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Isagani’s leg was bouncing as he sat in the waiting room.
He chewed on his lower lip. The clock hanging on the wall was tick, tick, ticking away and every movement of the second hand made him hyperaware of the beating of his heart. He considered for a moment that perhaps he should get that checked by a doctor while he was here. He ran one hand through his hair and placed the other on his knee to try and calm it down. Why was he so nervous about this?
“Daddy,” rang in his ears, causing him to tear his gaze away from the clock. “It’s just a check-up. No need to worry! I’m all healthy and stuff, see!” The girl next to him puffed out her cheeks and began jumping around the small room to prove her point, which successfully pulled a chuckle out of him. Isagani reached out for her waist, making her yelp as she was pulled onto his lap. “Alright, alright. Calm down, I’m sorry for being worried.”
“Hmph,” she huffed. She scrambled off his lap and looked him in the eye. “Good. You should be sorry.”
Isagani tilted his head. “What has your mother been teaching you?”
She blinked up at him innocently. “That I’m a princess?”
“Oh, are you now?”
“Uh-huh!” she exclaimed. “I don’t wanna be a princess though, I wanna be a knight!”
He chuckled. “You can be a knight if you sit back down, Laura.” She scrutinized him, looked him down head to toe, before humming her consent to this agreement. She plopped down on the seat next to him and took his significantly bigger hand in hers and began to fiddle with his fingers. “You have to knight me when we get home though,” she told him. “So it’s all official and stuff.”
“Of course,” he grinned back at her.
Beaming and nodding at him excitedly, she was contented enough with his answer to stay mostly quiet for the rest of the wait.
“Florentino,” a nurse called out.
Isagani stood up, his daughter’s hand still in his. When they walked up to the nurse’s desk, she was giddy from excitement. He was sort of perplexed at her energy, but he figured she would fall asleep as soon as they got back on the road. He couldn’t help but wonder what kid would be so enthusiastic to be at the doctors for a check-up because she definitely did not get that from him.
“Hello, Laura,” a second nurse greeted her, smiling brightly.
“Hello!!” she replied happily, while her father settled for a short nod of acknowledgment. Laura easily went through getting her height and weight checked, and Isagani let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding when the nurse informed him that everything was normal. Her temperature was checked next and then her blood pressure, and both of those came out fine as well.
The nurse told them that they were next in line to see the doctor, and Laura merrily skipped back to their seats.
She stuck her tongue out, “I told you everything was fine!”
He shook his head, “You really are your mother’s daughter.”
“That makes no sense! Of course I am!” she argued.
“It will make sense when you’re older,” Isagani teased, earning him the sharpest glare that a five-year-old could muster. He sighed to himself as he slumped back into his seat, a smile playing on his lips as his scowling daughter made a grab for his hand despite herself.
The pediatrician broke into a greeting immediately, the warmest smile that Isagani had ever seen in a man adorning his mouth. “Laura! How have you been, kid? You’ve gotten taller,” he laughed out easily, “Let’s pray for your sake that you grow taller than your doctor, huh?”
Laura began to chirp on about how good she had been since the last visit: eating her fruits and vegetables, going to sleep when it was her bedtime, getting stars for her work in pre-school. She looked so comfortable to talk to him, and Isagani just hovered next to the door, feeling as though he was intruding something which was ridiculous because this was his daughter.
The other man adjusts the stethoscope hanging around his neck as he looks up at Isagani. He motions for the father to have a seat on one of the chairs. “You must be her father. I don’t believe I’ve seen you since she was born?” The words seemed hostile, but he said them so welcomingly. He seemed so… good with people, so warm and friendly, and— And he was his daughter’s doctor, right. Of course.
“Yeah,” he replied stupidly. “I… I decided to go to law school, after the annulment with… yeah. I haven’t had the time to… yeah.”
“Okay,” the pediatrician hummed back. “You can call me Basilio.”
Isagani stared at the hand stretched out to him. “What? No doctor?”
Basilio shrugged. “If you want.”
“Doctor Basilio,” Isagani said out loud, taking the other man’s hand to shake. “Sounds good. Isagani Florentino.”
“Attorney?” Basilio inquired.
Isagani sighed. “Not yet.”
“Well, best of luck,” Basilio said, letting their hands detach.
He looked back to Laura, who was smiling at them fondly, and told her to stand in front of him. He put on his stethoscope and placed the diaphragm on her chest to listen after her heart beat, and then did the same from the back. He heard the rumble of her laughter the second time around and pointedly glances at her father, who had just retrieved his hands from her sides.
Isagani smiled sheepishly. “Sorry?”
Basilio shook his head with a soft smile, returning to what he was doing. “Okay,” he said after a while, “I think we’re all good for today. But she’s due for a couple of vaccinations soon, and we could get on those if you’d like.”
He thought he was finally beginning to understand his daughter’s enthusiasm over going to her pedia every other month, but he failed to see any reason for her face to light up at the mention of vaccines and needles. “Looks like my little knight’s up for it, Doc,” Isagani said. “Does she get a lollipop after? Please say no.”
His daughter looked absolutely scandalized, practically screeching, “Dad!”
“You’re going to get all hyper,” Isagani grumbled.
Basilio laughed at his little dilemma. “I’m afraid that’s protocol.”
“Could I have two lollipops?”
Isagani was about to protest, when Basilio shrugged at her. “One lollipop per vaccine, Laura, you know that.”
“I’ll do two! Let me do two! I’m gonna give the other one to daddy!” Isagani’s heart short-circuited at that. If love wasn’t willingly subjecting one’s self to being invaded by two needles for an extra lollipop, then he had no idea what love was. “Laura, calm down,” he chuckled. “You’re a brave knight, which is why you’re going to do two, and your father absolutely loves you, okay?”
Basilio watched them with an amused expression. “Her mother usually says no, gets really queasy with needles,” he told Isagani as he prepared the vaccinations. “You should bring her to her check-ups more often, Isagani. I encounter so many parents in my profession, so I might just be qualified to say that you seem like a really good father.”
Isagani flushed. “Thank you. You seem good, too. I mean, with your job and all.”
“That’s because I put my heart into it,” Basilio explained easily. “I can tell you do, too.”
“Oh,” was all he could say, feeling the warmth in his neck crawl up to his ears.
“I was serious, alright?” the doctor told him as he stood up and took his daughter’s hand in his, smiling that warm smile of his that makes Isagani want to melt. “I’m sure her mother won’t mind letting you have more of these doctor visits, especially once she finds out about all the vaccines we still have lined up. And you better be a lawyer the next time I see you, alright?”
Isagani laughed. “Alright,” he nodded, a yellow lollipop sitting in his mouth.