Mistakenly Eaten

29. Freedom From Pain

28:

Nicholas had always been a rational kid. Ever since he was four, his first memory was that he remembered seeing his brother hold a gun, something that he had usually seen his father’s men hold and kill people with.

He knew that it was something dangerous and bad.

He knew that the weapon that Lucas held so casually was actually something harmful and had the tendency to kill and hurt people.

That’s why he strayed away from it. Instead, Lucas always practices to hold it and when they turned six, their father took them hunting. Lucas was quick enough to kill a wild rabbit with his pistol but instead not only did he not know how to hold or shoot a gun, Nicholas ended up puking and throwing up, the moment he saw the rabbit’s dead body.

When they turned a little older, their father would take them to his office, the forbidden area for the children but only until allowed by Alejandro.

He would show the bruised and beaten up vigilante’s that his father had had beaten up by his men and while Lucas would enjoy and cheer watching people get beaten to a pulp, Nicholas on the other would cry, hide away and squirm behind his uncle Anthony or his father.

Alejandro understood that between his two sons, Lucas was obviously the one with more guts to carry on their mafia business and that’s why he had already decided to hand that branch to Lucas, he worried what could Nicholas do and what his calm, composed, much rational and rather the scared little one son would do in life.

When Nicholas turned sixteen, Alejandro first noticed the boy’s stance for calculations and business models, when he was able to save himself from getting frauded in a Ponzi scheme in his high school started by a rich student that even Lucas fell for.

Alejandro realized that his son had some sort of smart and ethical sense towards clean business which in turn gave Alejandro an idea.

An idea that made him realize that it was about time he branched out. Expanded his business and cleared his good business from bad.

Alejandro than came up with the strategy that he was going to let Lucas handle the entire mafia business and give the hotel chains to Nicholas to handle.

And he saw how within years, Nicholas focused just and merely on work and expanded their business throughout the seven continents and even made their hotels the number hotel chain in the entire world.

But despite of coming from a family that dealt majorly in mafia ways, Nicholas strayed away from violence.

There was a natural instinct inside the boy, that made him calm, composed and a peace loving individual.

He always chose to do the rational and the right thing.

He always made sure to never hurt anyone with his acts.

Of course, in his life, he had the occasional hanky pankies and did mess around with a girl or two every now and then but always made sure to never hurt anyone.

“I just can’t let this happen, Cam! They are all betraying that girl and I feel like if I don’t stop it than I am a part of this façade and I am also doing her bad and I don’t want to hurt her for any reason whatsoever.”

Nicholas complained to his sister, sharing his feelings about the whole situation. He considered her to be the most sensible one amongst his entire family and that’s why he shared most of his concerns with her.

He knew that sharing his true feelings with Lucas, would only make him a wimp in his eyes and Lucas would never pay much heave to his problems and simply pull out a gun and hand it over to Nicholas, asking him to take care of things in a dark manner.

Camila on the other hand, was not as much as Nicholas, but slightly rectified in that term.

She married a doctor, who came from a clean and sophisticated background and that’s why, she avoided using violent manners.

And besides, he consulted with her, more as a psychologist, rather as a sister.

“You do have a reason to fool that girl just like everyone else in that house.” Camila argued back with her brother.

“Me? What reason do I have? And what possible reason could you think and I couldn’t think of?”

Camila cleared her throat, as she excused herself from the patient that was sitting in front of her and moved to a corner in her clinic, standing in front of her large window, looking over at the beautiful blooming spring garden of her husband’s hospital, where patients of psych ward gathered around, spending some time out with the colorful flowers.

“You have the perfect reason to be selfish Nick!” Camila told her brother over the phone.

“Selfish? I don’t want to be selfish and if I do become selfish then…”

“I know, it won’t make you any different than the rest and that is fine! you don’t have to be different and always do the thing that no one else is doing. You have always been like this. Dad and Luke used to play with guns and you never did that. Mom and I always talked medicine and you also avoided that. You always want to the different thing but Nick, it is fine to be like everyone else every once in a while. That is the human part of you and you were sent on the island to help your mind relax but what have you been doing? Dad told me that you have been working constantly for the past one month and not just that but Serena and Salva told me that you even refused to eat anything and when you urged that you wanted to try the pasta from Gragnano, Salva went that far ahead and arranged the chef to have you at least eat some real food. Those people that you are trying to be so indifferent with, are actually there to help you. You know, how much Salva loves to party and live the city life but haven’t you seen how he had been spending all of his time on the island and he went so far ahead that you are telling me that he even set up a whole fake cooking competition only for you. Nick, when I say this, I mean it as your sister and not just as a psychologist but I really want you to let everyone do their thing. If you go ahead and tell the girl the truth, not only are you breaking her heart and causing her emotional damage at a very early stage of the whole thing’s development because she is still high on the zest of the fact that she got selected for a cooking competition. And you will also be destroying everyone’s hard work.”

“But there are several security concerns and…”

“Do you really think that Gigi is involved in something and he wouldn’t take the necessary measures to insure safety of our name and yours?”

Nicholas felt silent on Camila’s debate. She actually did have a point.

But he felt like he could have argued more and maybe, simply not listen to her.

All of that, were these feelings that he decided to subdue for the moment.

“You have been too hard on your own self. Nick. All the people in the house, they did everything for you. And give them a chance to explain themselves as well.”

Nicholas would’ve never allowed anyone to ever go to the lengths for him that everyone at the house did but perhaps he needed to listen to Camila or maybe, his own heart and for once, let something touch him and make him feel at ease.

Maybe, even he was tired of struggling too much and too hard. He was tired of the pain that he had been feeling and he needed something to make him feel a little less in pain.

Be it food – but it was about time for him to finally feel free.

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Well do you think Nicholas would listen to Camila's advice?

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