Page 100 of Stuck with Doctor Grump

I slipped the clover into my wallet next to the daisy.

Then I reached into my bag, pulled out a white envelope, and left it inside the locker.

For the next young surgeon.

They’d find it when they needed it. Or maybe they wouldn’t. But I needed to leave something behind—not advice from a pedestal, but truth from the trenches.

Don’t let the work become your identity. Let it be your gift—not your cage.

Remember to rest. To listen. To fall in love with something outside the OR.

And when you forget—because you will—start again. That’s the only real rule.

I closed the locker slowly, the click of the latch sounding louder than it should’ve.

That was it.

No parade. No final case. No clapping hands or dramatic speeches.

Just a man who came here chasing a calling—and was leaving because he’d found something even more sacred.

Peace.

I walked out the back exit and into the late afternoon sun, slinging my duffel over my shoulder. Ruby’s letter sat on the dashboard of my truck, folded and reread a dozen times. The paper had softened at the edges, but the words still hit like they had the first time:

You taught me love isn’t a thunderstorm—it’s the garden that blooms after.

I ran my fingers over the daisy next to it. The pressed petals were delicate, brittle now, but still beautiful. Still intact.

Just like us.

I turned the key and let the engine purr to life, then pulled out of the hospital lot without looking back.

I didn’t need to.

That chapter was closed.

As the highway unrolled ahead, the tension that had once lived permanently between my shoulders began to ease. My breath deepened. I adjusted the rearview mirror, not to see behind me—but to make room for what came next.

I didn’t know what would happen with Ruby’s proposal. Or with the community hub we dreamed of building.

But I knew one thing with certainty:

I wasn’t chasing a title anymore.

I was following a feeling. One that smelled like lavender and sounded like laughter in the garden.

One that waited for me in Cedar Springs.

I reached over and touched the edge of her letter again, the corner lifting in the breeze from the cracked window.

“I’m coming home,” I whispered.

And this time, I meant it with every beat of my heart.

The city receded behind me in the rearview mirror, but before I could officially call it done, I had one more stop to make.

Brandon’s clinic sat tucked between a faded laundromat and a mural-covered bookstore on the corner of 7th and Hill. Nothing about it screamed “modern medicine.” There were no motion-activated doors or polished marble floors—just peeling brick, a hand-painted sign, and the smell of antiseptic mixed with the faint scent of takeout.

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