The Drinking Game

Penny walked into apartment 4A, a bottle of tequila and two shot glasses in her hand. Sheldon looked up from his computer and watched her with mild curiosity. While his brain puzzled over advanced vector algebraic equations and grappled with the multifarious enigmas of the universe, he somehow had room enough in his assiduous mind to work out that there were only two people in the apartment. That meant that either one of those shot glasses was meant for him or that Penny enjoyed partaking of Mexican spirits two shots at a time. Occam's Razor suggested the former was more likely the case.

"We're going to play a drinking game," Penny answered the quizzical and slightly worried look on Sheldon's face.

"No," he answered, drawing out the 'o' in that way that annoyed Penny so much it made her want to smile. "iWe/i are not. iI/i am going to finish my game of Pac Man before I start my Star Trek: The Original Series marathon. iYou/i are going to go back to your apartment and drink yourself into a state of unconsciousness and not bother me through the entirety of previously stated marathon."

"I was hoping you'd say something like that," Penny stated, an evil grin growing on her face. "You know how you keep begging me to watch Star Trek with you?"

"I never beg."

"Fine. You know how you keep asking me nicely over and over again if I'll watch Star Trek with you?"

"I remember everything."

"Whatever. Anyway, I decided that I will watch it with you."

Sheldon stood up, a boyish smile played on his lips. "Oh, great!" He walked excitedly over to the sofa and picked up a DVD case. "You're going to love this. I recommend you keep an eye on Spock. Without him, the USS Enterprise would probably have crash landed on some sort of deserted planet and the entire series would have been a science fiction version of Gilligan's Island."

"Hold on there, Cowboy," Penny interrupted. "I will watch this with you only under the condition that we watch it with this." She held up the tequila bottle.

"I believe that the fullness of the experience of TOS is best left to the unenibriated mind, but if you would like to poison yourself into a stupor, far be it from me that I should keep you from it." Sheldon opened the case and walked over to the DVD player, placing it carefully in the tray.

"Wrong again! We're playing a drinking game. That means if I have to suffer through whatever the hell kind of geek fest I'm committing myself to, then you're going to get drunk with me."

Sheldon spun around and glared at her. He didn't know why he continued to do that since she never backed down. And sure enough she was gazing at him, smiling widely.

"What's it gonna be, Whack-a-doodle?"

"Fine," Sheldon sighed.

He heard himself saying it, but for all the little genius brain cells roaming in his head, he couldn't figure out why. Penny let out a high pitched squeal that made him want to squirt her with water. He sat down in his spot as she sat in hers. He set up the DVD, pausing it at exactly 00:00 while she poured tequila into the shot glasses.

"What is a drinking game?" Sheldon asked.

"Are you serious? Wow." She wasn't that surprised. If anyone in the world didn't know what a drinking game was, it would be Sheldon. "A drinking game is when we watch something on TV and whenever someone does something that was obviously going to happen we take a shot. So like, if we were playing a drinking game about your life, I'd take a shot every time you went off on some long lecture about, I don't know, the history of forks or something."

"Oh, I see. Like a trope."

"A trope? What's that?"

"A trope, in terms of television anyway, is a common pattern or a repeated convention. For example, every time Bones says 'I'm a doctor, not a fill in the blank' would be a particular common trope within Star Trek."

Penny nodded. She kind of knew what he was saying and was sure he probably got the drift. "Yeah, exactly. So every time Mr. Bones says that, we take a shot."

They discussed the rules of the drinking game, and Sheldon was actually having fun recalling all of the tropes that he had discovered throughout his life of watching Star Trek. The marathon began and shots were taken in between Penny's questions and Sheldon's explanations, which were becoming more and more incoherent by the end of the first season.

When the episode "Operation: Annihilate!" ended, they were both very drunk and Sheldon was trying not to throw up.

"That…that was soooo much fun and you know, the episodes weren't bad either," Penny slurred and made what Sheldon liked to think of as her duck face.

"I know!" Sheldon giggled. "But Penny. Shhh. Penny. I have a confession. This isn't the first time I've played a drinking game," he drawled.

Penny looked at him wide eyed. "It's not?"

"Bazinga!" He shouted and Penny erupted into a fit of giggles. Sheldon looked at her, a big dumb grin on his face and it made her laugh harder. Sheldon started laughing with her, his sharp inhalations of breath mixing with her loud, but endearing chuckles. The fell down to the floor, holding their sides and laughed until tears fell from their eyes. They lay on the floor next to each other, an occasional chortle escaping their lips.

They looked at each other, drunkenly taking in each one another's' eyes. Penny scooted closer to Sheldon, completely invading his personal space, but it seemed that Dr. Cooper was too drunk to mind. She leaned in and kissed him on the lips, a gentle and chaste kiss, which surprised her considering how much she had to drink. Sheldon returned her kiss and allowed themselves to be lost in the moment. They reluctantly pulled away from each other and sank into a comfortable silence.

"Penny," Sheldon said, his voice soft and honest. "Thank you for watching Star Trek with me."

Penny smiled at him. "Thank you for sharing it with me."

They stayed on the floor, next to each other and fell asleep in each other's arms.