Think I Want to Twist the Plot This Time

Part 2

"Do you believe the ends justify the means?" he asks, probably thinking Barbie has a higher degree than what she's letting on. She blinks, wondering what he means by this.

"I think it depends on the situation," Barbie replies slowly. Maybe she should give an example. "Like... I had to stop a good friend of mine from taking over my home for the worst." Probably the easiest way to say she and the other Barbies (and Gloria, Sasha, and Allan) stopped the Kens from enacting an entirely skewed patriarchy to Barbie Land, but it's all she had to work with. "But I never would have stooped low enough to intentionally really hurt him, even with what was at stake."

"Hm." She can see the corners of his mouth lifting again; is he amused by her answer? "I suppose now's not the time to be so general, or vague." He produces the pack of cigarettes and matches from his pocket again, pulling one out with his lips.

Barbie's mouth goes dry, the fluttering in the pit of her stomach starting up once more. This is different from when she sees a cute guy at the grocery store, or walking past her when she gets to school. This is primal, her body literally telling her that she wants him. What exactly that want is, she's still too scared to dig deeper for it.

Oppenheimer turns the pack to her, silently offering her a cigarette. Politely, Barbie just holds up a hand and shakes her head. "No, thank you." No elaboration. No lecture about how cigarettes age your skin and are the leading cause of lung cancer, like she's heard Gloria go on about so Sasha never starts up.

He simply shrugs, lighting up and putting the packs back in his inside pocket. What is it about the smell on him that isn't so terrible? Is it because he's still aware enough to exhale away from her? "What I meant to posit, Barbie, is if you believe the ends justify the means when it comes to ending this war?"

It's the first time he's said her name. In the low, calculated way he speaks, it sounds so... intimate.

But back to the question. Her lack of an answer for the moment means he thinks she's thinking about it, right?

The war isn't going to end for another three years. It ends in awful bombs and beachfront storming, but the world isn't exactly all at war back home, so perhaps in this case, the ends do justify the means. But he shouldn't know that. He can't know that. So now she has to wax philosophy—certainly something she doesn't think she can pull off because, well, they never made a Barbie who studied Descartes for a living. And yet those piercing eyes are looking back at her, expecting an answer, and if it's not something interesting or something he might want to hear she's afraid he's probably going to find some excuse to leave and now she's alone again.

"I think... however the war ends, whatever methods are going to be used to end it are going to change our entire world. I don't really think for the better, either." She's choosing her words as she says them, hoping that they're being strung along into something that's at least cohesive. "Whether or not that's justified?" She shrugs, taking a long sip of her seltzer water; God, she needs it. "That remains to be seen."

Oppenheimer smiles around his cigarette, the corners of those blue eyes crinkling oh-so-slightly. Looks like she can breathe a sigh of relief. "I don't mean to impose such a philosophical query as a means of gauging your character," he insists, a hint of almost a chuckle in his voice. "You're already effortlessly beguiling. I was just curious."

Barbie flushes again; she doubts any man back home would use those words to describe her. She hears "hot" quite a bit, to the point where that word has no meaning to her anymore. "Is Philosophy your field of study, Professor?" she teases, figuring that if he's going to flirt, she's got a green light to reciprocate.