Page 2 of Chosen Path
Bodhi King was cutting carrots in the community center’s cool, quiet kitchen. The sharp knife made a satisfyingchop, chop, chopas it thwacked through one carrot and then the next. Each careful slice of the knife through the firm orange flesh of the carrot was a chance to be mindful, to pay attention, to practice gratitude. He gave thanks for the hands that planted the seed, watered the soil, and weeded the garden; the sun and rain that coaxed the green curly shoots of the carrot top up from the ground; and, finally, the vegetable itself. This carrot would join the mound of parsnips, beets, and purple potatoes that sat in the metal bowl at his elbow and fill the bellies of the sangha, nourishing the members.
When the cutting board’s surface was covered, he lifted it and used the side of the knife to slide the bright orange rounds into the bowl. As the pieces tumbled into the pile of root vegetables, an unfamiliar male voice spoke from the doorway.
“Your knife skills give you away.” There was a hint of amusement in the words.
He blinked and turned toward the door, cocking his head to study the speaker. An older man, balding, with a thick pair of bushy white eyebrows. Medium height, stocky and solid. Piercing blue eyes studied Bodhi back from behind a pair of small, round, rimless glasses.
He didn’t recognize the man, but there were no strangers in the sangha. The word translated loosely as ‘community.’ But a sangha,thissangha, was more than that—it was family.
He smiled at the man, curious. “What does my knife handling tell you about me?”
The man stepped across the threshold and peered down into the bowl.
“You make confident, methodical cuts. There’s no hesitation. And those might be the most uniformly sized carrots I’ve ever seen. Some might say you wield that chef’s knife with surgical precision. That tells me you’re the man I’ve been looking for.” He extended his right hand. “Doctor King. I’m Doctor Alvin Kayser.”
Bodhi rested the knife on the wooden block and wiped his hands on the apron tied around his waist before shaking the doctor’s hand.
“Please, call me Bodhi, Doctor Kayser.”
“Only if you call me Al. Like the song.” The older man’s grip was firm.
“You’ve got a deal, Al. Are you in need of an assignment?” He cast his gaze around the kitchen in search of a task for the newcomer.
Al chuckled. “No, no. I’m in need of a forensic pathology consult.”
Bodhi’s eyes widened in surprise, then surprise gave way to faint puzzlement. “Oh? Did Saul tell you that you might find me here?”
Saul David, the county coroner, was an old friend. It was conceivable that he’d sent Al Kayser to the sangha. But if he had, he’d made a lucky guess. Bodhi hadn’t talked to Saul in quite a while. Too long, really.
“Saul? No, Sasha sent me.”
Bodhi’s puzzlement turned to bewilderment. “Sasha McCandless-Connelly?”
She was the only Sasha he knew. But it had been months since he’d seen the tiny lawyer and her husband, Leo.
“The one and only.”
“I wonder how she …?”
“Her twins go to school around the corner. She walks by this meditation center every weekday. She told me she sees your bike in the rack outside most Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I took a gamble—seeing as how you don’t have an office or a listed telephone number.”
“Can’t get anything by Sasha,” Bodhi observed. He sidestepped the unasked question about his lack of a public profile.
The doctor gave a wry, knowing chuckle. “That’s for sure. She takes after her grandmother.”
“Oh?”
“Sofia Alexandrov was a patient of mine for decades. That’s rarer than you might imagine. I’m a geriatrician. Most of my patients come to me after aging out of their primary care doctors’ practices. I’m the first stop on what’s usually a short, steep slide to … well, your speciality.”
“But not Sasha’s grandmother?”
“Heavens, no. Sofia was sharp as a tack and fit as a fiddle up until the very end. The weekend before she died, she finished the Sunday crossword in record time and placed third in a hula hoop contest.”
Bodhi smiled at Al’s obvious affection for his patient. “Any friend of Sasha’s grandmother is a friend of mine. Now what’s this about a forensic pathology consult? Do you have concerns about how one of your patients died?”
Al’s clear eyes clouded and his lower lip protruded. After a moment, he shook his head and sighed. “Not one—seven. And not my patients. A general practitioner in a small village way up in Vermont, near the Canadian border, has seen seven unexplained deaths in six months.”
Interest bloomed in Bodhi’s chest like a flower turning its face toward the sun. It was, perhaps, an unusual reaction to news of a spate of deaths. But he accepted it for what it was.
