Niko’s Eye

Chapter 77.

Sergio.

Are you really entertaining the idea of getting Aisha killed? What are you so afraid of? Your wife knows who Zainab’s mother is and so do the kids. That’s kind of self-explanatory in terms of your past promiscuity. So what else do you have to hide? Oh, your crimes. The hard core crimes that Aisha made you commit before you for you got steered back into your senses and your conscience. You respected. The man who helped you with that, so much that you had decided to help him with bringing the common nemesis down. You’ve made federal deals that will ensure you don’t ever spend a night in jail. So what is the problem? I think it’s just the fact that I was involved in so much that they have no idea about. It’s not even about Aisha anymore.

The thing is, Sam, I’m an emotional person. When the emotion is strong it feels the same as truth and it compels me. That’s great when I feel love with a person who loves me back, that’s what makes living so awesome. But there are other times when it hurts me or those I love, if I act on an emotion before I’ve seen things through the eyes of other people. So over time I learned how to question these emotions, the negative feelings and suspicions, rather in the same way I learned how to lucid dream. In the moment of negativity and entitlement I asked myself one simple question, "How would this look if I were a fly on the wall?" Then I can take a step back for a fraction of a second, enough to regain self control - maybe not fully, but better. It’s made my life so good, embracing the positive and questioning the negative. It’s smart. I’m a better friend, partner and relative.

There is a danger in sealing up us emotional types - in the shortness of temper that comes when we cry. There is a cruelty to taking our emotions as a type of rudeness, something "well mannered folks would hide". There is a cost in burying such pain in our bones rather than expressing it freely, one that brings on a loneliness of the soul. Yet with understanding and patience comes healing, a return to real joy, true happiness born in soulful connections. It is then we emotional types become a blessing to others, creating empathic connections with ease, becoming healers and helpers. For that is our purpose, to see what others do not because we feel so deeply. So be our heroes, help us to survive this cold world, and we will become your rescuers - shining true warmth into every heart, breathing peace and compassion into this ailing world.

For so long I thought you made me feel a certain way; if I was sad, or lonely, or frustrated, I became angry with you. But why you? Why not someone else? I guess it’s because you are the one I love the most, the one I feel most loved by. Was I angry you couldn’t kiss away my pain? That you were’t able to heal me with just words and kind eyes? Maybe.

It isn’t right though; I want to treat you the way you deserve... with the same love and patience you showed me. So I am learning how to walk with stronger legs, feet in boots of iron. My emotions still come in brutal waves, pain felt in full measure, yet I know they are only within my own mind. I have learned to keep on walking regardless, act like they aren’t even there... and soon they aren’t. Then I come back to you with a smile and see that you are just the same as before, constant and gentle. Please know I’m healing, gaining control, finding my stable core, learning to love who I am... driving these deep emotions into my passion for life, for helping others, for loving you. You have been my anchor, perhaps next I will be yours, yet one day we will simply be birds on eternal summer winds.

Sometimes joy and sadness get all mixed up, sometimes I think it’s supposed to be that way. If joy for myself means hurt for another, how can it be different? If I gain and you lose of course my emotions are mixed. I love competition, but only when the stakes aren’t so high, only when there is enough for all to be happy. Greg tells me to toughen up, grow up, as if I’m a baby. I’m not. I’m an emotional person and I can’t choose not to be. Maybe if I saw enough horror or lived somewhere my survival was really in the balance every day I’d have to. I don’t know. But in that tangle of emotion there is a path I must walk, yet like a ball of yarn, the thread must be pulled soft and slow. There is more wisdom in the emotions of a young child than in all the tomes in all the libraries of the world. We should cherish that beauty that wants others to be safe and well. Though it’s true that the young can be selfish, they react how we all should when they learn another is hungry or hurt. That’s how Anna always was; from birth onwards she was a pure spark of a child, always feeling for others as strongly as if she were their mother. With so much love inside of her, how could I not love her too? How could I not trust one with so much inner beauty?

Alejandro.

Show me a man with emotional warmth and I’ll show you a prince among men. Show me one with skin so thin that his heart shines though and I’ll show you the best a man can be. Show me a man who loves and holds compassion and kindness as his highest treasures, and I will show you a treasure of the Earth. For these values are human values and they belong to us all. They are the qualities that make a quality life, family and community. So, if you want to be loved as strongly as those storybook princesses... find a prince among men.

I can’t wait for our marriage. Then I won’t have to feel guilty about having lustful thoughts about Isis. She looks at me like the fire in her eyes has been dowsed with ice water, if anything it makes the blue more pale. I’m not used to it, it unnerves me. I want her to give freely like she always does but she won’t. It’s like she just crawled right back inside some invisible shell and no matter how hard I try she’s unreachable. She moves her eyes more slowly, like they’re heavy, an effort to move. I want to crack my usual jokes but I know she won’t laugh. I’m standing right next to her but she might as well be on the moon. Sometimes her eyes have frozen over like the surface of a winter puddle, robbing them of their usual warmth. She’s in there, I know it, but it’s like she just took a huge step back from life. I want to reach in and tell her it isn’t hopeless, but she won’t believe me. I want to rekindle her heat but her insides are too damp with uncried tears. I always knew she had pain inside, but now its visible on her face and I wish it would go away. I know that’s a selfish want, people have a right to their pain, they don’t ask for it - it just arrives like the gift you never wanted.

He squinted at me through hardened eyes that once had been my salvation, but now they brought only the unfounded accusations of a jealous lover. Their color had only yesterday reminded me of my sea-port home, gazing out to where the blue of the ocean blended into the blue of the sky, now they were simply chilling. Every muscle in his face was tense and without a word he communicated intense mistrust, anger, despising. Now he stood between me and the only exit, glaring, seething, clenching his fists rhythmically...

They say the eyes are windows, the thing is, my love, I can see through them. I can see your pain and your gentleness just the same. I see how every emotion comes together to form the art of your soul. It forms a picture I see in an instant and comprehend with full depth. So, I see you, I do. When I say that your eyes are beautiful, its the truth, for it’s not about colours or shape, it’s about the loving sweet essence that is so clearly there.

Eyes that see are the greatest blessing, for they are as orbs that shine lights and make even the realisation of what healing must happen... possible.

Emotions are a form of biochemical bank account; positivity pays in and negativity is a withdrawal. We can give to one another in an emotional ecosystem when society is healthy, cooperative and kind. In a society of competition people start to take more than they give, health of brain and body deteriorates, society becomes more violent and unstable. It all links back to the biochemical bank account and the lead indicator of too many withdrawals and lack of deposits is stress (high cortisol).