The Island Doctor

Chapter 2

On a remote area near the Palawan island, there was a village that was separated from the main city by an ocean that could only be reached by boat for two hours. Thus, it can be concluded that the island is secluded but there is an ample amount of support from the local government. The residents of the said village have only one doctor who came to that place more than twenty years ago and settled there for good. When Doctor Joshua Moralez first arrived on the island when he was around thirty years old, he was dumbfounded to find out that the village had no hospital or clinic. With the help of some good residents and of his own money, he built a small clinic that helped them whenever they got sick. The doctor married a local beauty and fathered a child. Many people in the said village who saw the couple have seen how loving his wife was, but they were insinuating that the doctor did not seem to reciprocate her affection. Nonetheless, with his wife, he had lived a peaceful life on the island which made him forget the one person his heart truly loved. His daughter, Katerina Moralez, is a nineteen-year-old young woman who loves and adores her father a lot. She is pretty with light brown skin, beautiful brown eyes which she inherited from her father, and a well-shaped figure. Her mother died when she was a small child due to an illness. Her father did not marry again but dedicated his whole life to saving the residents of the village. The weather on the said island is not that hot or cold. It's like a paradise where one can find plentiful kinds of trees, beautiful flowers, rare plants, and the sea surrounding it is abundant with different species of fish. Most of the villagers were fishermen, while some were farmers who tilled the soil and produced products that they sold to a nearby town which is two hours away by boat. It may be considered a poor village, but the natural resources are abundant and enough for the residents to survive.

One afternoon, Luis Antonio, a fifty-eight-year-old man, with a massive build and broad shoulders, and an old friend of the doctor greeted the doctor as he passed by his house.

"Good morning doc! Are you going to the clinic now? The weather seemed difficult today, it might even rain..." he said.

"Yes, Luis! I want to check on my patients today. During this season, most children have the flu and it is better to treat them earlier so they will not infect others. How about you? Are you going to the sea today despite the weather conditions? I hope that the rain will not be strong enough to throw off your boat." the doctor said to his friend as he smiled at him.

Both men laughed, remembering how the boat was turned upside down while the two of them were fishing, but luckily they were both great swimmers, so they just laughed it off and considered it as an unforgettable experience. "Nonetheless, Luis, take care of yourself, okay? My daughter loves to eat fish, especially those that you gave us. "Goodbye then, my friend!" the doctor bowed his head and went to the small clinic. Waiting for him at the clinic was a young mother who was carrying her child in" her arms. "Good morning doc!" she said, looking at the handsome features of the doctor. "Good morning Martha! Is your son sick again? Let me check his temperature." The doctor took out the thermometer and scanned the forehead of the three-year-old boy and was glad that he only had a slight fever. "Martha, your son is okay, only he had a little fever." He opened one of the drawers, took out a bottle of medicine, and gave it to the young mother.

"Thank you doc! I hope you will stay here in the village for a long time. Without you, I don't know how we are going to survive if one of us gets sick," she said. "Doc, as a payment, please take this basket of fruits that I harvested together with my husband." she gave the basket to the doctor, which the latter readily accepted. "Thank you very much! If you want more help, just come and visit me." added the doctor, who was used to receiving baskets of fruits, vegetables, a live chicken, and fresh fish as payment for his service to the residents. He knows how poor the people were in the village, so he does not ask for money and only accepts what they can afford to give him. His daughter, on the other hand, supports her father and she always greets the residents with a happy smile whenever she sees them inside the clinic. At nineteen, Katerina finished high school in the nearby town and her father wanted her to continue her studies in the city, but she refused - she did not want to leave her father alone. Instead of leaving him, she taught herself to learn about medicine by reading the books that her father had and she even helped when there were lots of patients at the clinic. In the afternoon, the doctor went home for a while to eat lunch with his daughter. The clinic and his residence are not far from each other. Katerina cooked grilled fish with a green salad for him as a side dish.

"How's the clinic, father? Do you have lots of patients today?" the young woman asked while serving her father with the grilled fish. "Not a lot, dear! I treat children who have caught colds because of the changing weather conditions," the doctor replied.

"Hmm, father, are you going back to the clinic? It seems like the rain is going to start now. The clouds outside are dark, which only shows that the rain will start pouring any minute now..."

They hadn't finished eating their lunch yet when the rain finally touched the ground, water streaming out which came from the nearby mountains, keeping everyone in the village vigilant and ready to go to the evacuation areas if the rain continued until evening. The electricity went off but Katerina had already prepared candles to light their house. The village's electricity is run by generators which are sponsored by the local government in the nearby town, which can be reached in two hours by boat.

"Father, stay still, it is better not to go back to the clinic right now," the young woman advised her father, who was preparing himself to go. The doctor listened to his child and went to his room and lay on the bed while his daughter cleaned the dishes and afterward went to the room and slept beside her father.

It was almost seven in the evening when they heard a loud knock at the door. It was dark outside but the rain had already stopped and it was damped all over. "Doctor! Doctor! Please open the door!" a familiar voice was heard from outside.

Joshua went out of his room and opened the door and saw his friend Luis carrying a body upon his shoulder. The doctor immediately opened the door wide and let his friend inside. He checked the stranger's pulse and was glad to discover that he is alive.

"What happened, Luis?"

"When I was out fishing, I threw out my fishnet and pulled it over when I felt the heaviness of my net and thought that I had caught lots of fish, but I was shocked when I saw the body of a man trapped in it. It was raining hard and my boat almost capsized, doc, but I'm glad to have saved the life of this young man."(pointing at the stranger with tattered clothes, disheveled hair, and some bruises on his arms)

"Help me bring the young man to the clinic, Luis! It looks like he had lots of bruises all over his body and they are now violet. He also needs fever reducer medicine quickly! But first. Katerina, dear, please bring me some of my old clothes so I can change him." his daughter quickly followed her father's order then left them alone. Her heart had been beating so fast since she first laid her eyes on him. "What's wrong with me? Why do I feel nervous and my heart... is beating fast and I can not control it!"

Inside the clinic, the doctor checked the stranger thoroughly and found out that he had suffered some injuries but none of them were fatal.

After the stranger was left alone and on the bed, Katerina sat near him, looking directly at him, wondering who he was and why he was even on the ocean during the storm that passed the island. She noticed how long his lashes were, his perfectly straight nose and his skin was white, but he had bruises all over. "Who is this stranger? I hope he is not a bad person. He looks handsome even when he has his eyes closed and he is even tall and he has a nice figure," she said to herself while continuing to observe the stranger. "I have to go back home and cook dinner for me and my dad and perhaps I have to bring the food here to the clinic. I doubt that my father will leave his patient behind."

When his daughter went back to their house to cook their dinner, the doctor found out more about the stranger. He noticed that he had plenty of bruises all over his body, including his chest, his back, his thighs, even his arms, and legs suffered bruises. "He was beaten badly and he was lucky enough to survive. It will take a week or two before he will fully recover, but I will try to help him as a doctor, whoever he may be."

Katerina came back to the clinic and brought dinner for her and her father. They decide not to leave the stranger in the clinic until he wakes up. After putting some medication on the stranger, Katerina approached her father and asked about the condition of his patient. "Father, is he going to die? He looks so pale and he had bruises all over his body."

Her father smiled and replied, "No, dear! He will be fine in a week or two, so you had better be a good nurse to him, okay? Let us help him recover and later on we will ask him what has happened to him. It looks like he is from a wealthy family..."

The young woman smiled then blushed when she heard what the doctor said. "Katerina, dear, do you perhaps like that stranger? Your cheeks are reddening and you seemed nervous..."

"No father! You've been mistaken! I'm just worried about him. He could have been a victim of some cruel people and whoever did this to him deserves severe punishment. Am I right, father?"

Her father chuckled and nodded his head in agreement. He had never seen his daughter agitated in front of a man. He too had a strange feeling towards the patient. When he wakes up, he would like to ask him about his family and how he had come to the island and become a victim of violence.

Early in the morning the following day, Joshua checked the stranger's temperature and found out that he was doing fine. He looked for his daughter and found her in the small kitchen - cooking breakfast. The doctor built a small kitchen inside the clinic so that he could stay in his office if there were some untoward incidents that might happen. "Good morning, Kate! How's my dear doing today? Did you sleep well?" he asked his daughter as he approached to kiss her on the forehead, which he does regularly.

"I'm fine father! Please take a seat and enjoy breakfast with me." her daughter replied, smiling at her father.

Both sat down on the chair and started eating their meals when they heard someone coming in their direction. It was the stranger. He woke up and walked his way to the area where he heard voices of people talking. He was shocked to observe that he was in a small clinic and with people he had never seen in his whole life. The stranger knitted his brows and glared at the doctor and his daughter. "Who are you, people? Where am I?" he said, leaning on one of the chairs to support himself. He could not stand straight yet and he felt so weak that he almost fell.

The doctor looked at him and noticed something strange about the young man. His features are almost the same as the person who was his rival once, but more refined. His grey-green eyes, the color of his hair, the shape of his nose...he really looked like him! "Do you want to join us, sir?" he asked the stranger, ignoring what he had thought of him. "You need to eat to recover faster. I am a doctor and I will help you with your injuries. Kate, dear, please bring another plate for the visitor."

The young woman got up and placed a plate on the table and looked at the stranger who was still not moving from where he stood. "Please come and sit beside father. You may be hungry right now."

The stranger looked at the young woman from head to foot and frowned. He is not used to eating rice with dried fish and tomatoes along with fried eggs. "I don't eat food like that. Do you have at least one piece of toast bread so I could eat a sandwich? How about brewed coffee? If you don't have one, I'll just go back inside and sleep. I'm still weak..."

Katerina got up from her chair and replied, "We don't have toast bread here on the island. If you want, I'm going to the market later on and I'm buying one for you. What else do you want to eat, sir?" her question annoyed the stranger, but he kept his cool, understanding that he was in a different place and he was at the mercy of the two people he is now conversing with.

"I won't ask for anything, it looks like you could not afford it. Just looking at this place makes me believe that you live in a poor condition which I'm not used to", he told them bluntly, which made the doctor knit his brows and grit his teeth while his daughter bowed her head in agreement.

"I'm going back inside and, by the way, I will pay for everything that you are going to give me, including the rent in your house, the water, the food, and even the medicine I needed for the recovery, doctor. One last thing, please don't tell anyone that I'm here, they might come back again and this time, they might succeed in killing me... My dad will be left alone and I will not allow that..."

The stranger went back to his room and lay down on the bed. He knows the person that wanted him dead and he is planning to contact his dad later when he is fully recovered. He wanted the culprit to rot in jail and he wanted to get his revenge. "She will pay for this! How could she even try to dispose of me when she is not even a good stepmom. If my mother is alive, she will never have a chance to become my dad's wife. Oh, I hate her! I swear to tell dad about what she did towards me and she will be punished, for sure!" he was still contemplating what he would do once he got better when the doctor came inside and sat on the chair next to the bed.

"So, how are you now, sir? You have been beaten very badly and luckily you have survived and are now alive. You don't have to pay me for anything but just show me good manners in front of me and my daughter, okay?" the doctor said these words, emphasizing to the stranger how rude and cocky he was to the physician and he is not going to allow it.

"Well, doc, I'm sorry if I have offended you, but that is the truth. I will pay you back double for all the help you will give me, but please never tell anyone about me. I could have been declared dead by now by my family and my dad would be very lonely." his voice became weak and sad when he mentioned his father.

"I'm sorry to hear that, but be assured that no one will know your presence here. I will talk to my daughter about your request, which she heard a while ago, and also to Luis, who saved you and brought you here. By the way, I'm doctor Joshua Moralez, the only physician on this island. Do you mind if I ask your name, sir?"

"I'm sorry doc, but it is better that you don't know what my name is. Later on, I will tell you, but not now... About your friend, I will pay him too, doctor! He had saved me from death and he must be compensated well. When my strength returns, I will go back to my dad and detail to him what has happened and I will make sure that his wife will be punished for what she did!"

The doctor was surprised. He even thought that he had misheard the stranger, so he asked him. "You mean, the wife of your father did this violence to you?"

"Yes, doctor. She paid a bunch of men to kidnap and kill me in the end, but before the head of the group had the chance to stab me, I hurriedly jumped into the ocean and woke up here. Doc, please let me stay here for some time", begging the doctor.

Joshua got up and assured him not to worry and would keep the secret only for himself and would not tell anyone about it, even his daughter. "You can walk, right? You must get out of the clinic before some of the residents come here and notice you. I will tell my daughter to accompany you to our house. It's very near, only two houses away. My child will take care of you and be assured that she will help and assist you, sir!"

" Thank you, doc! Your daughter is pretty...are you not afraid to leave her alone with a stranger like me?

"You are still weak, sir! I don't think you can move around as swiftly as you want. My daughter knows how to protect herself and I don't think that you are a bad person either." the doctor smiled at the young man and went to his daughter to inform her about his plan of letting the stranger stay in their house.

Although it is quite difficult for the stranger to walk, he tried his best with the assistance of the doctor and they were successful in transferring him from the clinic to the doctor's house.

Before Joshua left, he told his daughter to ask what the stranger needed, but she did not need to come closer to him. His daughter chuckled and asked, "What do you mean by that, father?"

"Simple. Do not look straight into his eyes. I knew someone who had those eyes and a woman who fell deeply because of those and made somebody very unhappy..."

"I don't understand father..." the young woman said.

Her father kissed her on the forehead and hugged her. "My daughter is all grown up now, and I swear I will protect you with my life and I will never let anyone deceive you or hurt you..."

"Oh, father! No one is in my heart but you and I will never give it to anyone unless you will allow it, okay? Don't worry about the stranger, he does not like me, I'm sure of it." she grinned at her father and let go of him. "You better get going, father, it's late. Some patients could have been waiting for you right now."

The doctor left the young woman, who busied herself with the household chores. Afterward, she went to the nearby supermarket and bought chicken that she would cook for lunch. When Katerina came back, she went to the room where the stranger slept and saw the young man looking out of the window and when he turned around, their eyes met. Katerina immediately closed the door and went to the kitchen. "His eyes are so pretty...hmm...my heart keeps on beating faster..."

She did not notice that the stranger followed her to the kitchen and sat on one of the chairs and observed her every move. "Relax, miss. Don't be afraid, you are not my type," he grinned at her.

"You are not my type, either. I went into the room to check if you were still sleeping but I could see that you were not as you are here now, limping, but could still walk. I am going to prepare lunch, so please go back to the room and leave me here." she asked him politely, but he did not move but kept on staring at her.

"I'll stay here but I will not disturb you. Go on and do whatever you want. Just think that I'm not even here, okay, miss pretty?" he smiled at her again, confused about what the young man said.