Page 16 of The Potter

“Serena!”

The redhead who’s been my secretary for the last five years appears. “Yes, Dr. Potter?”

“What room again?”

Dealing with Ms. Belle has made me crazy. I would have never forgotten a room number in a matter of minutes.

“Room one, sir.”

I nod, noting how put together she looks with her sleek black pantsuit. Not at all like Ms. Belle with her ruffled houndstooth and messy hair thrown together in a braid over her shoulder.

“I’ll send in a nurse,” Serena adds as I turn around, already striding toward the hall where my first patient of the day awaits. Seeing patients now is a torture I never thought I would experience. Burnout tends to happen to surgeons after years of practice.

Losing patients, bad outcomes, and hopelessness will inevitably take its toll, but I never thought it would happen to me, not this early in my career.

But it wasn’t several patients and multiple outcomes that sent me spiraling into who I am today. It was one patient, one bad outcome that ruined my devotion to the craft. It triggered a wave of insecurity that I’ve never dealt with.

I amtheDr. Potter.

I perfected the imperfections that haunted my patients.

I gave them hope. Peace. And a fresh start.

And with one mistake, with one patient, I took the hope from all of them. Just ask Ms. Belle.

Standing outside room one, I take the folder from the plastic holder on the wall and scan it.

Carly Sims, a thirty-four-year-old single mother of two. She suffered third-degree burns to the left side of her face and body while shielding her son from flames as they escaped a small house fire. The boy suffered superficial burns that healed without treatment. She wasn’t so lucky.

She saved her son, and now, she needs me to save her.

A knot forms deep in my stomach as a wave of nausea sweeps over my body. I don’t want to enter this room and give the woman hope when I know I can’t deliver on my promises.

Like Ms. Belle, Ms. Sims has been on my schedule for months. Before I realized I couldn’t operate anymore. If I’m honest with myself, it wasn’t the lawsuit that changed things.

It washim.

It was looking her in the eyes, smiling and hopeful that I fixed an imperfection that plagued her husband. It was holding her in my arms as she beat her fists into my chest, wailing that I was a liar. It was when she finally tired and crumbled to the floor, her body curling into itself as she blamed me. Hated me.

It was the first time I’d failed.

The first time I had disappointed anyone.

It was the first time I lost a patient.

And it killed every bit of good inside me.

I was no longer a savior, but a killer.

And I’m stuck, hiding behind the monster and giving people like Ms. Sims false hope.

“Dr. Potter?” Autumn—her real name, not a nickname from Duke—pulls me from my thoughts. “You ready?”

I nod, giving the solid wood door a frown.

Just fake it. That’s all you need to do. Give Ms. Sims the hope and solutions she deserves.

“Yeah, I’m ready.”

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