Beyond a Shadow of a Doubt (5/?)
He couldn’t. No, he shouldn’t.
To Hell with it.
Sheldon gauged the distance, leaned forward, and kissed her mouth.
HUGE thank you to yavie_namarie for the awesome beta! (First Beta Reader EVAR! So cool!) I can’t tell you how pleased I was to see so many corrections. So much room for improvement. I love it. Many blessings on your head.
ooo
“So, Friday is reserved for video games?”
“Vintage video games.” Sheldon spirited through Penny once they reached the second floor. She shivered, the paper bags in her hands rattling up a storm. Penny glared at his retreating--albeit translucent--back.
“What th’ Hell is your problem?”
Sheldon disappeared around the corner. “Mrs. Vartabetian.”
Penny rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Saturday is Laundry Day, right?”
“Saturday night is Laundry Night,” he corrected her once she caught up with him.
“What do you--or did you--do on Sundays?”
“I used to play paintball on the weekends at the University. Out of curiosity, why do you ask?”
If Penny weren’t weighed down with groceries Sheldon insisted she buy with money she didn’t have, she would have shaken her pointer finger at him. She settled for pressing her lips together. “Curiosity killed the cat.”
Sheldon sighed, exasperated. “Haven’t we already established that I’m dead, Penelope?”
As they climbed the stairs to her--their--his apartment, Penny caught a glimpse of red hair, pigtails, and a bundle of roses before Sheldon physically pulled her down to the third floor landing. “Whu-ut na-aow?” Penny asked, skipping steps to keep her feet, Sheldon having grabbed her by her underarms. She finally stood on her own and swung her grocery bags in giant arcs to rid herself of the feel of ice on her armpits.
Sheldon ducked reflexively, but unnecessarily, his face as white as snow.
It amused Penny to note that his flesh retained its peachy pigmentation. He looked healthy for a dead man. Usually. Now? Not so much.
“Ramona Nowitzki,” Sheldon said.
“Why are you whispering? It’s not like she can--“ Penny gasped. “You did have a girlfriend! You dog!”
“Please, Penelope. I don’t tell lies. I did not have a girlfriend. That,“ Sheldon pointed with vehemence. “is a graduate student who could not and still can’t resist my genius.”
Penny laughed. “Oh, I gotta see this.” She hurried up the stairs, asked, “Can I help you?” and chose to ignore Sheldon raising three kinds of Hell.
Ramona was very pretty and very tall. Penny’s smile widened while she soaked up her appearance like a sponge. A nosey, nosey sponge. Ramona reminded her of Sheldon. The colors she wore were bright and layered. She had an innocent quality about her, but the vivacious spark in her eyes might have suggested otherwise. She giggled, “No.”
“Oh, see, this is Sh--my apartment now.” Penny set her groceries on the floor and pulled her keys out of her purse.
“Really?” Ramona’s eyes widened. “Would it be totally weird if I took a look inside?”
“As long as you don’t try and steal Sheldon’s work.”
“You mean Dr. Cooper.” Ramona patted Penny’s shoulder, the sympathy oozing from her person completely irrelevant as far as Penny was concerned. “I know it’s tempting to refer to Dr. Cooper by his first name--” She breathed heavily through her nose, borderline orgasmic. “--but we can’t be selfish. We need to treat Dr. Cooper with respect.”
Penny suddenly regretted inviting Ramona in the apartment. The poor girl was turned on by the thought of calling Sheldon, Sheldon. “Respect,” she peeped. “Right.” Penny unlocked the door and carried her groceries to the island in the kitchen, mouthing Oh. My. God. to nobody and nothing since Sheldon was MIA.
Ramona stood in the middle of the living room. She shifted her weight from one foot to the next in a I’ve-got-to-pee! kind of dance Penny recognized all too well. The fangirl jig. A preset, universal routine that transcended race, age, and culture. The calm before the exaltation that manifested itself in the form of SQUEE. Ramona bottled her excitement well. Her “EEE!” was between clenched teeth so it could have been worse.
Maybe.
“I can’t believe it! I’m standing in Dr. Cooper’s apartment!”
Penny stared.
Ramona placed her bouquet on the coffee table with such reverence, Penny snorted out loud.
“You are so lucky!” Ramona inhaled through her nose again, her wide-set eyes on the brink of sprouting teeth and devouring Sheldon’s couch in one, fell swoop. “I can’t believe you got to keep his furniture!”
Penny shrugged. “Just lucky I guess.” She hid the growing concern on her face by putting away the groceries. She kept an eye out for Sheldon in the process. Though, why she thought he would be hiding in the refrigerator was beyond her. It just seemed like something a ghost would do. Then she wondered if Sheldon could shrink himself to microscopic proportions and that, if he was capable of the impossible, he could take her with him. Like, now. Penny turned from the cabinets, her lips forming the question, “You did know the super tried to sell Sheldon’s furniture, right?” but the sight of Ramona unloading a Ouija board from her shoulder bag was a bolt from the blue and so the only word that came out of her mouth was, “Eh?”
Ramona sat cross-legged in Sheldon’s spot on the couch. “Oh, don’t worry. I have a class at nine. This’ll only take a minute.”
“Oh. Okay.” Penny, stiff with shock, escaped to Sheldon’s bedroom, tossing, “I’m just...gonna get ready for work,” over her shoulder. She was relieved when she saw a Sheldon-shaped lump under the covers of his bed. “Sheldon!” she hissed. “What are you doing?”
“I’m hiding.”
“You’re dead. You can disappear remember? You can probably shrink to microscopic size if you wanted.”
“No I can’t.” Sheldon pulled the covers from over his head. “Not while she’s in my apartment.”
“Why?”
“She’s holding a séance. Or what she thinks is a séance.”
“So?”
Sheldon meant to speak Penny’s name, but it died on his lips in favor of a death-glare. “You aren’t dead. You have no idea what it’s like. The living have a great and terrible influence over those of us who curtailed the agony of waiting for final judgment and suspended our souls through space and time.” Sheldon’s skin rippled like stagnant water disturbed by a single pebble. “The way is not shut! It was not made by the dead and the dead don’t keep it! People reach out willy-nilly for a close encounter of the paranormal, pseudoscientific or not. The supernatural realm isn’t full of macaroons made specifically for them by their Meemaws! Souls aren’t treats that cater to their indulgences!” Sheldon covered his head again.
“Fine. I’ll kick her out.”
Sheldon was suddenly blocking his bedroom door. “No! Don’t!” His voice was panicked. His skin rippled again.
Penny wasn’t sure what to think, let alone do. “Okay. Um. Take slow, even breaths and--“
“I’m dead, Penelope! I can’t breathe!” Despite this, Sheldon inhaled and exhaled, pretending as if he gripped a paperbag in his hand, which also gave the impression he was tooting a French horn. “Her voice sounds so pleasant.” His eyes glazed over. “I should offer her some tea.” Sheldon solidly opened the door and walked, in a trance, toward the living room.
“Crap!” Penny wrapped her arms around Sheldon’s waist. She threw her weight into holding him at bay like some perverse Heimlich maneuver. Sheldon was taller than she was and smarter than she was, but he wasn’t a Junior Rodeo champion. Penny used her body to drag him to the floor. In the time it took for him to complain about how gravity should not have power over him, she was sitting on his stomach and plugging his ears with her fingers.
If Penny had half the mind to contemplate their compromising position, she would have been sorely disappointed in herself. After her relationship with Kurt had crashed and burned--drenched in gasoline--she had made a promise that she would not straddle a man until the hurt Kurt had inflicted upon her heart had healed. And it hadn’t. Not even close. It still stung like a bad paper cut. No. A cardboard cut. Doused in lemon juice. Under the nail of her big toe. The keratin split with a toothpick. After having kicked a brick wall.
Yeah.
But she wasn’t thinking about Kurt. Or the straddling. Or the heartache. She was a regular Harry Price.
Sheldon fazed through the floor and Penny fell on her bottom. “Balls!”
Sheldon reappeared a second later, stepping guardedly from his bedroom as if his bones would shatter into a million pieces if his pacing were too asymmetrical or his footfalls too heavy. He was wearing a woolen hat folded over his ears. Its tassels swung back and forth like braided pendulums. He raised his eyes to the ceiling, unable to look Penny in the face. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Did I hur--“
“No. Really.” Penny held out her hand for Sheldon to take. He hesitated before he helped her stand to her feet. As always, he felt as cold as ice, yet soft. He felt Tempur-Pedic mattressy, only made of sterner stuff, prone to frittering away at a moment’s notice. He felt wafer thin, but dense, too.
He made no sense, basically.
Penny’s mind reeled at the ridiculousness of the illusory appendage in her hand, working overtime in its attempts to categorize the uncategorized. To name a color that didn’t exist in the realm of visible light. This wasn’t the first time she had felt Sheldon, but it was the first time contact with his skin had lasted more than a split second.
Penny pressed the palm of her other hand flat against his chest. The cloth of his shirt merely felt cold, like she expected it would, and so touched his face.
Sheldon closed his eyes. His nostrils flared. “May I ask what you’re doing?”
“You feel so weird!” Penny exclaimed in her Dude-Where’s-My-Car? voice.
“I wouldn’t know.” He let her faze through him.
Penny pulled her hands back. “You can’t feel?”
“Of course I can’t! My nerve endings are--“
“Don’t you dare say the D-word! What am I supposed to do with Ramona?”
Sheldon didn’t offer any suggestions.
“Has she done this before?”
“Once before.”
“You didn’t show yourself to her?”
“I’ve only ever showed myself to you.” He paused. “Accidentally.”
“Who have you appeared to on purpose?”
“No one!” Sheldon squeaked, clearly upset by the idea. “I meant that I only ever appeared to you, which was an accident!” He gave Penny a familiar, fleeting look. The same one when they first met. It spoke volumes without saying a word. In a foreign language, though, because Penny didn’t understand. “As for Ramona, she was never allowed to come inside my apartment, much less use things of mine in her attempts to converse with me beyond the grave! It’s your fault, all the evil that has befallen me today!”
Penny peeked around the corner and into the living room, her back against the wall, James Bond-esque. Sure enough, Ramona had collected a few of Sheldon’s belongings and arranged them in a star shape on the coffee table; his dry-erase marker, his fork, his striped pillow, a collection of papers, his laptop, and his mug. She was chanting something ominous. “What’s she saying?”
“She’s speaking in Latin. Titillating me with the memory of the senses that have been denied to me upon my death. Taste, smell, and touch.”
Penny laughed quietly to herself. “So if I start describing what a peach tastes like you’ll freak out? Or does it have to be in Latin?”
“That’s a common misconception. Latin has nothing to do with it.” Sheldon joined her in spying on Ramona. His eyes glazed over again. “Oh, Lord, she’s touching my stuff.”
Penny stopped him from running into the living room, for he was solid again. She held him by his elbows and made him stand in front of her. “What’s the big deal?”
“What’s the big deal?” Sheldon almost rippled to pieces. He stooped so that she and he were on the same level, the anger in his voice ethereal. “The soul has the capacity to feel, but not in this world. Not well in this world. Being deprived of something as simple as the deliciousness of an intake of breath. Something as simple as the feel of your heart beating in your chest. Or the smell and taste of Thai on Monday nights. Frankly, it’s Hell on Earth.”
Penny was suddenly very aware of her breathing. She watched her breath blossom across Sheldon’s face like plumes of vellum.
Ramona stopped chanting. “Fiddlesticks!”
Penny took the opportunity to flee from Sheldon, mock-sympathize with the estrange graduate student, and show her out of the apartment while reluctantly pinky-swearing a sisterhood (the basis of which she did not fully comprehend). Penny stepped out of the apartment for some much-needed alone time. She rubbed her upper arms, taking a moment to feel what she felt. Really feel. The friction on her skin. The way her fingertips tingled at the contact, probably because she was so focused on the sensation.
She was really, freakin’ thankful this morning.
“Penny?”
Penny blinked. Leonard lingered in the doorway of his apartment. It had been so long--rather, it seemed like so long--since someone had called her Penny, she almost didn’t respond to her name. Penny blushed at the realization. Stupid Sheldon and his stupid Queen Penelope fixation. “Hey, Leonard.” She flashed him a smile, embarrassed that this was their second meeting and she was, yet again, in her pajamas.
Leonard, on the other hand, was dressed casually in a pair of jeans and an assortment of layers. A hoodie and zippers galore. “Hey, um...” He rubbed the back of his neck. “...are you doing anything...”
He protracted his question for so long, Penny asked, “Ever?”
“Today,” he finished.
“I’m working.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” Penny made a disappointed noise out of the side of her mouth even though she wasn’t disappointed. Not that she didn’t like Leonard. She did. She was just a bit distracted at the moment. “What’s the rub, sweetie?”
“I was hoping we could go grab some coffee or something. But if you don’t want to, that’s okay. I mean, you aren’t obligated--I was just going to pay you back for making me coffee yesterday.”
If Penny’s heart had had arms, it would have flailed them. “I’d love that. I’m off tomorrow.”
“Wh--really? Great!”
“Yeah. It’s a date.” Penny shut herself inside 4A with a spring in her step.
Sheldon was standing beside his spot, staring at the little butt print on his cushion. He made a God-awful moaning sound that did his ghostly stature justice. “You’re making a grave error,” he said.
Penny stalled, thinking he was going off about his invasion of privacy instead of Leonard. “Excuse me?”
Sheldon’s mouth twisted into a frown. “He’s not the one you’re--“
Penny silenced him with a wave of her hand. “Okay, okay. I get it. You don’t like Leonard. I don’t understand why, but you don’t.”
Sheldon walked through the coffee table just so he could stare down his nose at her. Penny held her ground. “I could explain myself fully, I you’d prefer.”
“No, thank you.” Penny’s eyes narrowed to slits. “For a ghost who harps on about feelings, you sure aren’t very mindful of other people’s.” She marched to the bathroom before Sheldon could say something about how he had explicated touch, taste, and smell of the soul, not emotions. Or whatever. Penny took her shower without the slightest sign of sabotage from Dr. Cooper, anyway.
Maybe she hit an illusory nerve.
Penny didn’t see hide nor hair of Sheldon before she left for work.
ooo
Penny unlocked 4A and poked her head inside the door.
Sheldon had his arm draped across the top of his board, his nose a hairsbreadth from the scrawl of his handwritten equations. He tapped the tip of one of his markers against his chin. His corporeal chin.
Perfect.
Penny smirked. She tip-toed to the couch, quickly assembled the Dollar Tree toy she bought on her way home from the Cheesecake Factory, stashing the plastic bag under the coffee table in the meantime. She took aim and pulled the trigger, hardly able to suppress the laughter bubbling in her throat. A foam projectile jettisoned across the room and hit Sheldon square on the back of his head.
Penny counted five Mississippis before he mustered the composure to stop ignoring her. “Surprise!”
Sheldon cocked his eyebrow.
“You said you played paintball on the weekends, right?” Penny waved another unopened Nerf gun for Sheldon to see. “I’m not sorry about what I said earlier, but I know I’ve been a pain in your ass since I got here so this is my way of saying thank you for putting up with me and my llama drama.”
Sheldon blinked.
“Llama drama being girl drama.”
Sheldon looked from Penny, to the Nerf gun, to Penny again. “In what universe is a Nerf gun a paintball gun?”
Pop. Penny shot him in the chest.
Sheldon scowled.
“I’m not made of money, okay?” Penny pointed to the foam balls on the floor by his feet. “Could you grab those for me? Each gun only came with two balls.”
Sheldon was suddenly looming, foam balls in one hand and (liberated) Nerf gun in the other. He loaded the plastic chamber and shot Penny between the eyes. “I can shoot so close to a raccoon that it craps itself,” he drawled.
“Good for you.” Penny tore open the other Nerf gun and shot him in the crotch. “I shoot to kill.”
Pop.
Pop. Pop.
Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.
ooo
Penny gasped for breath, bracing herself on her knees. “Cheater!” She rocked on her heels and fell over backwards onto the couch.
“I do not cheat.”
“You can’t dissipate in the middle of a Nerf fight, Sheldon!”
“I did no such thing.”
“My ball went right through you!”
“No. You missed.”
“Bite me.”
“There’s no need to get upset.”
“I’m not upset!”
“The register of your voice suggests otherwise.”
“Register this.”
“That is very unladylike, Penelope.” When she didn’t retort, Sheldon asked, “Penny?”
Still nothing.
He hurriedly checked her vitals. Once he assured himself that she had only fallen asleep, he fetched a blanket from the closet and tucked her in, taking off her shoes, carefully sliding a pillow behind her head, and repositioning her limbs until she resembled himself when he used to go to sleep. Straight as an arrow, her hands folded across her stomach.
He couldn’t. No, he shouldn’t.
To Hell with it.
Sheldon gauged the distance, leaned forward, and kissed her mouth.
He felt nothing. Like always.
“Irony, thou art a heartless bitch.”
To Hell with it.
Sheldon gauged the distance, leaned forward, and kissed her mouth.
HUGE thank you to yavie_namarie for the awesome beta! (First Beta Reader EVAR! So cool!) I can’t tell you how pleased I was to see so many corrections. So much room for improvement. I love it. Many blessings on your head.
ooo
“So, Friday is reserved for video games?”
“Vintage video games.” Sheldon spirited through Penny once they reached the second floor. She shivered, the paper bags in her hands rattling up a storm. Penny glared at his retreating--albeit translucent--back.
“What th’ Hell is your problem?”
Sheldon disappeared around the corner. “Mrs. Vartabetian.”
Penny rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Saturday is Laundry Day, right?”
“Saturday night is Laundry Night,” he corrected her once she caught up with him.
“What do you--or did you--do on Sundays?”
“I used to play paintball on the weekends at the University. Out of curiosity, why do you ask?”
If Penny weren’t weighed down with groceries Sheldon insisted she buy with money she didn’t have, she would have shaken her pointer finger at him. She settled for pressing her lips together. “Curiosity killed the cat.”
Sheldon sighed, exasperated. “Haven’t we already established that I’m dead, Penelope?”
As they climbed the stairs to her--their--his apartment, Penny caught a glimpse of red hair, pigtails, and a bundle of roses before Sheldon physically pulled her down to the third floor landing. “Whu-ut na-aow?” Penny asked, skipping steps to keep her feet, Sheldon having grabbed her by her underarms. She finally stood on her own and swung her grocery bags in giant arcs to rid herself of the feel of ice on her armpits.
Sheldon ducked reflexively, but unnecessarily, his face as white as snow.
It amused Penny to note that his flesh retained its peachy pigmentation. He looked healthy for a dead man. Usually. Now? Not so much.
“Ramona Nowitzki,” Sheldon said.
“Why are you whispering? It’s not like she can--“ Penny gasped. “You did have a girlfriend! You dog!”
“Please, Penelope. I don’t tell lies. I did not have a girlfriend. That,“ Sheldon pointed with vehemence. “is a graduate student who could not and still can’t resist my genius.”
Penny laughed. “Oh, I gotta see this.” She hurried up the stairs, asked, “Can I help you?” and chose to ignore Sheldon raising three kinds of Hell.
Ramona was very pretty and very tall. Penny’s smile widened while she soaked up her appearance like a sponge. A nosey, nosey sponge. Ramona reminded her of Sheldon. The colors she wore were bright and layered. She had an innocent quality about her, but the vivacious spark in her eyes might have suggested otherwise. She giggled, “No.”
“Oh, see, this is Sh--my apartment now.” Penny set her groceries on the floor and pulled her keys out of her purse.
“Really?” Ramona’s eyes widened. “Would it be totally weird if I took a look inside?”
“As long as you don’t try and steal Sheldon’s work.”
“You mean Dr. Cooper.” Ramona patted Penny’s shoulder, the sympathy oozing from her person completely irrelevant as far as Penny was concerned. “I know it’s tempting to refer to Dr. Cooper by his first name--” She breathed heavily through her nose, borderline orgasmic. “--but we can’t be selfish. We need to treat Dr. Cooper with respect.”
Penny suddenly regretted inviting Ramona in the apartment. The poor girl was turned on by the thought of calling Sheldon, Sheldon. “Respect,” she peeped. “Right.” Penny unlocked the door and carried her groceries to the island in the kitchen, mouthing Oh. My. God. to nobody and nothing since Sheldon was MIA.
Ramona stood in the middle of the living room. She shifted her weight from one foot to the next in a I’ve-got-to-pee! kind of dance Penny recognized all too well. The fangirl jig. A preset, universal routine that transcended race, age, and culture. The calm before the exaltation that manifested itself in the form of SQUEE. Ramona bottled her excitement well. Her “EEE!” was between clenched teeth so it could have been worse.
Maybe.
“I can’t believe it! I’m standing in Dr. Cooper’s apartment!”
Penny stared.
Ramona placed her bouquet on the coffee table with such reverence, Penny snorted out loud.
“You are so lucky!” Ramona inhaled through her nose again, her wide-set eyes on the brink of sprouting teeth and devouring Sheldon’s couch in one, fell swoop. “I can’t believe you got to keep his furniture!”
Penny shrugged. “Just lucky I guess.” She hid the growing concern on her face by putting away the groceries. She kept an eye out for Sheldon in the process. Though, why she thought he would be hiding in the refrigerator was beyond her. It just seemed like something a ghost would do. Then she wondered if Sheldon could shrink himself to microscopic proportions and that, if he was capable of the impossible, he could take her with him. Like, now. Penny turned from the cabinets, her lips forming the question, “You did know the super tried to sell Sheldon’s furniture, right?” but the sight of Ramona unloading a Ouija board from her shoulder bag was a bolt from the blue and so the only word that came out of her mouth was, “Eh?”
Ramona sat cross-legged in Sheldon’s spot on the couch. “Oh, don’t worry. I have a class at nine. This’ll only take a minute.”
“Oh. Okay.” Penny, stiff with shock, escaped to Sheldon’s bedroom, tossing, “I’m just...gonna get ready for work,” over her shoulder. She was relieved when she saw a Sheldon-shaped lump under the covers of his bed. “Sheldon!” she hissed. “What are you doing?”
“I’m hiding.”
“You’re dead. You can disappear remember? You can probably shrink to microscopic size if you wanted.”
“No I can’t.” Sheldon pulled the covers from over his head. “Not while she’s in my apartment.”
“Why?”
“She’s holding a séance. Or what she thinks is a séance.”
“So?”
Sheldon meant to speak Penny’s name, but it died on his lips in favor of a death-glare. “You aren’t dead. You have no idea what it’s like. The living have a great and terrible influence over those of us who curtailed the agony of waiting for final judgment and suspended our souls through space and time.” Sheldon’s skin rippled like stagnant water disturbed by a single pebble. “The way is not shut! It was not made by the dead and the dead don’t keep it! People reach out willy-nilly for a close encounter of the paranormal, pseudoscientific or not. The supernatural realm isn’t full of macaroons made specifically for them by their Meemaws! Souls aren’t treats that cater to their indulgences!” Sheldon covered his head again.
“Fine. I’ll kick her out.”
Sheldon was suddenly blocking his bedroom door. “No! Don’t!” His voice was panicked. His skin rippled again.
Penny wasn’t sure what to think, let alone do. “Okay. Um. Take slow, even breaths and--“
“I’m dead, Penelope! I can’t breathe!” Despite this, Sheldon inhaled and exhaled, pretending as if he gripped a paperbag in his hand, which also gave the impression he was tooting a French horn. “Her voice sounds so pleasant.” His eyes glazed over. “I should offer her some tea.” Sheldon solidly opened the door and walked, in a trance, toward the living room.
“Crap!” Penny wrapped her arms around Sheldon’s waist. She threw her weight into holding him at bay like some perverse Heimlich maneuver. Sheldon was taller than she was and smarter than she was, but he wasn’t a Junior Rodeo champion. Penny used her body to drag him to the floor. In the time it took for him to complain about how gravity should not have power over him, she was sitting on his stomach and plugging his ears with her fingers.
If Penny had half the mind to contemplate their compromising position, she would have been sorely disappointed in herself. After her relationship with Kurt had crashed and burned--drenched in gasoline--she had made a promise that she would not straddle a man until the hurt Kurt had inflicted upon her heart had healed. And it hadn’t. Not even close. It still stung like a bad paper cut. No. A cardboard cut. Doused in lemon juice. Under the nail of her big toe. The keratin split with a toothpick. After having kicked a brick wall.
Yeah.
But she wasn’t thinking about Kurt. Or the straddling. Or the heartache. She was a regular Harry Price.
Sheldon fazed through the floor and Penny fell on her bottom. “Balls!”
Sheldon reappeared a second later, stepping guardedly from his bedroom as if his bones would shatter into a million pieces if his pacing were too asymmetrical or his footfalls too heavy. He was wearing a woolen hat folded over his ears. Its tassels swung back and forth like braided pendulums. He raised his eyes to the ceiling, unable to look Penny in the face. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Did I hur--“
“No. Really.” Penny held out her hand for Sheldon to take. He hesitated before he helped her stand to her feet. As always, he felt as cold as ice, yet soft. He felt Tempur-Pedic mattressy, only made of sterner stuff, prone to frittering away at a moment’s notice. He felt wafer thin, but dense, too.
He made no sense, basically.
Penny’s mind reeled at the ridiculousness of the illusory appendage in her hand, working overtime in its attempts to categorize the uncategorized. To name a color that didn’t exist in the realm of visible light. This wasn’t the first time she had felt Sheldon, but it was the first time contact with his skin had lasted more than a split second.
Penny pressed the palm of her other hand flat against his chest. The cloth of his shirt merely felt cold, like she expected it would, and so touched his face.
Sheldon closed his eyes. His nostrils flared. “May I ask what you’re doing?”
“You feel so weird!” Penny exclaimed in her Dude-Where’s-My-Car? voice.
“I wouldn’t know.” He let her faze through him.
Penny pulled her hands back. “You can’t feel?”
“Of course I can’t! My nerve endings are--“
“Don’t you dare say the D-word! What am I supposed to do with Ramona?”
Sheldon didn’t offer any suggestions.
“Has she done this before?”
“Once before.”
“You didn’t show yourself to her?”
“I’ve only ever showed myself to you.” He paused. “Accidentally.”
“Who have you appeared to on purpose?”
“No one!” Sheldon squeaked, clearly upset by the idea. “I meant that I only ever appeared to you, which was an accident!” He gave Penny a familiar, fleeting look. The same one when they first met. It spoke volumes without saying a word. In a foreign language, though, because Penny didn’t understand. “As for Ramona, she was never allowed to come inside my apartment, much less use things of mine in her attempts to converse with me beyond the grave! It’s your fault, all the evil that has befallen me today!”
Penny peeked around the corner and into the living room, her back against the wall, James Bond-esque. Sure enough, Ramona had collected a few of Sheldon’s belongings and arranged them in a star shape on the coffee table; his dry-erase marker, his fork, his striped pillow, a collection of papers, his laptop, and his mug. She was chanting something ominous. “What’s she saying?”
“She’s speaking in Latin. Titillating me with the memory of the senses that have been denied to me upon my death. Taste, smell, and touch.”
Penny laughed quietly to herself. “So if I start describing what a peach tastes like you’ll freak out? Or does it have to be in Latin?”
“That’s a common misconception. Latin has nothing to do with it.” Sheldon joined her in spying on Ramona. His eyes glazed over again. “Oh, Lord, she’s touching my stuff.”
Penny stopped him from running into the living room, for he was solid again. She held him by his elbows and made him stand in front of her. “What’s the big deal?”
“What’s the big deal?” Sheldon almost rippled to pieces. He stooped so that she and he were on the same level, the anger in his voice ethereal. “The soul has the capacity to feel, but not in this world. Not well in this world. Being deprived of something as simple as the deliciousness of an intake of breath. Something as simple as the feel of your heart beating in your chest. Or the smell and taste of Thai on Monday nights. Frankly, it’s Hell on Earth.”
Penny was suddenly very aware of her breathing. She watched her breath blossom across Sheldon’s face like plumes of vellum.
Ramona stopped chanting. “Fiddlesticks!”
Penny took the opportunity to flee from Sheldon, mock-sympathize with the estrange graduate student, and show her out of the apartment while reluctantly pinky-swearing a sisterhood (the basis of which she did not fully comprehend). Penny stepped out of the apartment for some much-needed alone time. She rubbed her upper arms, taking a moment to feel what she felt. Really feel. The friction on her skin. The way her fingertips tingled at the contact, probably because she was so focused on the sensation.
She was really, freakin’ thankful this morning.
“Penny?”
Penny blinked. Leonard lingered in the doorway of his apartment. It had been so long--rather, it seemed like so long--since someone had called her Penny, she almost didn’t respond to her name. Penny blushed at the realization. Stupid Sheldon and his stupid Queen Penelope fixation. “Hey, Leonard.” She flashed him a smile, embarrassed that this was their second meeting and she was, yet again, in her pajamas.
Leonard, on the other hand, was dressed casually in a pair of jeans and an assortment of layers. A hoodie and zippers galore. “Hey, um...” He rubbed the back of his neck. “...are you doing anything...”
He protracted his question for so long, Penny asked, “Ever?”
“Today,” he finished.
“I’m working.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” Penny made a disappointed noise out of the side of her mouth even though she wasn’t disappointed. Not that she didn’t like Leonard. She did. She was just a bit distracted at the moment. “What’s the rub, sweetie?”
“I was hoping we could go grab some coffee or something. But if you don’t want to, that’s okay. I mean, you aren’t obligated--I was just going to pay you back for making me coffee yesterday.”
If Penny’s heart had had arms, it would have flailed them. “I’d love that. I’m off tomorrow.”
“Wh--really? Great!”
“Yeah. It’s a date.” Penny shut herself inside 4A with a spring in her step.
Sheldon was standing beside his spot, staring at the little butt print on his cushion. He made a God-awful moaning sound that did his ghostly stature justice. “You’re making a grave error,” he said.
Penny stalled, thinking he was going off about his invasion of privacy instead of Leonard. “Excuse me?”
Sheldon’s mouth twisted into a frown. “He’s not the one you’re--“
Penny silenced him with a wave of her hand. “Okay, okay. I get it. You don’t like Leonard. I don’t understand why, but you don’t.”
Sheldon walked through the coffee table just so he could stare down his nose at her. Penny held her ground. “I could explain myself fully, I you’d prefer.”
“No, thank you.” Penny’s eyes narrowed to slits. “For a ghost who harps on about feelings, you sure aren’t very mindful of other people’s.” She marched to the bathroom before Sheldon could say something about how he had explicated touch, taste, and smell of the soul, not emotions. Or whatever. Penny took her shower without the slightest sign of sabotage from Dr. Cooper, anyway.
Maybe she hit an illusory nerve.
Penny didn’t see hide nor hair of Sheldon before she left for work.
ooo
Penny unlocked 4A and poked her head inside the door.
Sheldon had his arm draped across the top of his board, his nose a hairsbreadth from the scrawl of his handwritten equations. He tapped the tip of one of his markers against his chin. His corporeal chin.
Perfect.
Penny smirked. She tip-toed to the couch, quickly assembled the Dollar Tree toy she bought on her way home from the Cheesecake Factory, stashing the plastic bag under the coffee table in the meantime. She took aim and pulled the trigger, hardly able to suppress the laughter bubbling in her throat. A foam projectile jettisoned across the room and hit Sheldon square on the back of his head.
Penny counted five Mississippis before he mustered the composure to stop ignoring her. “Surprise!”
Sheldon cocked his eyebrow.
“You said you played paintball on the weekends, right?” Penny waved another unopened Nerf gun for Sheldon to see. “I’m not sorry about what I said earlier, but I know I’ve been a pain in your ass since I got here so this is my way of saying thank you for putting up with me and my llama drama.”
Sheldon blinked.
“Llama drama being girl drama.”
Sheldon looked from Penny, to the Nerf gun, to Penny again. “In what universe is a Nerf gun a paintball gun?”
Pop. Penny shot him in the chest.
Sheldon scowled.
“I’m not made of money, okay?” Penny pointed to the foam balls on the floor by his feet. “Could you grab those for me? Each gun only came with two balls.”
Sheldon was suddenly looming, foam balls in one hand and (liberated) Nerf gun in the other. He loaded the plastic chamber and shot Penny between the eyes. “I can shoot so close to a raccoon that it craps itself,” he drawled.
“Good for you.” Penny tore open the other Nerf gun and shot him in the crotch. “I shoot to kill.”
Pop.
Pop. Pop.
Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.
ooo
Penny gasped for breath, bracing herself on her knees. “Cheater!” She rocked on her heels and fell over backwards onto the couch.
“I do not cheat.”
“You can’t dissipate in the middle of a Nerf fight, Sheldon!”
“I did no such thing.”
“My ball went right through you!”
“No. You missed.”
“Bite me.”
“There’s no need to get upset.”
“I’m not upset!”
“The register of your voice suggests otherwise.”
“Register this.”
“That is very unladylike, Penelope.” When she didn’t retort, Sheldon asked, “Penny?”
Still nothing.
He hurriedly checked her vitals. Once he assured himself that she had only fallen asleep, he fetched a blanket from the closet and tucked her in, taking off her shoes, carefully sliding a pillow behind her head, and repositioning her limbs until she resembled himself when he used to go to sleep. Straight as an arrow, her hands folded across her stomach.
He couldn’t. No, he shouldn’t.
To Hell with it.
Sheldon gauged the distance, leaned forward, and kissed her mouth.
He felt nothing. Like always.
“Irony, thou art a heartless bitch.”