Spending time with Penny has resulted in Sheldon beginning to care about her well being. Shall we up the ante?


It had been 52 days so far. Raj was doing fairly well. He had a calm personality for the most part, so he was a little more able to withstand the solitude. Howard and Leonard were verging on chaos. They were tired of being here. They were tired of snow. They were tired of no internet. They were mostly tired of Sheldon. Sheldon was …well, let's just say he was complicated and leave it at that.

(No? Okay, then. Let me see if I can explain.)

Sheldon was well equipped mentally and emotionally for the solitude. The cold did not bother him. The isolation was something he had always dreamed of. The lack of technology and entertainment was a bit of a 'bummer', as his brother would say, but he could live without myspace or Geeks Of Doom.

No, Sheldon had two very distinct problems. One was his lack of results. He was not getting the evidence he had anticipated, hoped for, dreamed of. In fact, he was getting little to no results at all. On top of that, he was bombarded with distractions. Well, one distraction. One stubborn, beautiful, blonde, 5'5", green-eyed distraction who smelled like apples.

He looked over at the curtain separating the room and wished he understood why she occupied so much of his thought process. He could not form an accurate hypothesis to explain it. Unlike Leonard or Howard, he had no desire to bed her. Unlike Raj, he had no desire to just be another one of her friends, either. He wanted all of her attention and time. He disliked sharing her with the others. He was envious whenever her attention was on one of them, or on none of them.

It made no sense. Why was he jealous of her time and attention if he was not physically attracted to her? Okay, so it wasn't that he didn't find her attractive at all. She was aesthetically pleasing. Her form was proportional and had low body fat. She was, in all honesty, a very beautiful woman. But he had no reaction to her beauty. No rapid oscillations, increased respirations, or perspiration. Not arousal of any kind. Yet he was drawn to her every waking moment.

He sat up and drew on his robe. He was unable to sleep, so he might as well check on his equipment.


Sheldon hung up his jacket and shed his gloves and hat. He looked at the clock and decided to shower, even though it was 97 minutes before his usual time. He just didn't want to go back to the bedroom and stare at the curtain for the next hour and a half. He grabbed a clean towel from the linen closet and opened the bathroom door. He stepped inside and turned. Only to find himself facing a running shower. The glass stall did little to hide Penny from his eyes. Her head was thrown back as she rinsed her hair under the spray. Her body was on full display.

His eyes involuntarily ran down her face to her ample breasts, across her narrow waist, over her rounded buttocks, and descending her lean legs to her feet. She turned to face the spray and grabbed a loofa. Sheldon silently slipped back out of the bathroom and hurried to the bedroom. His breathing was ragged as her image burned into his mind. He looked down at the evidence of his attraction. Well, he could no longer say he had no physical reaction to Penny.


Penny glanced at Sheldon with a frown. He hadn't spoken to her in four days. She had no idea what was wrong, and no idea how to ask him. As soon as she got within five feet of him, he took off on some pretext or another. He stayed up until after she had gone to bed, too. Howard and Leonard had seen it as their opportunity to make up for lost time. They had immediately begun to crowd her again, doing their utmost to flirt and capture her attention. A couple of times, she had seen Sheldon glaring at her and it made little sense. How could he be mad at her for their behavior?

Raj was equally clueless. He had tried to talk to Sheldon once about why he was avoiding Penny, but Sheldon had shut him down with a brusque "I have no idea what you mean, nor do I care to know."

In the end, Penny did what she had done from the beginning. She did her job, and she avoided everyone except Raj as much as possible.


Raj usually went with her to pick up supplies. It was something she actually looked forward to. A five minute snowmobile ride to the landing site, load everything onto the trailer quickly and then back to the station to unload and have hot cocoa. Only Raj wasn't feeling good today. He had a bad headache. Penny looked at Leonard and Howard over by the table and mentally shook her head. No way was she letting one of them ride behind her on the snowmobile. She jumped slightly as Sheldon appeared beside her. He was pulling on his heavy gloves, looking stern and uncomfortable.

"Shall we?" he asked in a bland, cool voice. Penny sighed, wishing she knew what his problem was. She nodded and followed him outside. Sheldon settled behind her and placed his hands on her waist gingerly.

It only took a couple of minutes to transfer the three boxes, and then they were heading home again. Penny gunned the machine a bit more than usual. Raj was one thing, they were comfortable enough with each other that they could laugh it off, but the vibrations from the machine was making Sheldon's body react. She was very aware of the hard length pressed against her bottom.


Sheldon was mortified. He had not taken their proximity into account when he decided to help her pick up supplies. There was no hiding his body's arousal. Even out here, in the icy wind, he could smell her shampoo and feel her generous curves against him. As soon as they reached the station he jumped up, grabbed a box and scurried inside.

When Penny walked into the station Sheldon was nowhere to be seen. She knew better than to seek him out. He wouldn't laugh it off like Raj. The best thing she could do was pretend it never happened.