Stuck in Heaven

Chapter Sixteen: Climax #1

"So, how does it feel being Paul here?" Ash teased Megs, trying to at least get them in a better mood before everything went to shit. 

"Oh god, now I understand why he broke down." Megs joked, though it didn't fly over like they'd intended. 

"Yeah, Bill... in the timeline we're more familiar with, Paul was the one to do what Megs is doing." Ash chuckled, smirking. 

"Not everything." Megs sighed. "I'm doing things right. Paul... made a lot of mistakes."

"They seriously left Paul in charge of the apocalypse?" Bill blinked. 

"Yep..." Megs smirked. 

"He's almost as unstable as I am!" Bill scoffed. 

"Well... I wasn't going to say that to your face..." Ash blushed. 

"It's okay, I know I'm... not doing too well. Especially with everything around Alice." Bill sighed. "It's just a mess."

"I feel that." Megs nodded. 

"You know, I should have seen this coming." Bill shook his head. "This morning... we were having this silly little fight over Deb- I don't like that girl."

"You know, she's Ethan's cousin." Megs chuckled. "She's really nice."

"She smokes." Bill grumbled. 

"You mean she's a part of the Smoke Club. None of them are smoking bad shit anymore- I don't even know if she smoked the bad shit to begin with. Occasionally she'll smoke a cig. But everyone in the Smoke Club is in their senior year. They-" Megs started.

"My mother died of lung cancer when I was Alice's age." Bill cut in. "I... don't really talk about that unless I have to. It didn't... it wan't enough for me to shake the habit... until one day when Alice was little. And I guess they were talking about smoking in school or something. And my four year old daughter- god she was cute back then- told me that... God, I remember the exact words. She said that 'teacher said if you smoke you die'. At first I got really angry, because how dare they tell her that? But then... I started to remember visiting my mom during chemo, and how hard life was for her... How hard life was for me. I never wanted Alice to feel the way I did back then. So I stopped."

"I'm so sorry..." Ash breathed. 

"The kicker is now I gotta worry about it all over again." Bill huffed. "Because she's got a girlfriend who smokes, who might turn into a wife who smokes, who she's going to need to go to chemo for, who she's going to watch die! And a part of me thinks that will be even more devastating for her!"

"Have you ever told Alice any of this?" Megs asked him. 

"No... I... it's hard for me to talk to Alice." Bill sighed. "She never really lets me get a word in. And that Deb has convinced her I'm homophobic. She won't hear me out, and I don't want to make things worse."

"You're going to need to tell her eventually." Megs pointed out. "Otherwise she's always going to think you're homophobic, and you don't want that."

"I know." Bill admitted.

"You'll probably have an opportunity once you save her today." Ash suggested. "She'll be so relieved to see you that she'll probably actually listen for once."

"That's... you're right." Bill seemed to realize. "I just... I feel terrible about this morning.

"It can't have been that bad." Megs soothed him. 

"You know, she's a good kid- I mean, you guys are her friends. She's smart and I respect her choices, and if we're being honest, I just don't like Deb. I just think she could do better." Bill bit his lip. "This morning, being the knucklehead I am, I said 'Why don't you try dating someone at your own high school in Clivesdale?' And she said 'You just don't like Deb.' And what was I supposed to do? Lie? So I said, 'Why don't you try dating someone like Grace Chastity?' and she goes, 'No! Grace Chastity is a nerdy prude!' And I said, 'One, I said date someone like her, and two, that is not a very nice thing to say!' and suddenly, I'm defending Grace Chastity of all people!"