"Hey Mr. Monk let's play truth or dare," Natalie suggested
"Truth or dare?"
"Yeah truth or dare"
"Isn't that like an uncomfortable game"
"It can be but that's part of the fun of it"
"Uncomfortable and fun are not words that I would think are interchangeable. Fun is fun and uncomfortable is uncomfortable"
"Come on," Natalie whined, "just play with me for a little while"
Monk sighed. He knew that Natalie was not going to give up.
"Okay fine," he said, "I'll try it"
"Yay. Okay truth or dare"
"Um… dare—no truth… no you know what dare… no wait truth… yeah truth"
"What would you really do if you had a time machine"
"Is that a trick question"
"No of course not. What sort of trick question would that be?"
"Okay, okay obviously if I had a time machine I would go back and save Trudy-"
"Okay here's an interesting question. If you had a choice between doing something nice for yourself and doing something nice for a friend who would you chose to do something nice for?"
"What?" Monk asked half laughing—half gulping
"Say you had a choice between doing saving Mitch or saving your own wife who would you pick"
"I can't answer that question"
"Why?"
"Because there's no right way to answer the question. I-if I said I would save my wife all of a sudden I would be an SOB and if I said Mitch well I honestly don't know if I could honestly say that. I mean my unselfish side would say Mitch but unfortunately I'm not unselfish. I can be very selfish at times"
"So you're saying you don't know the answer"
"I'm saying I don't know the answer"
She reached out and hugged him. Then she kissed his cheek
"What was that for," he asked her
"That was for being my friend," she said, "I love you as a friend"
"I love you too," he told her, "only as a friend though"