabeled jars, mixed-up strains, a customer convinced of everything they've read online. Sometimes it's smaller than that. Sometimes it's stranger. Berny thinks every one of them deserves getting to the bottom of. I think most of them have an obvious explanation if anyone bothered to look. We're both right often enough that we keep doing this.
This is where I write it down. Short, true-ish accounts of what actually happens behind the counter at a dispensary in a town that can't decide what it wants to be yet. Nobody asked me to keep notes. I do it anyway. Old habit.
New case every issue. Come back and find out what broke this time.
Old Pete finds a jar so purple it convinces him he's struck gold, certain purple means stronger. Berny tries to explain the science. Pete isn't buying it, not entirely, and not for the first time. Roz just wants him to stop holding jars up to the window.
Read MoreBerny finds a jar so sticky it's basically hugging the glass, and she's convinced something's wrong with it. Roz knows exactly what's going on, but explaining it turns into more of a hands-on demonstration than either of them planned for.
Read MoreA man walks in with a nose he trusts more than the label on the jar, and forty years of "practice" to back it up. Roland's already talked three customers out of perfectly good purchases before Roz even gets her coffee. Old Pete has one question, and it's not about the weed.
Read MoreA customer strolls in demanding something "high in turpentine." Old Pete nopes out on the spot. Roz gets dragged in against her will. Berny's the only one who can save this conversation, but not before the guy defends his logic with total, unearned confidence.
Read MoreOld Pete has a theory about why he raids the cracker aisle every single shift. Berny has a better one, and it involves his brain doing something behind his back. Roz just wants everyone to stop dropping crumbs on her desk.
Read MoreA woman walks in holding a single gummy like it might detonate, demanding someone talk her out of eating it, or into it, she hasn't decided. Berny offers patience. Roz offers the truth, whether anyone wants it or not. There's no magic number that'll save her from herself, just a slow wait and a phone that won't stop buzzing.
Read MoreOld Pete finds a forgotten jar in the back of the shop and declares it a casualty of time. Roz isn't so sure that's the right diagnosis. What follows is a quiet disagreement about the difference between expired and just old, and a museum-worthy discovery neither of them can agree on how to feel about.
Read MoreGary wants a higher THC number. Berny wants him to trust his nose instead. Roz just wants to be left alone with her coin. Only one of them is going to walk away satisfied, and it isn't the guy holding the jar.
Read MoreA new customer at Stone & Fern is convinced his order got swapped, and he's not leaving without an explanation. Roz has her own theory. Berny has a different one. Somewhere between the two of them lies the truth about what actually happened to the jar.
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