Chapter Text
Prologue: He jests at scars that never felt a wound
Friday Evening, May 6, 2011
Leonard was busy packing for his upcoming trip to Seattle for the conference. He seemed truly happy, excited about the opportunities this occasion would present, and he was wholly consumed with his travel arrangements and the like.
Good, thought Sheldon, Go.
He wanted to be alone.
He was sitting at his work desk, computer humming underneath his still hands, staring blankly at the screen. He'd been reading his work email earlier and stumbled across an old message from Kripke.
Something told him not to open it. He was about to delete it when he happened to glace at the date—late summer 2009.
Just after they got back from the Arctic.
It was that alone that should have stopped him, but his curiosity could never be denied and before he thought it through, he'd opened it, and read—
An elegant, sharply worded insult. A masterpiece of derision and mockery. With every sentence his jaw tightened, his long fingers slowly curling into fists and his throat tightening until his neck and shoulders were knotted with pain.
Betrayal. That's what it was, what had happened to him in the Arctic. His best friend and roommate, someone he was supposed to trust, had made him a laughingstock. Destroyed his reputation. He'd saved Leonard's life once—even saved his career and his future when he inadvertently scared off Joyce Kim—and this was how his friendship was repaid.
With lies.
Betrayal.
Like any emotion, he'd tried valiantly to suppress his it, to bury it so deep in his psyche that he could destroy it, remove it, by sheer will, from the warehouse of his formidable memory.
And it had almost worked. It had taken some time, but eventually, after long nights with a twisted sick feeling his gut he finally felt that he was able to forgive Leonard and the others for what they'd done. Soon, he found he was able to smile again, able to carry on as if it had never happened. He was brilliant, after all. He was destined to win the Nobel Prize for his work, because one day, he would solve the mysteries of the universe, he'd capture the Holy Grail, the Truth, the Theory of Everything.
But now—
Now the hot, heavy feeling in his gut pulled at him from inside. He'd been made an object of ridicule among his peers. Kripke's derision was nothing to that, to that horrible interlude after the Arctic when he'd had to answer to charges of ineptitude, incompetence, and fraudulence. Everything he'd ever done, or published, was called into question. He was still picking up the pieces.
He was supposed to be my friend…my best friend.
"So…hey…I was thinking…you wanna do something simple for supper tonight rather than order take out?"
Sheldon heard Leonard moving about behind him, opening and closing the cabinet doors, rooting through their pantry. "How about soup and grilled cheese…well, no grilled cheese for me, of course, but what do you say?"
Sheldon didn't answer. Couldn't answer. Lost inside himself, lost in the past, he didn't notice the single tear that fell from the corner of his eye only to drop on the back of his hand. A salty little pool that expanded, then gradually evaporated, leaving no trace.
"Sheldon?"
The taller man was hunched over his laptop, working on something, he supposed. Leonard frowned, and then shrugged to himself. Figures that Crazy was off into some land of his own, chasing strings and dark matter and unseen dimensions.
It was just like him to be so insensitive.
"What's the matter? You sick or something?"
Still no answer.
Frowning, somewhat unsettled, Leonard stared at the other man for some time, an odd mixture of exasperation and affection pulling at her features. If he didn't know any better, he'd say that something was bothering Sheldon. He seemed almost…blue.
Shaking his head, Leonard resumed his preparations for dinner. What was his deal, anyway? What did he ever have to feel upset about, in his monkish, virginal existence?
"Fine—"he said suddenly, before he knew that he intended to speak, "don't start complaining later on when you're hungry. I've got packing to do."
Sheldon's long, straight back never moved.
~xX0Xx~
Saturday: May 7, 2011
The next morning, Sheldon went straight to his whiteboard.
He'd had a troubled, fitful sleep, and dark dreams.
There was cold, endless cold, and a pair of dark, mocking eyes following his every move. Jealous, envious eyes.
In the dream, there had been a whiteboard before him, but the equations were gibberish, nonsensical. They kept changing! He tried to understand, erasing one element and substituting another, but everything he wrote somehow changed the moment his marker left the surface to place another stroke. Numbers moved, fuzzy around the edges, they lied to him, and he couldn't find their sum.
Now, as the gray-pink dawn lit the sky, he set to his whiteboard and wrote as fast as his hand could move, never as fast as his mind, plotting in an intricate, symbolic language—
Rs(M¯) » 3 km
A collapsed star…
Rs(109M¯) » 20 A.U.
A collapsed star cluster…
And he stepped back, blinking rapidly, waiting for the numbers and letters to change, to skate away off the edge of the board, to blur and blend before his eyes until he couldn't read what they said, couldn't understand…
When they did not, when nothing changed, when he realized he could understand what he had written, he heaved a sigh relaxing from his crouched, expectant posture.
Something hard snapped, then gave way under his foot.
Scowling, he lifted his slippered foot and glanced downward, momentarily distracted by the noise, the feel of something underfoot—
It was…a star?
A sunny yellow star, with a glittering, copper heart. The scowl faded, replaced by a soft, wondering sort of smile.
A star, yes, a Penny Blossom.
He bent and scooped it up from the floor, examining it under the light. The back was bent, the clasp broken, the silken petals dusty and tread marked from the floor.
It was…beautiful.
Like her…
He slipped the sad little flower into the pocket of his robe, his hand cradling it for another moment before he let it go, dropped it into the depths of his pocket, where it was forgotten.
Because he was already bent over his board, erasing what he'd written, starting again, with fresh, original research.
What he'd written! Simple, elementary physics, mere trifles, just to test himself, to see if he was still capable, still a genius, still a contender for the Nobel Prize…
There was nothing wrong with him. It was just a dream. A nightmare. He'd lost nothing of his competence, his genius, his unique understanding.
The scowl returned.
Even so, he had to stay ahead of the numbers…
~xX0Xx~
That Same Morning...
"Next!"
Penny was bent over her script, deep in concentration. She was so focused she hadn't heard them call her into the audition room.
There was a deep, tired sigh as the casting assistant glanced down at her clipboard. She shouldn't. She really shouldn't, but what the hell, she was feeling sorry for all of these beautiful, vapid blondes lined up outside the audition room eagerly waiting for their chance in the spotlight, the chance to blow them all away, and catch their Big Break.
Though her sympathy was at a low, and she contemplated skipping the next person in retaliation, she thought of her karma, and thought it was probably a bad idea. One of these empty-headed beauties could be the Next Big Thing, and knowing her luck, she'd sooner or later be fetching them their morning latte and Green M&M's…
Heaving another sigh, she read the next name off of the list.
"Penelope Bloom!"
No response.
"Is there a Penelope Bloom here?"
She waited a second, scanning the assembled blondes leaning this way and that along the length of the hall. Some of them looked up at her for a moment, hopeful, only to look away when they realized she wasn't calling for them. The rest were reading the provided script aloud, emoting to the ether as they practiced, and waiting their turn.
So she waited just a second more, and when no one answered, she gathered breath to shout out another tried and true 'next!' She wasn't going to call out a name again. She was done with her little bit of charity for the day—
"Ne—"
"Oh! Wait! That's me! I'm coming! Just a sec!"
One of the sunny little fluffs pulled herself away from the rest, gathering her script and her bottled water (because god forbid that she put on weight, of course—that any of them did) jogging over to her, her face lit by a nervous smile, hand outstretched in greeting.
"Hi!" Even her voice was sunny yellow. Way too chipper for this time of day. "I'm Penelope Ow—uh…Bloom. Nice to meet you!"
The other woman glanced down at the proffered hand, a slight frown marring her features. Well, wasn't this cute. This one pretended to have manners, sincerity…
But when she glanced up and met the girl's eyes, she was taken aback by their open, honest expression, and the quick intelligence that animated the smoky grey-green of her gaze. She was a beauty, true, but there was something very sweet in her expression that spoke of an open, giving nature. She was nicely dressed, maybe a little too girl-next-door, but nice, and there was a bright yellow flower barrette in her hair, just above her right ear. She shook the girl's hand.
"What's this?" she found herself asking, gesturing toward the flower.
Penny smiled, truly pleased.
"This?" the girl asked, gesturing towards the barrette, "oh…this is a Penny Blossom. I make them!"
Despite herself, the other woman softened, returning her smile. "Anyway…" the girl said after a beat, "sorry to make you wait. May I come in now?"
The older woman nodded her head, feeling some guilt at her prior thoughts. Maybe this one was different after all.
"This way—"she gestured, stepping back to allow the girl to pass her into the audition room. "Good luck," she called after her, before she could stop herself.
"Thanks!" Penny returned, squaring her shoulders and walking into the audition room…
~xX0Xx~
Saturday Afternoon...
Stars.
The answer, the answer to everything, the only answer that would matter, was there. It had to be.
In stars.
He contemplated the singularity at the heart of the black hole, where, theoretically, there is infinite space-time curvature due to an infinitely intense gravitational field from a region of zero volume…
Remember—
Bekenstein and Hawking postulated that quantum data did not stay trapped at its center…radiation carried it away, encoding it in the delicate correlations between the outgoing quanta. In other words, nothing is squashed out of existence…nothing…
Not even the minute particles that made him who and what he was…and that was an oddly comforting thought.
He sighed, stepping away from his white board because he was starting to see double. The numbers swayed and vibrated in his vision, much like quantum strings, but it didn't help him clear his head, or get past this latest…obstacle.
Damn.
He was stuck.
Stuck?!
He was tempted to grab the board and snap it half with his bare hands—that is, he would do that if he had the Hulk's mighty strength, or Superman's, for that matter.
Sheldon held his hands in front of his face, studying the long, elegant fingers, the slender wrists, the squared palms.
He had nothing. All he had where these puny, mortal hands.
He grit his teeth.
And this useless, circling, shoddy EXCUSE for a hypothesis!
Sheldon growled in frustration and ran his hands through his hair, an action that caused the normally neat, sharply controlled strands to feather and spike in several directions, unaware of the roguish look it gave him. It was heightened by two day's worth of stubble lining his jaw, and his heavy hooded eyes from lack of sleep.
He was never going to win the Nobel…not if things kept going like this. Why was he so sub-par? Why could he not meet, match, and surpass the most formidable minds of his age?
When he had to, he must…
What the hell had Leonard done to him?
~xX0Xx~
Later that same Saturday Afternoon...
Somehow, Penny found herself at their door, though she hardly remembered how she got there. She must have knocked, though she didn't remember doing so, because her hand was resting on the flat surface of their door, the slight pain in her knuckles already fading as she stood staring at the brass 4A fastened above them.
She closed her eyes. It wasn't a good idea for her to be here, not when she was like this. When she couldn't think, couldn't breathe...
Fresh tears threatened, but she stifled them almost immediately. She wasn't going to cry. Not now. Not ever. She wasn't going to think about it.
Right now Penny needed to talk to (Sheldon) someone.
About quantum particles. Pulsating strings. Fuzzballs. Anything.
(Lasers?)
She shook her head, unaware that she was doing so, and just what she had questioned and rejected, or the significance of her denial. She reached down and the knob turned easily in her hands, something she didn't question, only knowing that right now she wanted to get inside, to see them, without stopping to dig for her spare key in her purse.
"Sheldon?" she called out, stepping into their apartment. "Leon—"
She paused when she saw him standing by the large bay window, holding a white board in front of him like some oversize piece of notebook paper, frowning as he scanned its length, muttering to himself.
Penny took a breath to steel herself and master her emotions. Even as clueless as Sheldon was, she didn't want him to know how she was feeling, or that anything was wrong.
"Hey!" she called out, doing her level best to sound happy and unconcerned. "There you are. What's up? Is Leonard home?"
She was surprised to find that she really didn't care if Leonard were or not, and was rather hoping he wasn't. She'd asked, she supposed, because in some weird way she felt like she had to. Like it was some sort of…obligation.
But Sheldon didn't answer, didn't even turn around or indicate that he'd heard her. He appeared deep in thought.
Maybe she should just go…
"Guess not. So what's up?" she found herself asking instead, walking over to take her accustomed spot on the couch, picking up a magazine from the coffee table and pretending to flip through it.
Sheldon sighed, running his hand over his face.
"Penny…I have long given up on understanding your motives for your constant presence in our apartment, or why you feel it necessary to interrupt my work with your inane, irrelevant chatter. I'm in no mood to comprehend either, so please go."
Geeze…what the hell?
She turned to face him, more than a little put off by his brusque demeanor. She felt an angry retort rise to her lips, but she tamped it down. Her emotions were too close to the surface right now, and she was being oversensitive, considering what had happened that morning…and this was Sheldon. Pain In The Ass Extraordinaire. Just turn the other cheek, she chided herself.
"Aww…is someone a little crabby today?" she tossed over her shoulder. "What's the matter, did you forget to eat your high fiber cereal this morning?"
Whoops. So much for the cheek-turning. This was sure to inspire a minor hissy fit—
So she was startled when he turned sharply on his heel, his blues eyes snapping fire.
"Penny—there are far more important matters to contend with than breakfast food, fiber content, or satisfying your limited curiosity. I repeat, Leonard is not here. Now please go, I have work to do! When I tell him you stopped by, he'll run right over to return the favor, I can assure you. He's good at doing what he wants, no matter the consequences!"
She shot to her feet, her temper rising despite herself. She really shouldn't have come here…
"Well excuse me, Genius!" What was his beef with Leonard all of a sudden? "Did you ever stop to think that I might have come here to see you? That maybe I just wanted to talk to you?"
Before she could register what she'd said, or the stunned expression on his face, she collapsed back onto the couch, burying her face in her hands, finally succumbing to the need to cry.
Sheldon blinked, the former irritation falling from his features as he took in this new development. Everything seemed to be running in slow motion, and with half of his attention still on the board behind him, he hadn't really been conscious of what he'd been saying to her. Now hearing it repeat in his head, he thought that perhaps he'd been just a trifle harsh…
He looked at her again, her slender shoulders shaking with the force of her emotions, sobbing brokenly.
Had he…had he done this?
Before he could examine the situation further, or even begin to offer an apology, or a hot beverage, Penny bolted to her feet.
"You know what, never mind! It's not like you can understand what I feel like, or would even want to. I mean, all you care about are things you can't see or even prove exist! More dimensions, strings—like that's important!"
She was walking towards the door—
Sheldon started to follow her, instantly forgetting his earlier, albeit brief remorse at her outburst of emotion.
"These things, as you call them, are the answers to the most fundamental questions of the universe, the answer to everything—not just why we exist but more importantly how we exist, what it means to—"
Penny stopped abruptly and turned to face him, so suddenly he barely stopped his forward momentum, swaying on his heels a beat or two before regaining his footing. He then noticed how close they were standing to one another…
"I didn't get the part!"
Her eyes were green and gray combined. She was wearing a yellow Penny Blossom in her hair, just like the one in his pocket.
"Didn't what?" he asked, struggling to remember what they'd just been arguing about. He didn't often find himself in such close proximity to Penny, and it was a bit…disconcerting.
"I went to an audition this morning. That one I told you about," she answered, her voice thickening with each syllable as her emotions got the better of her. "Some stupid sitcom…just a bit part…and they trashed me. Tore me to pieces. It was the most humiliating thing I have ever experienced."
This close, he could smell the light scent she wore. He couldn't place it at first, because it was something different. Penny, for all her chaotic, unpredictable behavior, also had her routines, and one of them was her preference for vanilla scent…
But this was different…he took a short breath…definitely different. Cherry?
"Sheldon?"
He took a step back, the better to clear his head.
Penny scowled, then turned to grab a tissue, blowing her nose. "Forget it. I don't know why I thought I could talk to you about this. You don't understand anything about feelings…or having feelings…"
Sheldon crossed his hands behind his back, assuming his lecture pose, unaccountably stung by her words.
"So I take it you failed an audition, is that it? That's hardly anything new."
Her eyes snapped up to his, and while still red-rimmed and watery, there was a familiar steel there that he'd seen before. It was there every time they crossed swords, whenever they sparred, and he felt something similar respond inside him. It was oddly…stimulating.
"Oh yeah? What's going on here?" She gestured to his whiteboard beyond. "Stuck again? That's hardly anything new."
His eyes narrowed, and he found himself stepping forward to close to gap between them once again, the better to loom over her in a superior fashion.
"So…if I am stuck it's only briefly. That's because I dedicate myself wholly to my endeavor and minimize or eliminate distractions of any kind. Perhaps you could do the same—"
"Why do you do that, Sheldon?" she asked suddenly, cutting him off. "Explain it to me, because I really don't get it."
His eyebrows rose in surprise, and he titled his head to the side, thinking. She'd never asked this question before.
"Why do I do what?" Intriguing.
"Cut everyone, and everything, off. Don't you care, or want anything else in life?"
"The Nobel Prize, of course," he answered a moment later, as if it were as obvious as the nose on her upturned, lovely face, the cheery Penny Blossom in her hair. "I should think that much is obvious, since I mention it quite frequently. I wish to win, and I will win, the Nobel Prize."
She nodded her head as she looked at him, a smirk tilting her mouth. He didn't excel at reading facial expressions, but something told him that she wasn't quite, as they say in the vernacular, 'buying it.'
"Right. Like that answers the question. The Nobel Prize. A piece of paper—"
"Dear Lord, Penny! It's not a piece of paper it's a medal of hon-"
"Okay okay—a medal then. So what's the big deal? You get it and what happens?"
Sheldon blinked. He'd never thought of it quite like that before. He was momentarily stumped. But he had to answer so—
"I get another one?"
Penny's smirk deepend. "Not really an answer, Sheldon. Don't you want more-?"
Sheldon took a step back, somewhat uncomfortable with this line of questioning. How had it gotten here anyway?
"Well, what about your acting?" he interrupted. "Isn't it the same for you? Aren't you in this for a prize of some sort? An awar—"
She cut him off with a wave of her hand, suddenly impatient.
"Oh, of course that's part of it. But I do it because I love it, you understand? Because it makes me happy. Only right now I seem to be sucking at it. Sucking a lot, and I hate it." Her voice caught towards the end of that sentence, as her sadness took hold of her again. "And I don't know what I'm doing wrong."
"Maybe this isn't your true vocation, Penny. Have you ever thought of that?"
She looked up at him again, frowning at his choice of words. "No—I know I can do this, I know I have creative talent."
Sheldon nodded, crossing his arms across his chest. "Then maybe you should think about limiting your focus, that is, concentrate your energies on your craft alone. Minimize, or eliminate distractions. Seek perfection. Your pursuit of coitus, for example, that would be an ideal place to start—"
Penny snorted, stooping to gather her purse from the couch and preparing to leave, finally.
"Never mind. I can't talk to you about this. Coitus. You know, Sheldon, one of these days you're going to realize how much you're missing out. Some award isn't going to make you happy…"
He followed her to the door, again oddly unsettled by the tone of her voice, the implication that he could not, or would not understand her or her trivial problems. He realized she was leaving, and he started to chase her towards the door
"And maybe one day you'll realize that acting isn't your true talent, though how that will happen when you're—"
She slammed the door, cutting him off, and he glared after her, debating for a moment whether to go after her...
Heaving a sigh, he turned back to his whiteboard. A moment later, he felt something an awful lot like regret.
No. He shook his head. He didn't need, or want anything else in life. He had science; he had the single-minded pursuit of a goal. The Nobel Prize. He didn't need anything—or anyone—else.
~xX0Xx~
Chapter 1: The Call
Monday Night: May 9, 2011, about 5pm
She was halfway through Monday night dinner rush when Rick popped out of the back office and called after her. "Penny! Hey—gotta minute?"
There was something about his voice that raised the alarm, and she stumbled as she abruptly stopped on her way out of the kitchen, glasses rattling on her overloaded tray in her hurried shuffle out of the door.
"Yeah," she answered quickly, taking a moment to regain her balance, "let me just get this out and I'll be right over." He nodded, running a hand through his hair in a distracted manner, looking tense.
She tried not to think about it as she bumped her hip against the swinging door and made her way out to the dining room. "Coming out!" she called reflexively, lifting the tray aloft to clear her line of vision. There was a strange fluttery feeling in her stomach. She didn't know why but suddenly she was really worried. Something was really wrong…
"Okay…you had the Cuban and you had the Cheesesteak, right?" she rattled off with a perfunctory smile to the people at her table as she set the appetizers in front of them, "and a refill on that Coke," she finished with a cheery wink, again merely show for the sake of the tip, "anything else I can get you?"
It had been three days since her strange argument, or whatever that was, with Sheldon, just that past Saturday, and she'd kept her distance from the boys and their apartment since then, even skipping out on Leonard's impromptu going away party last night. He was going to some big deal physics conference up in Seattle and would be gone about two weeks.
"-kins?" the woman was saying. There was a long pause. Too long. Penny lifted her eyes and forced herself to pay attention to her table; she couldn't afford to lose a tip. "I'm sorry," she began, with what she hoped was a sympathy-inducing smile," I dropped out there was a sec. Just a little tired, workin' a double. What did you say wanted?"
The woman's face was carefully blank. Penny had a sinking feeling she wasn't going to get much of a tip out of these people.
The woman sighed.
Make that no tip at all.
"Napkins?" the woman answered with a touch of frost in her tone, "there aren't any on the table, and we would both like one, please."
Penny's smile was about to fall from her face and straight to the floor if she kept this up much longer—her face couldn't take the strain.
"Sure thing!" she answered brightly, backing away, "Coming right up!" She swept into the closed back dining room and grabbed two neatly rolled napkin sets from an empty table, then swung back around and dropped them off without a word. Screw the tip…
She hadn't been on her game since the failed audition and her argument with Sheldon. She just couldn't get it out of her head, what they'd said to her—
"indistinguishable face, round and ordinary"
"wide upper arms, too wide"
"bust is too small"
"needs to lose at least 10 pounds"
"uninspired delivery"
"no instinct for subtlety"
"needs acting classes…if she took them, should demand money back"
How could Sheldon understand what it was like, to be pulled apart like that, to have everything you're ever worked for savagely mocked and called into question?
As she left for the kitchen, that strange flutter in her stomach returned as she approached Rick's office. Who was calling her, and what for? Sheldon was alone now that Leonard was out of town for the next two weeks. Was it some kind of shredded chicken crisis or something?
She knocked on Rick's half-open door. "You wanted to see me?" she asked, pushing it all the way open and stepping inside. He looked up from his desk, his face tight, and gestured to the phone.
"Call for you." He nodded at the handset. "You better take it right away." He stood then, and walked to the door, stopping at the threshold. "I'll give you some privacy."
That formally nervous flutter in her stomach officially leveled up to a bona fide plummet. This was not good.
She picked up the phone. "Hello?" she said, just as Rick softly closed the door behind him, leaving her alone in his office.
"Yes…hello? Am I speaking to Penelope Owens?" The voice was cool, formal, and her sudden dread only increased—
"Yes, this is she," she answered quickly, trying to ignore the sudden rush of sound in her ears, the sound of her blood rushing through her veins, and the sting in her eyes from threatening tears. Oh my God…it's Mom! Something's happened to—
"Miss Owens, my name is Melody. I'm an ER nurse for Huntington Memorial Hospital. I'm calling on behalf of..." the voice continued, and then a sudden pause, the distant rustle of papers, and finally a name, "Sheldon Cooper."
Wait—Hospital?
"Sheldon?" she said automatically, now truly concerned, "what's this regarding?"
"I'm sorry, Miss Owens. I have some bad news..."
"What! Has something happened to Sheldon?" She suddenly couldn't stand. It was as if the floor disappeared from beneath her, leaving only a void. A great terrible hole of…nothing...threatening to pull her and everything else inside of it and leave nothing behind. It was like the end of the world. Like her heart, like all time, had stopped.
It's called a singularity whispered a distant portion of her mind in a playback of some long ago lecture once delivered from the left-most cushion of a soft leather couch. That's what it was called, she remembered. Something Sheldon taught her.
Oh my god…Sheldon…
"Yes. That's why I'm calling. I'm very sorry. This is never easy—"
"Oh no—" she chocked back a sob, her voice rising hysterically, "is he dead?"
Please god, no…
She couldn't breathe. Any moment now she was going to pass out. This just couldn't be happening—
"No—no—" the nurse continued quickly, "he's alive, but in critical condition." It took a moment for her words to sink in, and when they did, Penny felt like time started moving again. Her heart started beating again, and she pulled in a shaky breath—
Alive.
Thank god—
"Wh…what happened?"
"He was brought in the ER about 2 hours ago," the nurse continued, "with severe trauma to the cranial and thoracic regions…his head, shoulders and chest, in other words. We've got him stabilized and he's been moved to the ICU, but I must stress that his condition is very serious. We've been attempting to contact his family or relatives, but there's been no answ—"
"They're in Galveston," Penny interrupted. Lord—his Mother!
"Yes," the nurse replied, "While we're trying to reach them, I thought I would call you. I see from the paperwork here that you're Mr. Cooper's fiancée …I know you'd want to be here…"
"His what?"
There must have been something slightly telling in her sudden confusion, because then was a pause, a shuffling of paper.
"Fiancée. You are Mr. Cooper's fiancée…corr—?"
"Yes! Yes, I am, sorry,' she answered instinctively, desperate to repair the damage she'd done with her thoughtless response, though she was confused. Since when was she Sheldon's fiancée? And there was paperwork on this? However they came to think this, or however it came to be there, wasn't important right now. She realized right away that there was no way she'd get into the ICU unless she went along with it, and she wasn't going to set them straight just now. What was important now was going to see Sheldon. To make sure he was okay…
"I'm just…really upset. I can't think straight." Her voice broke with emotion, real emotion, even as she was thinking that it might be a good idea to choke up a little, the better to pass herself off as the fiancée…
But she didn't have to act, because her fear and concern were real. Something happened to Sheldon, and she couldn't bear the thought—
The tears that had been threatening to spill over finally broke free, and Penny hastily wiped them away. Her mind was racing with thoughts of the night ahead. She wanted to leave now and get to the hospital. She had to know that he was alright or if…if…no, she didn't want to think about it. She had to call Leonard and let him know right away. He'd want to know…
"Okay—"she said, pulling in a shaky breath. "You said he's in the ICU? Where would I go when I get there?"
She took a pen and paper from Rick's desk and jotted down the details.
"Got it. East Wing, First Floor, emergency parking to the Left of the entrance."
She hung up the phone and swept out of the office, her mind already far from work or anything else. She had to get to the hospital.
"Penny?" Rick was standing by the employee lockers, shifting from foot to foot. He looked on sympathetically as Penny reached for her purse and some Kleenex, wiping away her tears. "Everything alright?"
Penny spun the dial on her locker, popping it open to get her coat and purse.
"No…look, Rick…I need to leave. This is a…family emergency."
"No problem…just make sure you close out your tickets or transfer them, okay? And drive safe."
She couldn't believe it was going to be this easy, but then, that didn't mean she wouldn't potentially pay for it later in some way.
She found Rachel in the kitchen and begged her to take her table 12, the napkin table. She didn't care; she wasn't going to get a tip from them anyway. Even if she did, she didn't care at this point.
"Sure, no problem. I'm sorry, okay? Hope everybody's alright."
Penny shot a quick thanks over her shoulder and rushed out to door.
~xX0Xx~
Monday Night: Huntington Memorial Hospital, about 5:23pm
"Excuse me…I'm looking for Sheldon Cooper. Can you please tell me where he is?"
The ICU nurse (her tag read "Sue") looked up from her screen, flashing Penny a quick smile. "Hello…yes, I can…but I do have to ask, are you family?"
"Yes." Penny answered, "I'm his fiancée …"
The nurse pulled out a chart. Checked a notation.
"Name?"
"Penelope Owens."
The nurse nodded her head, as of expecting the answer. "Alright…let's see…Mr. Cooper is in room 37…just down this hall to the right…"
Now that she was here, could see that this was really happening, Penny was starting to cry again.
"Thank you" she said, reaching for a tissue. "Can you please tell me how he is?"
"Well, let's see…Dr. Brown is the attending…" she glanced at some notes, "and right now his vitals are stable…he's been in and out of it since he came in. He may not be awake…"
"Have you gotten a hold of his family?"
"Yes…all family has been notified." She glanced at the phone in Penny's hand. "And I know this is a bad time, but we do ask that you don't make any calls on your cell phone here—it interferes with the equipment. If you have to make a call please be sure to step out to the lobby…"
Penny blew her nose, nodded and tucked her iphone away into her purse.
"Sure…thanks…thank you…" she called to the nurse, already turning to head down the hall, scanning the doorways for the right number.
34…35…36…
37.
She stopped at the doorway, almost afraid to go in. She felt rooted to the spot, shaken to the core with a myriad of powerful emotions. Fear, shock, and…something else.
What that something else was, she didn't know, but it was something undeniable and all-consuming. The terrible fear that had gripped her from the moment she'd taken the phone call at work has refused to let go. For the past hour she'd been helpless to its influence, unable to think of anything but simply getting here and seeing that he was alright, that he was alive, with her own eyes. She had the terrible suspicion that if he wasn't going to be alright, then neither would she.
Penny pushed that thought away, refusing to examine it further. It was almost inconceivable that just four years ago she'd first met Sheldon Lee Cooper, or Leonard Hofstadter or Raj or Howard…because she felt like she'd known them forever…and now…now she couldn't imagine going back to a place or a time without them.
She took a quick breath and walked into the room, her eyes falling immediately to the long, thin man lying so still and stiff in the hospital bed. She gasped, her hand rising to cover her mouth, stifling a sob at the sight. There were tubes and wires everywhere. He was hooked up to two IV's, one with clear liquid and the other with something bright red, like plasma or blood. The medical monitor at his bedside was beeping steadily, slowly, displaying all his vitals. His head was extensively bandaged and she couldn't really his face underneath it all, though she could see that the flesh around his eyes were purpled and swollen, his inky black lashes in stark contrast to the color of his bruised skin.
And yet despite it all…
It looks just like he's sleeping… she thought, with a reluctant smirk at the picture he presented. If it were anyone else, lying there ramrod straight and mummy-like, it would be unnatural. But not Sheldon…not her...Wackadoodle.
She walked over and sat down in the armchair immediately beside the bed, reaching out for one long, pale hand, hesitating only a moment before taking it in hers, bringing it to her lips automatically. She realized that he wasn't likely to stir or protest her touch, not as he was now. And even if he did, she would gladly bear his ire. Because this…this lying there still as death, pale and silent and bruised…this was worse. What she wouldn't give to have her crazy, demanding Sheldon back…
A sob broke free as fresh tears fell from her eyes, blinding her. She brought his hand to her lips and kissed it again and again, holding it to her and wishing she could simply make it all better, make it all go away…
She sat forward and laid her head on his chest, listening for his heartbeat, praying and sobbing in equal measure. Please let him be okay…please…
There was a rustle of sheets and she felt him stir beneath her.
He felt like he was submerged under water. Dark water, for he could see nothing, hear nothing but the thud of his pulse in his ears, at the base of his skull. He struggled to break to the surface, but he was so tired, and maybe it would be better to stop trying, and let himself sink to the bottom, to drown.
But there was something up there, out there, beyond the heavy black that surrounded him. Another person. Crying?
He tried to concentrate, to isolate the sound. A woman. A crying woman…
She blinked back tears, raising her head, wary and hopeful. In the next moment, she felt a touch to her hair, the side of her face. She gasped as she looked up and saw that his right hand was buried in her hair, his fingers splayed against her scalp, interlaced with honey blonde strands.
"Sheldon?" she asked, her voice hoarse from crying, his face a blur through her tears. "Oh God…Sheldon?"
It took all his strength just to open his eyes, a herculean effort to focus on the face that was bent so close to his own. As his vision cleared her saw her by degrees, first her eyes: green and gray and gold, wet with tears. Then her mouth: a perfect, pink bow that shook with the force of her emotion. And then her face: classically beautiful, oval-shaped, framed with honey-colored hair, the soft strands wound over his fingers like silk ribbon…
She struggled to clear her vision, blinking rapidly, only to raise her eyes and meet the soft, liquid blue of his gaze. He was awake, and looking at her—
"Sheldon?" she repeated, barely daring to breathe—
Who was she, this beauty, crying for him?
"Hello," he replied, his voice only a whisper, broken from strain and exhaustion and injury, as it spun out in a slow drawl, the accent of his childhood.
She sat up slowly, confused by the expression on his face, something off in his eyes. He was awake, yes, and conscious, but something was wrong. It was his eyes—
they were less hard, less aloof and removed than they usually were. Instead of flat, neutral blue, they were slightly warmer, softer, a cornflower blue. He was looking right at her, but she could tell…he didn't recognize her.
His next words confirmed it.
"Who are you?"