Page 82 of Perfectly Us
I know I still need to face it, and I will. But right now?
“Come on before I eat your hand,” Alex says, tugging me toward the stairs. “I smell bacon.”
Right now I’m going to keep it shoved in the back of the drawer, in the back of my mind, for just a little longer.
Chapter Seventeen
Alex
“I’m surprised you can still walk,” Ruben says, following me as we enter a theater to clean it. “I haven’t seen your boyfriend’s dick. Obviously. But dude looks like he’s packing.”
“Oh, he’s packing all right.” As I walk up the steps, going from aisle to aisle to sweep, my ass aches a bit. I like the reminder of him though.
Sex with Shiloh has been intense lately. Not a bad intense. Just… different. He’s taken me hard and fast, then slow and intimate. After each time, regardless if we fucked hard or not, he holds me close to his chest, not really saying anything. Like his mind is trying to go somewhere else and I’m the only thing keeping him grounded.
Four days have passed since the night Shiloh woke up crying. He hasn’t told me what happened, but with his friend from that summer camp dying, I think maybe that had something to do with it.
Whatever the reason, it’s making me uneasy. With how Shiloh holds on to me, it’s like he’s storing me to memory, every kiss, every touch. Almost like he’s saying goodbye.
Fuck. My stomach rolls at the thought, and I sweep more forcefully.
“I have another philosophical question for you,” Ruben says, following me out of the auditorium and dropping empty soda cups into the trash outside the door.
“Hit me with it.”
“You’re walking along a railroad and see that up ahead, the track leading over a bridge is broken. A train full of people isn’t too far behind you. If they hit that broken track, everyone will die. It’s okay, you think. There’s another track that’s perfectly intact. Safe. You’ll just pull the lever and change the path of the train. Right before you pull the lever, though, you see someone trapped on the safe track.”
“Trapped how?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Ruben says, flicking his hand. “Point is, the person is trapped, and there’s not enough time to free them first because the train is fast approaching. Do you still pull the lever and save the people on the train, even though that one person is right in the train’s path and will die?”
“Of course,” I answer. “I mean, that’s horrible. I feel bad for the dude that will die, but more people will be saved.”
“Okay.” Ruben and I are in the concession stand now, and he rests his hip against the counter. “Consider this though. What if the person stuck on the track is someone you know? What if it’s…” He scrunches his face up, then snaps his fingers. “Shiloh. Shiloh is trapped on the track. To save all the people on the train, women, children, he’ll have to die instead. Do you still pull the lever?”
“This question is bullshit.” I cross my arms. “I’d quickly free Shiloh, then pull the lever.”
Ruben shakes his head. “Not enough time.”
“I’ll make time.”
“You can’t. So what do you do?”
“What wouldyoudo?” I ask, turning it around on him. “And Mel is the one on the track.”
“It would be damn hard, and I’d cry like a baby, but I’d pull the lever and save the people on the train.” Ruben looks like he means it too.
“Fine. I’d do the same.”
“Really?”
“Yep,” I say, then grab the broom and dustpan resting against the wall. “I’m going to check the arcade.”
As I sweep up random pieces of popcorn near the claw machine, Ruben’s stupid question gnaws at my brain. Of course I want to do the right thing and save all the people on the train. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or whatever. Thirty lives—or however many people are on the damn train of death—mean more than one life.
But honestly?
If the scenario was real, and I actually had to choose, I’d save Shiloh.
