A/N - New story time! Obviously starting on a Monday, can't give that up! I'm going to aim for updating this once a week. Not sure how long it will be… but bear with me! It's AU. Set in the modern day, Leonard and Penny are teenagers - Penny 16, Leonard 17. Ah, reflecting back on those days! Since, in The 8 Simple Rules Paradigm, you guys settled on Nebraska, this'll be set in Nebraska. I'm not narrowing down to a specific high school or area, because I simply don't know enough about Nebraska and also I already painted a picture in my head of the location and I just don't want to disrupt that ;) Oh I should have mentioned. This is like… the background prequel and sequel to the events and stuff in The 8 Simple Rules Paradigm. I started writing it when I finished it just as a way to have it down and know in my mind how things happened and stuff. So, now it's here :) Anyway, enough from me. Hope you enjoy this story, you all know I love hearing from you :)
Tentatively, Leonard cleared his throat as he approached the table at which the blonde girl who had been sat for an hour and forty-eight minutes without so much as turning the page of her textbook was staring into space. His heart began to race as he opened his mouth to speak, wondering why he had even thought to come over in the first place when just the idea of speaking to her was nerve-wracking. "Umm… hey. Hi. Can I help you?"
Looking up from the page she had been staring at for what felt like an eternity, Penny found herself looking at a slightly scared looking bespectacled boy with a neat mass of brown curly hair who, if she remembered rightly from the School Awards Ceremony a couple of weeks ago, was in the year above her and incredibly smart. Blinking a few times to try focus herself, she gave him a confused smile as he fidgeted with the sleeves of his jacket, but didn't say anything.
"It's just that you haven't turned the page for like... nearly two hours." Leonard said in response to her acknowledgement of his presence.
"Oh." Penny finally came to her senses, and cleared her throat slightly. Glancing at her empty exercise book and untouched textbook, she felt herself blush slightly. "Yeah."
"Okay." He nodded awkwardly at her, before sighing as though to tell himself to just get his words out. "Did, umm, did you need any... any help?" This was terrifying, absolutely terrifying. Worse than having to play a cello solo in front of the entire orchestra.
Looking quickly again to the textbook and her empty notes, she furrowed her brow and bit her lip apologetically as she looked back up at him. "Uh, really? Would you mind?"
"Sure, not at all." He looked nervously at the chair next to her. "Can I sit here?"
"Of course." Penny smiled at him, and she found herself smoothing down her sweater slightly as he sat himself down next to her.
"Thank you. I'm Leonard by the way." He held his hand out to her.
"I'm Penny," she replied, shaking his hand. Suddenly her eyes grew wide and her face burst into a grin. "Hey, I do know you! You won those awards and things at the School Awards Ceremony... Leonard Hofstadter!"
"Yeah, that's me." Leonard shrugged and gave her a shy smile, not used to being recognized by anyone other than his few immediate friends. "I didn't know people actually paid attention at those."
"Well, I had to, I was collecting the Cheerleading award with the squad." Penny beamed proudly at him.
He suddenly looked mortified, as though the fact that he had just found out he was talking to and sat next to a cheerleader was an absolute unthinkable event. "Oh! Right. Yeah, Penny, I remember you now. You look really different when you're not in your Cheerleading uniform. Sorry."
"Of course I look different. I don't walk around in it with my hair scraped up all the time, do I? And why'd you say sorry for?"
"I dunno." Leonard began fidgeting with his sleeves again, averting his gaze. "I've just never spoken to a Cheerleader before."
"And I've never spoken to a…" she paused, trying to think of a better word to use than 'nerd', "…someone who won an 'academic' award before, so, what's your point?" Penny raised a brow at him, frowning.
"I'm not sure. I don't know. I'm sorry." Leonard shook his head, wishing he was better at having conversations with people, deciding to quickly change the subject. "Umm, so, you're a cheerleader… is that… is that fun?"
"Yeah, it is fun." Penny nodded enthusiastically. "Well, until you get yelled at for like two weeks because you still can't do the splits. I can't help it, I'm just too scared to go all the way down!"
"Oh, that's too bad. I'm sure you'll get there." Leonard offered with a tiny shrug.
"Maybe. I didn't make the team last year because I 'wasn't flexible enough'. What kind of crap is that?" Penny rolled her eyes, scoffing.
Leonard wanted to tell her that that was probably a fair point; from what he'd seen of the cheerleading routines, flexibility was a fairly important part of it - but decided against it. "At least you made it onto the team this year."
"Yeah, I suppose." Penny dropped her hands onto the table in front of her. "Anyway, now my Dad's getting mad at me because my grades suck and I don't even know where I'm supposed to start. There's so much stuff in here!" She jabbed at the textbook accusingly.
"Well," Leonard looked at the textbook, pulling it towards him, "what, in Math, do you struggle with the most?"
"Everything." Penny grumbled.
"Oh. Then, I guess, we can start at the beginning of this text book, and the easy bits - we can skip over those, and focus on the bits you really don't get." He flipped to the contents page of the book she'd been staring at.
"So, we'll be doing the whole book then. Great," she sighed, looking uncertainly at the contents page.
"We don't have to do all of it if you don't want, I mean, that's a lot of time with me, it was just a suggestion-"
"Oh, no, no," Penny sat up suddenly, her brows raised in worry. "No, I didn't mean... I just meant, great, that's a lot of studying to do, and I'm not good at studying, and I probably should have paid attention in math class. That wasn't about you. I'm sorry." She gave him a reassuring smile. "Okay, lets start at the beginning then."
"Are you sure? Because we don't have to if you don't want to."
"I do, I do want to, it's a good idea. It's just a lot of studying. But I guess if I have you to help me then it won't be as bad as it was trying to do it by myself." Penny smiled at him. "It'll be nice having you here with me."
"Okay." Leonard nodded. Well, at least it wasn't spending time with him that she was complaining about. However, he had no idea how to take her compliments… were they compliments?
"Right…" Penny looked at the textbook, and then back at Leonard, picking up her pencil. "Chapter one, then. Lets go."
"Umm, is it… is it too much to ask if you could help me study tomorrow as well?" Penny bit her lip as they exited the library, her books tucked under her left arm, looking up at Leonard apologetically. She didn't want to impose on him, or subject him to trying to teach her, or force her inability to study alone upon him - but he had been incredibly helpful, and very kind about the things she struggled with and got frustrated at herself for. And if she was honest, she just really enjoyed his company.
"Oh, yeah, sure, I'd be happy to." Leonard nodded, trying not to feel excited that somebody was actually suggesting that they wanted to spend some more time with him - a girl wanted to spend time with him, a popular girl - even if it was just for studying, she did seem to be a genuinely nice person.
"Oh my God, thank you." Penny breathed a sigh of relief, before scrunching her face up nervously. "And, uh, Wednesday too?"
"Okay," he replied quietly.
"And... okay, it's just, I have a test next week and I want to at least not fail it this time, so-"
"Thursday and Friday too?" Leonard finished for her, an amused smile beginning to form on his lips.
"Is that too much to ask from you? I... if you have other plans then that's okay, I won't interrupt, you can get on with your life-"
"Oh, come on, do I look like the kind of person who has other plans?" Leonard chuckled slightly, before realizing how sad that made him sound. "It's fine, I'll help you."
"You seriously have no other plans this week?" Penny pulled a face at him.
"Other than studying, playing video games and stuff on the weekend with my friends... no, not really." Leonard shook his head.
"So... what do you do for fun?"
"I just told you - video games and stuff." He said this as though it were obvious.
"Oh, alright. I've never played a video game before. But... if you're sure you're okay with helping me study all week? Really sure?"
"Absolutely! It's more exciting than studying alone, anyway."
"Aw, okay, well, thank you, so, so much." Penny smiled sweetly at him as they left through the main gates. "I'll go over the stuff you showed me tonight, and have a look over the next chapter of the book for tomorrow."
"Wow, alright, that's more enthusiasm than I thought you'd have for this. But that sounds good."
"Well, if I'm studying, I might as well be all in, mightn't I?" Penny shrugged. "I'll meet you in the library after school?"
"Yeah, okay."
"Oh, here," Penny pulled her phone out from her pocket, unlocking it. "We should swap numbers in case one of us is late, or the library's too full, or something."
"R-really?" Leonard stuttered. She wanted his number? "Alright. Sure." He pulled his phone from his pocket and unlocked it before handing it over to her.
They typed their numbers into each others phones, and Leonard had to remind himself that this was just exchanging numbers for academic purposes - nothing more, it was just a practical move. Penny bit her lip as she slowly entered her number, wondering why she felt this nervous over simply giving Leonard her phone number. Was this what people meant when they used the phrase 'butterflies in my stomach' - and why was she getting them now? Her friends would probably laugh at her for this if she told them - firstly for feeling nervous about something so little as giving a guy her number, and secondly, because it was Leonard and he was... well, a nerd. A sweet, kind, and cute nerd.
"Here," Penny handed his phone back, releasing a breath she didn't realize she had been holding.
"Thanks. Here." Taking his phone, he passed back hers.
"So, same place and time tomorrow, yeah?" Penny confirmed again.
"Yeah," he nodded.
"Alright. Good. Again, thank you so much. What way are you going from here?"
"Home."
"No, I meant, which way is home for you?" Penny giggled. "Are you going left or right from here?"
"Oh! Left."
"Me too!" Penny grinned excitedly, and they began walking again, Leonard resuming fidgeting with his sleeves. "So how far is your house?"
"Not too far, I'm only up the top of this road and then left down the hill and a short walk from there."
"Oh, that's not too bad then."
"What about you?"
"I'm right up the top of the hill. Then you know the funny roads from there? Up one of those. It seems like a long walk but it's actually not so bad when you're used to it."
"You live in one of those big houses?" Leonard asked, remembering the area from when he and his friends had done a massive scavenger hunt a couple of weeks ago.
"Uh-huh. Got a big garden too, with some chickens right out back. The farms only ten minutes walk up the road, which is awesome. I like going up to the farm, sometimes I go ride the horses but not so much these days." Penny explained, though she was much more interested in Leonard's house. "What's your house like? Is it one of the proper housey-houses? Like, on a normal street? With a neat fence?"
"Yeah. It's like all of them in that area. Semi-detached, little front garden and drive, back garden... we don't have chickens though."
"That would be funny keeping chickens round there." Penny giggled.
"My mom wouldn't like having chickens. She doesn't even let me go to the farm, she says it's too mucky." Leonard frowned, and they approached the top of the road, slowing their pace down.
"Oh, that's sad. You'll have to come over and I'll take you one day, I think you'd like the animals. I'll show you my favourite horse too. Anyway, I'll see you tomorrow?"
"Yeah, okay." Leonard smiled, trying not to focus on her possible invitation to hang out one day, out of school and not for studying.
"Great. It was really nice to meet you, Leonard."
"You too, Penny."
Leaning up slightly on her tiptoes, Penny wrapped one arm around Leonard to give him a hug. Not used to this display of affection, he stiffly placed one arm around her. Again, Penny felt those butterflies in her stomach (she was now sure it was butterflies, rather than just a stomach bug - though she wasn't sure she'd have an explanation for either), and a slight blush arose in her cheeks before she pulled away.
"Okay, I'll see you after school tomorrow. Have a nice walk home. I'll study the next chapter tonight."
"You too, hope you're home before it's too dark."
"I hope so too." Penny nodded. "Bye, Leonard."
"Bye, Penny."
Somewhat reluctantly, both of them turned to go their separate ways.