This chapter is pretty short, but if I added it to…well, by the end you'll know what's coming next, it would turn out to be thousands of words and I don't like having insanely long chapters. So I'm going with this. :D This is leading into another attempt at Penny winning him back, reminding him of her, without doing anything to make him hate her for it.

Still own nothing.

Penny carried her basket to the laundry room door and peered in. Leonard was standing near the first machine with his back to her, dropping clothes inside. Penny walked in as casually as possible, attempting to appear surprised that she'd run into him there. "Oh. Hey Leonard, how's it hanging?"

He turned slowly to look at her, raising an eyebrow. "What?"

She shook her head. "Slang, sorry." She went to a machine and opened it, dumping her laundry inside. "How's it going?"

"Not bad," he said, nodding. "Not bad."

"How's Stacy?" Penny asked, casually – or so she hoped.

"Good," Leonard said, nodding.

"Not living together yet?" she teased.

He smirked. "No. Won't make that mistake again."

Penny looked down at the washing machine. "Look," she began.

Leonard followed her gaze. "At what?"

She looked at him in confusion for a moment. "No, that's not what I meant. I mean, look, I've been meaning to talk to you."

"Oh yeah?" He asked, a thin cloud of suspicion coming over his face. "What about?"

"Stacy."

Leonard furrowed his brow, thrusting his jaw forward and cocking his head. "Am I going to like this?"

"Yes," Penny said with conviction. "I want to apologize. You're free to date whoever you want, and it's not my place to intrude on that. I've done and said some things that I am not proud of, and I want us to be able to be friends again."

Clearly, that wasn't what Leonard had been expecting at all. Penny didn't know if she should be happy that he appeared pleasantly surprised, or upset that he really thought she was going to make things difficult again. Either way, his face was softening and he smiled at her. "Of course we can be friends," he said warmly. "Stacy can't change the fact that we've known each other for years, and we know just about all there is to know about each other…I mean…yeah. My having a girlfriend is no reason for us to stop being friends."

Penny did feel relieved to hear that. They couldn't have a romantic relationship without being friends first, anyway. "Good. I'm glad."

Leonard smiled, reaching behind him to move his laundry basket toward him. He looked back at her and smiled. "Come here." He stepped toward her, holding out his arms.

Penny had to remind herself that this was a standard hug, and to pull back after two Mississippis. But she almost didn't mind. Although they'd gotten along better since the big blowup in the hallway, she'd never formally apologized, and it felt good to know that they were officially on good terms again.

"So, how did you get that scratch on your leg?" He asked, pointing to it.

"Oh, you noticed!" She said, realizing an instant later that she sounded too happy about that. She quickly spun a lie. "I thought I had covered it enough, guess not. I was moving around Mrs. Gunderson in the hallway and scraped it on the brick corner."

"Ouch."

Penny shrugged. "Eh. It's fine." No way am I telling him about how I actually got that. Not now, not ever. Well, maybe in fifty years I'll tell it to our grandchildren "hey, funny story, one time Grandpa was dating this other girl…" Okay, maybe not. "How did you get that nasty blood blister on your thumb?" She asked.

Leonard looked at her in surprise. "How did you notice that?"

"Come on, I'm very observant," she said. "You know that. Now spill. How did it happen?"

"I was trying to change Stacy's flat tire."

Stacy. "Of course you were," she mumbled. "Nothing," she insisted when Leonard cocked his head in confusion. "I was thinking about something else."

"Okay. Hey," he said suddenly. "I'd been meaning to ask you, we're all going to a Star Wars party next Friday. Want to come?"

Penny perked up. "Really? Who's going?"

Leonard thought a moment. "Well, there's me, Stacy, you, Sheldon, Howard and Bernadette, Raj, Leslie, Amy, Stuart…maybe a few other people. We're dressing up; it's going to be a lot of fun."

Penny nodded, smiling. "Sounds like fun! You know how much I love Star Wars. Is Sheldon requesting a costume meeting?"

"It's tomorrow, actually. During dinner."

"I'll be there," she promised, wondering, momentarily, if he had been going to invite her prior to the apology. Then her thoughts turned to exactly what Star Wars character she would be, and as it turned out, the decision was not hard.

Who is she going to be? Any guesses? Next chapter will be up soon! :D