This chapter is short because how the heck do you write these characters? Seriously! But anyway, I had to include it because my summary says "it's residents" and not "the fourth floor."
I still own nothing.
It was morning. The sun came in through the translucent drapes and landed on her face. She rose from the bed and stretched, her arms aching from helping her neighbor paint the day before. She glanced at the clock. Nine A.M. The neighbors below her would still be sleeping, the ones above her gone for work. The one next to her hadn't put squat in her jar yet, so there was no point in sneaking around her. Mrs. Vartabedian probably wasn't aware the fundraiser was even going on.
Sliding her feet into her slippers, Mrs. Gunderson shuffled into the kitchen. She'd bought a rotisserie chicken the night before with a fifty dollar bill and the change was sitting on the counter. She picked it up and stuffed it into the pocket of her robe. She had a place planned for it.
Exiting her apartment ten minutes later, she tiptoed up to the fourth floor. As she expected, both apartment doors were shut, no artificial light showed underneath the door, and no raised voices could be heard from 4A. Perfect. Mrs. Gunderson held her hand out over 4A's jar and dropped in eight dollars. That would teach Sheldon to march around with those hulk arms yelling about being sad or tired or good-night-puny-human-ing everyone he came into contact with. And it would teach Leonard to stop…doing whatever had caused that "yee-haw."
Speaking of which…Mrs. Gunderson turned and regarded 4B with a shake of her head. That nice young lady had never bothered her until she started spending the night above Mrs. Gunderson's apartment and appealing to a deity in such a fashion. But all of that was worth the rest of the negative points that the elderly woman had. Apparently others agreed; Penny had a lot of negative points in her jar.
As Mrs. Gunderson returned to the third floor, she greeted her neighbor, who was just exiting her apartment door. "Good morning, there."
"Good morning!" Mrs. Vartabedian said cheerfully. "What have you been up to?"
"Fundraiser," Mrs. Gunderson said. "I was punishing those who kept us awake last year."
Mrs. Vartabedian shook her head. "You think you have it bad! They spent most nights over my head. They didn't want to violate Crazy's roommate agreement that determines when a girlfriend is living with Leonard. So most nights, they were keeping me awake with their…" she trailed off and rolled her eyes.
"So are you putting silvers in their jars, too?" Mrs. Gunderson asked. "I noticed that both of them have a lot."
Mrs. Vartabedian shook her head. "I'm not participating. I'll just donate to the cause. I'm not a war person so this fundraiser isn't my cup of tea…but you know why the fourth floor has so many negative points, don't you?"
"No, I don't," Mrs. Gunderson admitted, cocking her head. "Why is it?"
"Penny challenged Leonard and Sheldon to the competition. They're trying to outdo each other."
"Where did you hear that?" Mrs. Gunderson folded her arms. It made sense, of course. Everyone in the building knew how competitive the fourth floor was.
"Grossinger was in the laundry room and overheard them discussing it at the mailboxes."
"Ah," Gunderson nodded. "That'll be interesting."
"It will." Mrs. Vartabedian nodded. "Well, I have to go fix my hair before work, but we'll talk at book club." Mrs. Gunderson nodded, and Mrs. Vartabedian smiled at her and withdrew into her own apartment.
The older woman walked over to her couch and lifted the cushion, smiling down at the coffee can filled with pennies. "Not participating, my rear."
Wow, I just looked at my stats and I've written over 150,000 words! Yay me! *does happy dance* Or maybe that's just showing how pathetic I am, haha.
Review please!
