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The Tropical Paradise Alteration
By JBean210

Based upon "The Tropical Paradise Theory" by SRAM

Published 1/24/2015

-=o=-

A/N: Okay, bear with me. I like the premise of SRAM's story "The Tropical Paradise Theory" and decided I would write an AAU (alternate alternate-universe) version of it, aka fan-fanfiction. The story lines will proceed more or less in parallel; only the details will change. At least at first.

-=o=-

Chapter One
Paradise in Jamaica

-=o=-

Leonard Hofstadter whistled softly to himself as he walked along the beach, making his way to the monitor shack to check equipment status and download the last 24 hours of data to his thumb drive for transmission back to the research teams at Oxford and Cal Tech.

June was coming to a close, and Leonard marveled at how quickly the past month had flown by. He had been here in Jamaica, staying at the Sunset Beach Resort for a month now, and the changes it had wrought in him, both physically and emotionally, had been tremendous. He was relaxed and tanned from laying in the sun after his few hours of work were completed each day; perhaps even a little bit buffed, he imagined, by his semi-regular trips to the weight room of the resort. He was no Schwarzenegger, of course, but he no longer felt quite so self-conscious leaving his tropical shirt unbuttoned when he went out in the morning. His legs, so pasty-white and thin a month ago, were now a much healthier shade of tan, and his calves and thighs had put on mass from his daily morning walk to and from his beachfront suite. He did have a vehicle, of course—an SUV supplied by the research grant, to use for driving to the monitor station and back—but he rarely used it for that purpose. The station was nearly inaccessible by road, anyway, and he would have had to walk almost as far after he'd driven the SUV to the end of the access road between resorts.

As he whistled, Leonard realized he was whistling the theme song to the original Star Trek television show. He smiled, thinking of whistling that same tune at his favorite restaurant that night. Especially if Martha was there. It was Martha who usually waited on him when he ate there, which was pretty regular since they served good food there. He and Martha had developed something of a friendship during his time on the island, and she would sometimes sit and talk with him while he ate. He would innocently whistle that tune, to see if she recognized it. And of course, who wouldn't—almost everyone knew Star Trek! Then he would ask her if she knew the words to the song. "There are words to that song?" he imagined Martha asking. "I never knew that!"

"Well, let's see if I can remember them," Leonard would say (of course he knew the words—he had memorized them many years ago):

Beyond
The rim of the star-light
My love
Is wand'ring in star-flight
I know
He'll find in star-clustered reaches
Love,
Strange love a star woman teaches.
I know
His journey ends never
His star trek
Will go on forever.
But tell him
While he wanders his starry sea
Remember, remember me.

Leonard only hoped he could keep from tearing up as he recited these words. He brushed a bit of sand (yeah, that's what it was, Hofstadter!) from his eyes, smiling at the awed look on Martha's face at the depth of his Star Trek knowledge. And was there perhaps a hint of interest there as well? Leonard was still trying to work out just how interested Martha was in him. But he was getting closer and closer to her, he hoped. Perhaps before he returned to California he would work up the courage to ask her out.

There was an ironic smile on his lips as Leonard thought back two months, to the day he'd gotten the email offering this position to him. He had not been interested, not at all! The North Sea research mission had been—well, if not a nightmare, more like a very surreal dream. He had expected, as it was sponsored by the Great Man, Professor Stephen Hawking himself, that it would be very focused, very no-nonsense and highly research-driven. Instead, it had been a three-month long party, with everyone enjoying themselves tremendously and continuously.

Except for Leonard.

He'd tried. He'd really tried, especially since there were some pretty hot-looking women scientists on the boat with him—both men and women were about equally represented among the research teams. But he'd felt awkward, out of place—it felt like he couldn't completely relax among people he didn't really know, not like he knew Raj, Howard, and Sheldon. Not that any of them were much in the way of ladies' men. Well, Howard imagined he was, and Raj sometimes as well, when he had some alcohol in him. Sheldon, of course, was just—Sheldon. An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, wrapped in—crazy.

One thing that had helped Leonard decide to take this assignment had been Sheldon himself. Sheldon had undergone something of a "crisis of faith" in his life right around the time Leonard had been offered the chance to go to Jamaica. Some new developments in dark matter research, coupled with absolutely nothing going on in string theory, had shaken Sheldon's long-term plans to confirm string theory and win the Nobel Prize in physics. He had tried to switch his field of research, only to have the university reject his proposal. Like a petulant child, Sheldon had run away. Well, as far as the train station. But when he, Howard and Raj went to get him, Sheldon declared that he was leaving on a train and didn't know when he'd be back. In just about everyone's estimation, this confirmed the theory that Sheldon was bat-shit crazy.

But he'd done it, Leonard had to admit. Sheldon actually got on a train and left California. He checked in from time to time with them, though his whereabouts remained mostly a mystery. He'd been gone for six weeks now, and no one had yet called for them to come and claim his body, so he must be doing okay, Leonard and his friends had reasoned.

It had made Leonard realize something as well. If Sheldon Cooper could leave his comfort zone, could go out into the world to do some traveling and find himself, or whatever the heck he was doing out there, then Leonard Hofstadter could stretch himself a bit as well. On top of that, he'd gotten a personal phone call from Stephen Hawking himself, asking Leonard to consider taking the assignment, that Professor Hawking wanted someone as dedicated and conscientious as Leonard had proven to be monitoring his data. Well, after that it was easy-peasy.

Leonard stopped for a moment as he came to the small peninsula where the monitor station was located, out at the far end. Up the beach a short distance was a private resort, one that catered to the wealthy and powerful. Sunset Beach was a great resort, but he wondered just what went on in the private ones, where supermodels and movie stars no doubt luxuriated in hot tubs and sat down to eat seven-course banquets every day. He searched the patios and balconies for any signs of occupancy—normally there was no one and nothing to see.

Except for this morning. He could just make out two people, both women, standing on a spacious-looking balcony at the top of the building. They seemed to be looking out over the beach—it was hard for Leonard to tell, they were far enough away and his vision, even with his glasses on, wasn't the greatest.

Well, if they were looking at him, Leonard reasoned, he wouldn't disappoint them. He turned and began walking down the peninsula to the monitor station. Would the women still be there when he returned in a few minutes? He smiled at the thought, then admonished himself: Better concentrate on Martha, not two faceless women he would probably never have a chance to meet, much less get to know and perhaps have something deeper happen with one of them.

-=o=-

Penelope slowly opened her eyes, trying to keep the morning light from blinding her as she struggled to wake up. The bed wasn't familiar, and for a moment she looked around, disoriented, until she remembered where she was. This was the beginning of a much-needed vacation, a respite from the fast pace of movie-making and promotional talk-show interviews and dealing with the paparazzi. And, not dealing with Steven.

Steven had been the last major relationship in her life; failed, of course, because between the two of them their acting assignments had left little time to be together, and because Steven couldn't help being a jerk when he wasn't getting sex regularly from her. So she'd heard the stories and seen the photos of him with various other girls—Beyonce, Taylor, and a few actress-wannabees who thought hooking up with someone like him would propel them into the limelight of Hollywood. More often than not it had propelled them into nothing more than the Enquirer.

Finally, eight months ago, she had confronted him about it. Steven had tried to laugh off the infidelities as something that "just happens" when you're in Hollywood. "Not with me it doesn't 'just happen,'" she told him, and ended it then and there. It had been a hard breakup—the scandal rags splashed it across their front pages, with awful and mostly untrue details—but she'd gotten through it with the help of her friends and the picture she started shooting a few weeks later. Now that her new movie was in the can, she could afford to take a month or two off, relax, and just spend time with her friends. No men, and no complications.

She pushed the covers off herself, then heaved her legs over the edge of the bed and onto the floor, stopping for a moment to let the fogginess drain out of her head. The trip from LAX to Jamaica had been spent chatting and gossiping with Katie, Bernadette and Amy—her entourage (as the paparazzi called them) and her friends (as she called them). In the airport in Jamaica, they'd had porters gather their luggage and put it in a taxi, then they all piled into a limo for the trip down to the private resort her agent had booked for them. The limo's bar had been well-stocked, and even in the relatively short drive down to Montego Bay she had consumed a couple of stiff drinks and a wine cooler.

Once in their suite of rooms, they had really cut loose, laughing and running from room to room trying to decide who would sleep where. Penelope, of course, took the biggest room; rank did have its privileges! Katie took the one adjacent to hers, and Bernadette and Amy got the last two on the opposite end of the suite. Then they broke out the wine and sat around planning what they would and wouldn't do while they were on vacation. It was well into the wee hours of the morning before Katie half-carried her friend to her room and poured her into bed, not even bothering to take her sandals off.

Standing with a groan, she went into her private bathroom (nice!), tossed off her clothes, and stepped into the shower. She let the warm water pour over her, waking her and making her fully conscious once again. Drying off afterwards, she opened up one of her suitcases and found a top and shorts that looked good together, then padded softly into the living room area and went out on the suite's spacious patio to see what the view looked like.

It was fabulous. They were on the top floor of the suite and the view of the bay was fantastic. The temperature was warm, even this early in the morning (it couldn't be much past nine a.m.—almost the middle of the night, in her estimation!) and the was a light breeze coming in from the water. There was only one thing she really needed now—

"Coffee, Penny?" Her friends called her Penny, of course. Penelope was her starlet persona, bigger than life and twice as sassy. It was always a relief to turn off that part of her when she was out of the public eye. She turned, finding her best and oldest friend Katie holding out a cup of coffee toward her.

"You read my mind," Penny said, gratefully taking the cup and sipping from it. It was just how she liked it—hot but not scalding, with a bit of creamer and just enough sweetener to take the edge off the coffee's bitterness. "What are you doing up so early?" she asked, taking another sip.

"I was about to ask why you were up so late?" Katie grinned, sipping from her own cup. "But I guess I already know."

Penny shrugged. "Sue me—I'm on vacation, I'm going to drink a little."

"I've got no problem with that," Katie agreed. "Just remember, though, you're here to enjoy yourself, not drink yourself into a coma every night."

Penny rolled her eyes. "Yes, Mom," she said, only half-sarcastically. Penny and Katie had been friends since grade school, back in Nebraska. It was Katie who'd persuaded Penny to leave her small-town existence behind, to follow her dream and head for California to become a star. She'd even followed Penny herself a few years later, coming to the Golden State to make her own bid for stardom. She'd succeeded, too, but only modestly; her roles had made her well-known in Hollywood but hadn't propelled her into stardom like Penny.

"Which reminds me," Katie said, interrupting Penny's reverie. "Did you call your mom last night and let her know we made it here?"

"Not yet," Penny sighed. "I better, though—she worries if I don't text her at least once a week." She took out her phone and began composing a message to her mother: FLEW INTO JAMAICA LAST NIGHT. HAD A GOOD NIGHTS SLEEP. KATIE SAYS HELLO AND SENDS HER LOVE. ME TOO! XOXOX. She pushed send and her phone beeped as the text went off on its way to the heartlands of America.

"Ooh, check it out," Katie said as Penny was putting her phone away. "Stud muffin alert." She nodded toward a lone figure walking along the beach to the north of them, a guy in shirt and shorts.

"Mm," Penny nodded, not really paying attention; Katie was always pointing out guys for her to ogle, now that she was single again. This one wasn't even close enough to make out much detail about him; he had black hair, Penny could see, and appeared to be wearing sunglasses, though it was hard to tell at this distance.

"What do you think?" Katie asked, nudging her with an elbow.

"About what, a guy walking along a beach?" Penny asked, amused. "I think it's too bad he doesn't have someone with him. Or a dog or something."

"Oh, come on," Katie pouted. "It's okay to look, you know. It's not like you're going to run down there and hook up with him."

"Oh, it's so not like that," Penny agreed, sipping her coffee again. At that moment the figure on the beach stopped and looked around. What was he looking for? Penny wondered, watching him. Then his gaze seemed to settle on her, lingering for a long moment as he stood stock-still, staring in their direction. It seemed like he had seen them and was trying to get their attention. For a moment Penelope took over; she started to raise her hand, to wave at him, one of her many fans.

Then the figure turned and began walking up a small peninsula toward a small building at its far end, and Penny let her hand drop. So he hadn't been admiring her from afar. Well, that was probably for the best, Penny decided. She wasn't here to find a man, she was here to rest and recuperate with her friends after eight months of movie-making. "Come on," she said to Katie. "Let's get some breakfast." The two best friends walked back into their suite to check on how hungry the other two women were.

-=o=-

The balcony was empty when Leonard returned to the beach from the monitor station. It was no big deal, he told himself; he was being silly thinking the women might be there when he came back, watching just for him. Making his way back to his resort, he transferred the sensor data from the station to his research teams, then spent the rest of the morning making his daily reports and intermittently checking Facebook status on Howard and Raj. Neither of them had anything particularly juicy on their pages (other than Howard's description of a brisket his mom had made the night before—Howard had described it as a personal best for her). At least that was more than Sheldon had on his; since he'd left California he hadn't bothered with Facebook updates, or Twitter, Instagram or Google+, for that matter. There was only an occasional email these days, informing them he was still traveling and didn't know when he would return.

The phone suddenly rang. Leonard stared at it in surprise—it had hardly rang since he'd gotten here. The caller ID said it was an Arizona phone number. He picked it up. "Hello?"

"Hello, Leonard." It was Sheldon. Leonard smiled, surprised but pleased he'd finally called.

"Hey, buddy, it's good to hear your voice," he said happily.

"Leonard," Sheldon said, "I'm in Kingman, Arizona. I need you to come pick me up."

What now? "Um, that's going to be a little hard for me, Sheldon. I'm in Jamaica."

"Leonard, I'm at the police station," Sheldon continued as if he hadn't heard what Leonard said. "I was robbed! They took my wallet, my iPad, everything!"

"Oh no," Leonard groaned. "Are you okay?"

"No, I'm not okay!" Sheldon exclaimed. "I'm-I'm wearing borrowed pants, I don't have ID, and—" his voice dropped in volume "—one of the officers here won't stop calling me 'chicken legs!'"

Leonard smiled in spite of his friend's predicament. "Okay, look," he said, patiently. "I can't come get you, but—"

"Why can't you come?" Sheldon demanded. "It's only a six-hour drive from Pasadena to Kingman—I had one of the officers here look it up."

"Sheldon, I told you, I'm not in Pasadena. I'm in Jamaica right now."

"What are you doing in Jamaica, Vermont?" Sheldon asked. "I was in Vermont a week ago, by the way—if I'd known you were going to be there I'd have waited for you."

"Not that Jamaica," Leonard said. "I'm in Jamaica, the country—you know, for that research assignment Professor Hawking wanted me to go on."

"I thought you weren't going to take that," Sheldon said, beginning to sound agitated. "Oh, this is a disaster! I've been robbed, I have no money, I don't even have my own pair of pants—how am I going to get home?!"

"Don't worry, buddy," Leonard assured him. "I'm on it. Just give me your address there and I'll have someone come get you." Leonard wrote down the address of the police station in Kingman, assuring Sheldon someone would be there as soon as possible, then hung up and called Howard.

"Ya-hello," Howard said. "Hey, Leonard, how're things going in Bootylicious-Land?"

"Just fine, Howard, but we've got a problem."

"What's up?"

"Sheldon just called me from Arizona. He's been robbed and he's at the police station there. I said I'd find someone to come get him."

"Oh, and you immediately thought of me," Howard snorted. "Thanks, pal. When you get back I'll return the favor and schedule a colonoscopy for you."

"Come on, Howard. Sheldon doesn't have anyone else to turn to."

"All right," Howard said, reluctantly. "I'll go get him. But you owe me. What's the address?"

Leonard gave him the pertinent information, then added, "You might want to go over to our apartment and get him a pair of pants to wear home. And he's got a spare phone in his desk. And I'm pretty sure he'll want his toothbrush."

"You're joking," Howard said disbelievingly.

"No, I'm not," Leonard said, "and it's really depressing I know that much about Sheldon in the first place."

"Okay, I'm on my way," Howard said. "Maybe I'll bring Raj along, too. That way I can spread the hell around a little." He hung up and Leonard clicked his phone off. Well, that sounded like the end of Sheldon Cooper's Fun with Trains Travelogue. He could hardly wait for the episodes to come out on YouTube. Smiling, Leonard went back to his daily reports thinking, tonight he'd have something else interesting to talk about with Martha. She'd already heard a lot about Sheldon in the past month.

-=o=-

"So what should we all do tonight?" Bernadette asked when they returned to their suite after a poolside brunch.

"I suppose taking in a movie is off the table," Amy said, looking at Penny. "Although you are playing at the Palace Multiplex tonight."

"Seen it," Penny said, smiling. Amy had been the last person to join their group, having been a colleague of Bernadette's since the two of them had collaborated on a few papers involving both micro- and neurobiology. At first, Amy had been something of a wet blanket, but she, Katie and Bernadette had managed to loosen her up some.

Maybe too loose, Penny added to herself. Amy had something of a "crush" on Penny, if it could be called that. It was an odd mixture of admiration and sexual attraction, which was strange considering Amy told everyone she was straight.

"It couldn't hurt seeing it again," Amy continued, giving Penny a disarming and slightly creepy smile. "We all know how good you were in that picture."

"True, I was fabulous," Penny agreed, joking.

"Well, I vote for dinner and some clubbing," Bernadette put in. Both Katie and Penny looked at her, surprised. Bernadette was the brainiac of the group—she had taken a lot of courses in college besides the ones for her biology degree; she practically had another major in physics, and had told them that for a while, she had seriously considered going into physics rather than biology. She and Penny had known each other since their days at the Cheesecake Factory together, and they'd kept in touch after Penny had gotten her big break. "Don't look so surprised," Bernadette told them. "I mean, what are we here for if not to have a good time?"
"You're right," Katie agreed. "It sounds like a plan, then. I'll find us a nice restaurant and check out the night clubs in town." She went over to the laptop computer the resort's concierge had set up for them and began surfing the web.

A few minutes later she turned to face the group again. Penny, Bernadette and Amy had been trying to decide what to do that afternoon before dinner. As if there were any doubt, Katie added to herself. "I found a place not far from here," she said. "It's got a pretty good rating on the food and service. From there we can head into Montego Bay and check out the clubbing scene."

Penny nodded. "And we all know what we're doing this afternoon?" She paused expectantly.

"Shopping for shoes!" Amy, Bernadette and Katie all shouted at once.

"Damn right!" Penny agreed. It was practically a tradition for her to buy a new pair of shoes in every city she visited, whether for work or play. Katie got on the phone to the driving service, ordering a car to take them to the nearest shopping center. A full-size one, she decided, anticipating hauling a lot of merchandise back to the resort by the time they were done.

-=o=-

After an afternoon of sunbathing, drinking tall glasses of tea and surreptitiously surveilling the women sunbathers around him, Leonard retired to his room to shower and head out for dinner. He put on another tropical shirt and a pair of white shorts like the ones he'd been wearing that morning, then slipped into his sandals and drove the SUV over to Martha's restaurant.

The hostess smiled as he entered. "Welcome back!" she beamed happily at him. Leonard had been coming here so regularly that most of the staff treated him like an old friend. And he did tip well, he reminded himself.

"Hi, Angela," he greeted her in return. Seeing Martha behind the bar, he asked, "Is it okay if I sit at the bar tonight?"

Angela glanced toward Martha. "Of course," she said, leading him over. "Here you are," she said, placing a menu in front of him and returning to her station.

"Hey, Leonard," Martha said, coming over to take his drink order. "Long time no see," she joked.

"Yeah, almost a whole day," Leonard said, joking right back at her.

"Having your usual drink tonight?" she asked. Leonard normally had iced tea with his meals.

"Maybe not." He sat back, thinking about what else he could try. "Maybe something with a kick to it," he suggested. "But not—not too big a kick. I have to drive back to my room afterwards."

Martha laughed. "I suppose a Flaming Bob Marley is out," she guessed.

"Probably so," he agreed. "I'm not even sure who Bob Marley is."

"Oh dear, Leonard," Martha shook her head. "Do you live under a rock up there in America?"

"Well, it's a comfortable rock," Leonard joked.

"How about an Appleton Spiced Iced Tea?" she suggested. "Since you're an iced tea drinker?"

"Alright," Leonard nodded. "And I think I'll have some jerk chicken tonight, with rice and plantain."

"Ah, going native, eh?" Martha kidded him. Normally Leonard had a hamburger or some grilled fish, nothing out of the ordinary.

Leonard shrugged. "Just getting out of the box a little," he said. "You never know when doing something unexpected will help you get, um, lucky." Which was about as risqué a statement he'd ever made to her.

Martha smiled at him. "You never know," she agreed. "I'll put the order up for you," she said, setting his spiced iced tea in front of him and bringing his ticket over to the kitchen window. Leonard took a sip of his tea, finding it smooth yet with a bit of a kick that regular iced tea didn't have. Martha had chosen well for him.

There was a small commotion at the front of the restaurant as a group of people entered, laughing and talking. Leonard glanced toward the front but the entrance was out of his direct line of sight. He turned back to the bar and took a another sip of his tea, enjoying its spiciness.

The party, or whatever it was, was moving his way. This time Leonard didn't turn around. He could tell where they were just by hearing them talking. The hostess sat them at a table in the center of the room. They were discussing some kind of shopping expedition they'd been on that day; nothing of interest to Leonard. He took out his phone and started his Kindle app, bringing up Brian Greene's book on parallel universes to read.

"I don't know about you," Katie was saying to Penny. "But I worked up quite an appetite shopping."

"You hardly bought a thing," Penny pointed out, a little disappointed her friend hadn't enjoyed herself shopping. For Penny buying shoes was like entering Nirvana. She had three new exquisite pairs now, one pair of which were on her feet now.

"I was enjoying myself vicariously through you," Katie said. "You really get your Inner Shopper going when you're buying shoes."

"I'll say," Bernadette chimed in. "I thought she was going to have an orgasm when she picked up that last pair!"

"That's humorous," Amy chuckled. When the others looked at her, she added, "Because, you know, most of the time ordinary objects such as shoes don't induce such an intense reaction in the female nervous system."

"You mean, compared to something like—an electric toothbrush?" Bernadette teased her.

Amy's face went blank. She leaned closer to Bernadette. "You promised you wouldn't say anything about that!" she hissed.

"About what?" Katie asked, interested. It was always fun making Amy a little uncomfortable.

"About her toothbrush," Bernadette said, a wicked smile on her face. "His name's Gerard."

Kathy and Penny looked at each other. "Why would you name your toothbrush Gerard?" Penny asked.

"Um," Amy muttered. "Well—er…"

"She uses it for stress release," Bernadette supplied, still smiling.

"How is brushing your teeth going to relieve stress—oh," Katie suddenly saw what Bernadette was driving at. Amy had gone red-faced. "Well," Katie went on. "That's certainly a—creative—use for an electric toothbrush."

"I can't believe you would say something like that," Amy pouted, crossing her arms and turning away from Bernadette.

"Oh come on," Bernadette chided her. "You love that toothbrush and you know it. Didn't you tell me that every woman should have one just like it, for—stress relief?"

"Yes," Amy admitted. "But I would have preferred to introduce Gerard to my friends in my own time."

Penny smiled, tuning out the conversation between Bernadette and Amy. They always had good-natured spats over inconsequential things. She glanced around the room, which was still relatively empty—there was only one other person in this part of the restaurant, a lone guy sitting at the bar, his back to them.

As she stared at him, she realized the guy was wearing the same clothes she'd seen that morning, on the guy walking along the beach: a gaudy tropical shirt, white pants, and sandals. Quite a coincidence, she thought.

At that moment the guy's barstool turned and his face came into view. He was staring intently at his phone, as if he was reading something very important. Suddenly he shut off the phone and looked up.

Into Penny's eyes.

It was the guy from the beach. Penny could see his features much more clearly now, and they were identical to what she'd seen before from a distance: dark hair and glasses, though he wasn't wearing sunglasses now, just regular ones (and kind of dorky-looking black horned-rims at that). His eyebrows were full and expressive; they made him look kind of sad, she thought.

Sipping on his iced tea and reading Brian Greene, Leonard suddenly felt his bladder was a bit full. It was an inconvenient moment—but then, when was it ever convenient to go to the bathroom? Still reading, he spun his barstool around, finished the paragraph he was on, then put his phone to sleep and looked up.

In front of him was a beautiful blonde, staring directly at him. Leonard was mesmerized by her, forgetting even that he could rarely meet a woman's gaze and hold it until he knew them well.

Everything went into slow motion. Leonard was getting to his feet, sliding his phone into his shorts pocket. Except that he missed and the phone fell to the floor. He bent over to pick it up and his charge card fell out of his shirt pocket. He stood up, realized it had fallen out, then bent over again. When he stood again the blonde was smiling at him.

Was she laughing at him? Leonard winced, then made a beeline for the men's room, wondering if there was a window in there he could climb out of.

Katie, who'd been enjoying the repartee between Amy and Bernadette, noticed the guy at the bar staring at them, and his abrupt departure to the men's room. She glanced over at Penny, who at that moment looked down at the table, a solemn expression on her face. What had she missed?

She nudged Penny's arm. "Is everything okay?"

"Oh." Penny looked at her like she'd just awakened from a trance. "Sure. Yeah. Everything's fine. Why do you ask?" Penny wanted to know.

"You were staring at that guy," Katie nodded toward the men's room.

"What guy?" Penny asked blandly, trying to cover her tracks.

"The guy that was at the bar," Katie said, flatly. "What happened?"

"Who said anything happened?" Penny blurted. "I happened to look up as the guy walked out of the room. That's it."

"If you say so," Katie said, skeptically.

"I do say so," Penny insisted. "Nuuuthing happened, okay? Case closed."

"Okay," Katie shrugged, by now resolving to herself to get to the bottom of this mystery.

-=o=-

A/N: That's the first chapter. As I read other chapters of SRAM's story I will add my version to this one, to see how it develops in contrast to his.