Page 50 of Chosen Path
Wendy stood up. “Well, I’m sure you’ll deal with him. Just like you dealt with Nik and Corrine, right?”
Ron rose to his feet. “Thanks for breakfast, Wendy,” he choked out. “I suppose we’ll see you folks at the church.” He pumped Greg’s hand and went to fetch his coat and Kimberly’s in a hurry.
Kimberly took her time folding her linen napkin into a precise square then placed it smack in the middle of her fruit salad juice so that Wendy would have no choice but to launder it. Then she pushed back her chair.
“Thanks for your hospitality, Wendy.”
She turned and fixed Greg with her fiercest look. He broke eye contact first. Ron returned with her coat and helped her into it.
“I’ll walk you folks out,” Greg said.
When Kimberly and Greg were standing out on the front stoop, Greg leaned in close to Kimberly and hissed, “You did this. Fix it.” Then he waved a cheerful goodbye to Ron and pulled the door shut with a loud bang.
CHAPTERTWENTY-FIVE
Scandia Bluff Medical Office and the residence of Molly Hart, M.D.
Fifteen minutes later
Hope yawned and reached for the coffee that Molly had brewed before she and Bodhi ran out the door for their gruesome field trip to the mortuary. They’d given her a brief explanation, but in her pre-caffeinated state most of it had bounced right off her. Something about examining Corrine’s body.
As fuzzy-headed as she was thanks to sleepiness (and, it must be admitted, wine), the thought of how she’d found Corrine cut through her brain fog. She sipped the hot coffee and sat up straighter. Finding Corrine had freaked her out yesterday for all the understandable reasons that discovering a dead body usually upset someone. But there was another reason, one that she simply couldn’t get past.
Don’t do this,she told herself.Remember how excited you were yesterday? Focus on the future, focus on the history center you’re going to start with Molly. Look forward, not back.
And yet, she stared down at the folder in her lap. It was her mother’s patient file. She’d seen it on Molly’s desk yesterday, along with the files for Nikolas Lundgren, George Alden, and everyone else who’d died in the past year. Well, everyone except Doc Larson, she amended. Molly had pulled the files of the patients who’d died for Bodhi’s review.
Put it back, Hope. Spend a few hours organizing the records, then go home and take a shower before the funeral service.The voice in her head was giving her sound advice. She knew that. But she also knew she was going to reject it.
She ran her palm over the folder’s black cover, then studied each letter that Doc had carefully printed on the tab in neat block letters, so different from the tiny cursive handwriting he used when writing patient notes. She could imagine him, hunched over his desk laboriously forming each letter with care and precision for his official file label:Laura Moss Gardener.
She smiled at the memory of Mom and Dad joking about a Gardener marrying Moss.
Do it, or don’t. But don’t spend a precious morning off work dithering.Mrs. Grant’s decision to close the library because so many patrons would be at the church and memorial luncheon was what finally tipped her over into action. It was as if the universe itself had cleared this path for her to go down.
She squared her shoulders and flipped the folder open. Each page of the thick file had been two-hole punched and threaded through the metal bracket set into the top of the hard cardboard folder. The top sheet was her mom’s death certificate. Molly had submitted the official form through the state’s electronic death registry but had printed out copies: one for the file; one for Kara to use as the executor of Mom’s estate; and one for Hope to use while making the arrangements for her burial.
Seeing the words in black and white made Hope’s breath catch in her chest.
MANNER OF DEATH: RESPIRATORY FAILURE
DUE TO (OR AS A CONSEQUENCE OF): UNDETERMINED NATURAL CAUSES
Her hand shook as she lifted the page to reveal the next sheet. It was the executed Advance Directive for Health Care.
She remembered the day she’d first learned her mom had chosen her to be her health care agent. Mom had popped into the library mid-morning four years ago. A clear, August morning. She’d been to Doc Larson for a checkup and had a hair appointment at Sheilia’s A Cut Above at one o’clock. Could she take Hope out to lunch beforehand?
Mrs. Grant shooed Hope out the door for some quality mother-daughter time. They decided to eat at an outdoor table on the patio at the Moose & Goose, mainly because it was right around the corner from the hair salon and Hope loved their asparagus and pepper soup with homemade bread. Mom was in a happy, almost giddy, mood. Hope assumed she must’ve gotten a clean bill of health from Doc Larson.
Birds sang in the trees. The late summer sun was pleasantly warm on Hope shoulders, but the air held a hint, just a whiff, of the shortening days and cool weather to come. A brilliant orange and black monarch butterfly fluttered around their table, finally perching in a sunny spot on the tan canvas umbrella that shaded the table.
Mom clapped her hands in delight. “Look, Hope. A monarch. It’s a sign.”
Her mom adored monarch butterflies and had maintained a wildflower and milkweed garden for decades for her winged friends. So, her joy wasn’t surprising, but Hope remembered being puzzled by the cryptic announcement.
“A sign of what?”
Mom’s smile faded. “Oh, I don’t know. Of something. Did you know that four generations of monarchs are born and die each year before the final generation is born—the ones who will migrate south and overwinter then fly back in the spring and lay the first generation of eggs for the next summer? It’s amazing.”
