Rise Then Fall - Part Two

We drove home listening to the radio, commenting scarcely, due to the THC, mostly. It

wasn't long after we got in that the doorbell rang.

“Hey S (Name again truncated to protect the guilty.). Come on in.”

We went into the dark, hazy basement. They made the deal.

“So, you guys want to smoke?”

“Aah, we just did. I'm all right.” C said.

“We can't really dip into this stash just yet, but there's half a blunt. If you want to dome

it, go ahead.

“I think I'm all right.”

We sat around in awkward silence for a few minutes before S picked up his phone. He

answered, talked for a few seconds, said something about leaving to go smoke, and said he

had to be off. I wasn't sorry to see him go. A good business resource, I decided, was all he

would be useful for...at best. A friend, definitely not.

“So now what?” C asked.

“Got any button bags?” I asked, facetiously.

“No, but we can go get some. How are my eyes?”

“Red.” I said.

“Hand me those eye drops, would you? It'd do you good to use some too.”

Another quick trip, this time, to a crafting store. We got button bags, and card stock,

the remaining supplies being at C's house. It felt like it took forever waiting for C's stoned ass

to look at all the interesting stuff, but in realty, it took just over an hour.

We got back to C's house, cleared the dinner table off, and laid out all the supplies.

The ounce in a gallon size bag, the scale, the Exacto knife, the card stock, a few black

sharpies, and the smaller bags, of course.

There was no conversation as to doing it all. Tomorrow was 420, the high holy day for

stoners. The demand would never be higher. If hitting it hard on 420 didn't work, the brand

idea could probably be safely scrapped all together.

We designed a logo together. We settled on “Achaz” and a stylized connecting A and

Z for the name and logo. Achaz means 'possessor'. It's a Greek name, or something like

that. It was fitting, short and different enough to be easy to remember. We used the knife and

card stock to make a stenciled logo, the Sharpie to put the small logo on the bags. We made

a second logo of the full word 'Achaz' and put it on the outside bag. Then, the scale let us

break the ounce into 28 one gram piles. Each gram filled a button bag satisfyingly, but the

process of making and filling the bags was slow and tedious. After all 28 bags were filled, I

again thanked C for all of his help. By this point, the hour was getting late, and C worked first

shift.

“I'll be heading along then.” I said, stuffing the 28 marked bags into the gallon bag and

stuffing the lot into a pants pocket.

“For the love of Christ, be careful.”

“Always am. You know me.”

The bus ride and walk home was nerve-wracking, but mercifully uneventful.

Some say fake it until you make it. Some think this is cliche, trite advice. I think it's

very accurate. That first day, 420, I wasn't a drug dealer. I was a scared white man holding

an ounce of cannabis, with the intent to sell. I had put the gallon bag with the button bags

inside a blue backpack, and threw some other stuff in there, to make it look like an overnight

bag. A pair of pants, a shirt, toothbrush, toothpaste, a bar of soap in a case, just to throw off

a casual search. The bud was just in the double bag, because I figured I had little hope of

throwing off a police search. A case or container of some description would only make life

harder for me, I figured. Dressed in a pair of plain blue jeans, a red button down, black tennis

shoes and black socks, I took the bus to the station.

I walked over to the 'smoker's outpost', this little metal and glass structure designed for

smokers. I pulled a dollar out of my wallet and asked:

“Who's got Newps for sale?” trying to procure a few Newport brand cigarettes. I don't

usually smoke, but I figured calming my nerves a little would help. A young black man with

sagging pants and a SouthPole shirt walked over and produced the necessary cylinders of

poison. I traded two for a dollar, took one, lit it and inhaled deeply. He turned to walk away,

and nervous as all hell I fired my tentative opening salvo.

“Hey.” I said.

“Yeah?” he asked.

“Looking for some bud? Got the real Achaz.” I said.

“Who the fuck is Achaz?” he inquired.

“Only the supplier for the best bud in town.”

“Lemme see.” he said.

I swung my bag down in the corner of the depot. My eyes started to water as the

smoke drifted up into my eyes, but I managed to see well enough to pull out and palm one of

the smaller bags.

We slapped palms to transfer the bag from hand to hand. He took a quick peek at it

and swore.

“Damn! This is some good looking bud.” Thinking quickly, I moved in for the kill.

“One for $20, three for $50.

“What the hell. It's 420. Let me get three.” he said, reaching for his wallet. We

inconspicuously made the swap.

“Good looking.” he said, obviously pleased.

“You know anyone else that's lookin?” I asked.

“Nah, but stick around here and you'll find people.”

“Yeah, today of all days.” I said.

We had a chuckle at that and passed our separate ways.

After that first devil of a sale, it just flowed. “420 special” of 3 grams for $50 worked

wonderfully. I quickly got into a pattern of leaving the bus stop when security came by, doing

a loop downtown, coming back in five minutes, selling for about half an hour...rinse and

repeat, if you will. By the time the sun was going down, my bag was empty and my wallet

was full. Not wanting to flash the cash, I resisted the impulse to count my money right there

and then, but instead took the bus home, walked inside and counted.