Niko’s Eye

Chapter 70.

Isis.

Why do I feel sorry for her? Is it because she looks like even her own skin wants to crawl away from her?

The news article that I had read about her was so personal. I could see her as easily as my own, biological mother standing there in that war. She had nothing. No safety. No right to food or home. No place to go. If I was there I could call out her name and she would turn and see me. But what would she see? Help? Judgement? Pity? Refuge? A chance to survive the hell she’d been catapulted into? And here I am in my home - warm, safe and fed by Alejandro. There by the grace of God I go.

Isis looked at Aisha as she shifted uncomfortably in the chair she was seated in, in front of her and Alejandro.

She sat there and thought about the question that was racing in her mind ever since the day that she had found out the truth.

Why?

After a groundbreaking 16 minutes of silence, Alejandro cleared his throat.

Oh my God, he’s such a schnitzel.

Isis and Aisha both turned to look at Alejandro.

"I’ll just step outside to make a few calls. Isis, are you gonna be okay?"

She nodded absentmindedly as he leaned in to give her a kiss on the forehead. Isis watched Aisha as she looked on, wide-mouthed.

"Didn’t think anyone could love me like this, did you?" She asked, making sure that Alejandro was out of sight.

Aisha flinched as she was snapped out of her thoughts, whatever that they may have been.

As Aisha fixed her in the eye, she noticed a glossy glint in her eye.

Is she crying? No f*****g ways. Sadness comes as a painful cleanse. It is a chance to detox and reassess what is helping and what is hurting, a chance to make new choices and inform others that one has boundaries, needs and vulnerabilities. That could never be Aisha.

The sun that was coming through the high windows was warm on Isis’ back as she sat in the prison’s visiting room. She was clad in a blue Chanel boob tube, complete with a Baby Phat lululemon skirt and a pair of white Air Jordan 1’s.

Maybe that was why Aisha was stunned. I was finally able to dress the way she never allowed me to. But it’s ironic how her "holy" ways landed her in jail, while me, the "sinful" one, was walking free. Anyways, I am not here for that.

"Hello Isis, I see Alejandro has taken good care of you, better than I ever have actually." She said, looking down at Isis’ sneakers. "You’ve always wanted a whole collection of these shoes. Which I would actually afford at the time. I was just too bitter to be a mother to you."

Okay, this is not what I was expecting. Maybe I should let go of my anger.

She remembered Alejandro’s words before they came to the prison.

Let the sadness and anger out or it’ll poison you; such open heart surgery without anaesthetic takes real bravery. Do it though. I’ll be waiting for you at the finish with a glass of water, or gin.

Should I?

One must remove a bullet from a wound and one must let sadness come out.

Alejandro.

Alejandro observed the prison gate guards who were smoking. If this was still the old Alejandro, he would’ve been standing here on the outside of the prison, also smoking a very expensive cigarette or cigar. He watched the smoke. It had a way of revealing the air, making an artistry of its swirls and flow

He scrunched up his nose in disgust as he thought of days where he used to inhale nicotine.

The wrinkled toxic stick had a slow creeping stench. Within moments its chemicals invaded everything we were, from a sickly yellow film over our skin to the air in our lungs. The cigarette smoke had this entitlement, to be closer to you than some subway creep breathing in your face, touching as if random yet calculated. The cigarette was as those belching cars, feeling so entitled to pollute. It as if the purchase brought some strange notion of dominance - that they could then knowingly be objectionable, to bring chemicals into the environment, and the right of being a consumer trumped the rights of others to breathe clean air. Could there be any more lame symbol of the era of addiction over true moral choice than the cigarette? Perhaps the coffee and cars... for the bizarre use of prime agricultural land and the gratuitous pollution. They are a hang-over of sorts, from an age where a person’s right to get rich is placed more highly than the rights of the masses to health.

He stopped himself as he realised how weird he sounded in his own head.

I’m not supposed to judge others either.

Suddenly, his attention steered towards a prison ward who was speaking to the gate guards. It looked more like a sermon. He found his feet walking towards the prison ward, carefully paying attention to what he was saying.

"You wanted to save them from hell? You aren’t being honest with yourself, no don’t pout, you weren’t. You were scared of hell, you wanted to go to heaven and you thought by converting them you’d win "brownie points" with God. Isn’t that right? No? You say you wanted to save them, to bring them everlasting life? Bull. I told you this course of action would decimate their population and culture for generations. The true reason, the deep reason, for any action should be judged by the result instead of the proclaimed intention. The stated intention is no more than smoke from a fire that’s already burning. Confused? Let’s look at our example, maybe that will help. "

What is he talking about?

"The result in this case was the destruction of the First Nations in mind, body and spirit, and so that was the intention of option A, it satisfied a deep fear in the settlers and the rest is self serving bullshit. The deep, real motivation was fear of the natives and fear of cultural difference - so the true intention was their destruction, which was the result. Religious ideas are dangerous if they let us hide behind a false nobility while doing barbaric things. So - good news and bad - the good news is knowing all this makes the analysis of complex political situations and world problems simple. The bad news is it makes the manipulation of people, of populations, simple too. Just trigger a deep emotion they won’t consciously acknowledge (repress) and then give them a way to satisfy that urge whilst keeping their ego in tact, or even better, feeling noble. Sounds like religion, right? "

This sounds like blasphemy. In it’s purest form.

"Oh, God is talking to me again. Hm. Okay. He says all you need to know is that He is real and He loves you. He says to stop allowing yourselves to be controlled by the news, the media, the corporations, religions and the banks. He says they have you dancing like puppets while His earth is destroyed - all so that they can make themselves rich and powerful. He says wake up, and when you are awake don’t go back to sleep."

Don’t go back to sleep. So basically, not falling back into the same pattern, the same life. Maybe he knows what he’s talking about.

The darkness of the film is a gloom that permeates every aspect of script and plot. Clouds loom in the sky, every shade of monochrome from sliver though storm grey leaving gaps only for the black night. Against the cars with their running boards lean the men, faces partially obscured not only by the lack of light but by the rims of their fedoras. The only glint in the blackness comes not from the moon, but from cigarette tips like crazy red fireflies born to die.

I can’t go back to being a gangster. I chose religion.

Most conflict between religions can be chalked up to an over-focus on the word-play and myths and an under-focus on the concept and intuitive emotions they bring. For example, if we think of the ancient Greek religion, we have Zeus who is the king of the gods and there are a host of other lesser Gods who are either good, such as Athena the goddess of wisdom, or negative, such as Ares, the god of war. If we think of the Abrahamic religions we see a focus on there being one God who is supported by angels and opposed by Satan and demons. Yet when we realise that these are conceptually identical, only the words attributed by mankind have altered, we have a great leap forward in our comprehension. We could simply call "Zeus" "God," the supporting positive goddesses and gods as "angels," "Ares" becomes "Satan" and any negative lesser "gods" become demons. As such the conflicts between monotheism and polytheism should melt away to a new comprehension of the divine force.

It is one divine truth yet it can be seen in and spoken of from infinite beautiful perspectives, a multitude of voices that strengthen our will to love and guard both creation and each other.