Written for a song meme on Livejournal: imyourheroine gave me the song 10,000 Nights by Alphabeat. I don't like the song, but I like the lyrics and I love Penny.
-x-
Sheldon is nothing like any of the guys she's dated before. For one thing he's Sheldon, which means he's pretty weird. Anyone who's met Sheldon would tell you that. If she had to go into details, she could make a list. He's tall, all right, but not muscular at all. She could beat him at arm wrestling any day. In fact, she has. It was very satisfactory. Sheldon talks easily enough but he's not what you'd call a good conversationalist.
They also have very few things in common. They used to have nothing in common at all, but they're working on that. Sheldon taught her how to play WoW and got her to watch Battlestar Galactica. She's never been able to get Sheldon interested in any of her hobbies, but she's trying.
Also, completely unlike most guys she's dated, Sheldon looks like a jerk and is actually a nice person. Or at least most of the times. Or at least the times that counted. She stopped being insulted by Sheldon's better-than-you attitude a long time ago: the sky is blue, Sheldon thinks I'm stupid, nothing new in the world. It's just the natural order of things. As long as she knows that Sheldon will be there if she needs him, she'll manage.
Of course, provided that she doesn't need him while his schedule says he should be doing laundry or something like that. Sheldon really needs to add an emergency clause to his schedule, and no, she's not going to use the bat-signal to signal an emergency.
But that's the thing. The basic difference, the one big thing that makes Sheldon different from all the Jacobs and Marks and Harveys that she dated in the past, is that Sheldon stuck around. He stuck around through Penny's endless rants about her failure to get any acting jobs, through her despair at losing her first acting job, through her horrific breakup with Leonard and through the two even more horrific subsequent breakups.
He's been a constant in her life for years, and you can see it from all the little details. Case in point: she would have never used the word 'constant' before meeting Sheldon. Sometimes she wonders if he knew that it would make her fall for him. Probably not, she thinks, this is Sheldon after all. Thinking that he could understand the subtleties of human romance is kind of like thinking that toasters are a sentient race planning to take over the world.
But he had to notice some change. She was sure that something about her had been different since that morning when she woke up and thought, "Oh crap, I think I'm in love with my crazy nerdy neighbor."
Sometimes she stares at him and wonders. And that's another good thing about Sheldon: you can stare all you want and nobody will find it strange, because everyone is always staring at Sheldon for one reason or another.
So anyway, she stares at Sheldon and wonders what she'll do now. The idea of starting a relationship with Sheldon is strange. Sheldon has the same concept of romance as the aforementioned toasters. She doubts that Sheldon would do dating or kissing or anything traditionally associated with a relationship. But she can't deny that she's thought about it. About them. Together.
She doesn't think she's ready to tell him right now, or tomorrow, or next week. Maybe it'll take her a year or two to find the courage to ask Sheldon out, or maybe ten years. Maybe twenty or more. But it's okay: she has all the time in the world, and Sheldon will stick around.
