Page 89 of Forgotten Path
An instant later, Angela Green’s squad car sped into the parking lot, followed by the chief’s car and a van full of FDLE officers. Law enforcement officers streamed through the lot, shouting orders. Felicia took control of the scene, coordinating the action.
Bodhi slipped away from the group of townspeople and found a large flat rock on the periphery of the lot. He lowered himself to a cross-legged seat and watched the buzz of activity. After a bit, the lines of townspeople dispersed and drifted away in groups of twos and threes. Mirabelle Owens made her way over to him and perched on a nearby boulder.
“Strange little town, isn’t it?”
He gave the question some consideration. “I suppose.”
They fell silent. After a moment, he asked a question of his own. “Why did you join them?”
“What?”
“You don’t live here. You don’t work here. What possessed you to link arms with them and face down a danger that, on its most basic level, has nothing to do with you?”
She was quiet for so long that he thought she might not know why she’d done it.
But then she lifted her chin and said, “This part of the state is called the Forgotten Coast partly in jest, partly in a counterintuitive tourism campaign, but mostly because ithasbeen forgotten. Oyster Point, like the other little towns around here, has been left to fend for itself. I just wanted them to know that they aren’t alone.”
He nodded but said nothing.
She continued, “Of course, the truth is you and I and Detective Williams and the guys from the FDLE, we’ll all leave here and go back to our lives, and I guess they will be forgotten again.” Her shoulders slumped. “So I guess it was an empty gesture, in the end.”
“Maybe it doesn’t have to be.”
IV
May all beings be safe,
May they be healthy,
May they be happy,
May they be at ease.
A simple loving-kindness (metta) meditation
CHAPTERFORTY-SIX
Six weeks later
The Joel J. Ashland Community Clinic and Public Health Research Center
(formerly Wolfe’s Bed & Breakfast)
Oyster Point, Florida’s Forgotten Coast
Bodhi was scraping the rash on the inside of Craig’s right elbow to get a culture when Mirabelle breezed through the examination room with a basket of fresh scones.
“I see Mrs. Wolfe’s been busy,” he noted.
“Yes, she and Clara have just about finished setting up the free store.”
Mrs. Wolfe had donated her home to serve as a permanent clinic and research facility. She stayed on to serve as the facility manager, in part because, as she’d confessed to Bodhi, she couldn’t give up her library. It had been her idea to expand the monthly food bank into a grocery store where the community could “shop” for staples and other donated items that fit their menus, preferences, and needs.
The guest rooms had been converted to exam rooms, with a handful of bedrooms set aside to host the rotating cast of physicians and medical students rounded up by Mirabelle, Eliza Rollins, and their colleagues from the southeast medical examiners’ group to devote one week each month to treat patients. Thanks to their efforts, the clinic was staffed twelve hours a day, six days a week, every week, for appointments with after-hours and Sunday hours available for emergencies.
Craig cleared his throat. “I heard Fred pled guilty and agreed to testify against Chad.”
Bodhi nodded. “That’s good. The town needs closure.”
