A/N So tomorrow's officially the last day of school for me. I'll try to update as much as I can over the summer, since I have little to no social life it won't be that hard anyway. Thanks for the nice reviews.

Chapter Ten

"I thought you wanted to stay single."

Savanna and I were seated at a nearby Starbucks, next to the strip mall in downtown Pasadena. "What happened to the fun-loving, single girl attitude?"

"I guess things took a turn," I said. For the worst or for the best; I wasn't quite sure yet.

"And you hung out with his friends Thursday night, didn't you?" Savanna pressed on.

"Yes." God. "Since when is that a crime?"

"I'm not saying it is," Savanna said. "But hanging out with his friends is total girlfriend behavior. Especially when they play video games-"

"Savanna," I said softly. "Shut up, okay?"

She shrugged, stirring her hot mocha with her straw. "I'm just saying," she said in a low voice as a guy with long hair wearing an AC/DC shirt eyed us from the corner, "you might get too attached. He asked you to be his girlfriend, right?"

"That's what dating is, isn't it?" Okay, so that was a bit too sarcastic. But her grating was getting on my nerves. Especially since she dated her way through high school, and probably wouldn't stop, even in college.

"Just because we're dating," I said, squinting at the water ring my cup had left on the table, "does not mean we're serious. Yes, I said I am his girlfriend. But that doesn't mean we'll have sex or anything."

Savanna looked at me, then let out a laugh, a sort of short, sharp "Ha!" That caused AC/DC Guy to look over at us again, a look of concern on his face.

"What are you looking at?" Savanna asked snidely, flicking her thumb at him.

He shrugged, still looking a little worried, then went became very interested in the menu hanging on the pastel-colored wall.

"Girlfriends don't have to be serious," I told her. "We're just dating our way through the next few months. I don't even know if we'll last that long."

"He had sex with his last girlfriend, right?"

"Yes," I mumbled. This topic of sex was making me uncomfortable. Especially since we were discussing it in a public area.

"So, he's going to want it from you," Savanna informed me, as if I didn't know that already.

So far, the only time Leonard and I had discussed sex was that night in the hallway, when we talked about his history with Penny. Since then, the topic had become taboo. Or so I thought. To Savanna, however, it was available to the public eye- obviously, as we discussed sexual acts at a Starbucks table.

"What do you see in him, anyway?" Savanna continued.

"That sounds really mean," I told her, but she ignored this and said, "Trust me, Sophie. You're going to regret it if you go through with it and it ends badly." When did she become so cynical?

"And I'll regret it if I don't go through with it in the first place," I said in a low voice. "Really, Savanna, it isn't the end of the world."

She snorted, as if she'd heard this before, and took a sip of her drink. "God, it's hot in here."

I rolled my eyes and ran my finger in circles around the water ring on the table next to my cup. My ice was melting.

The previous night, I had been at Leonard's. All of his friends had come, (God, he was popular) and we sat back and played Call of Duty till I insisted we watch an episode of Seinfeld, with Sheldon grumbling about it to himself.

Honestly, I liked his friends. There was Raj, who was from India and, although naive and awkward, was sweet. He'd had his fair share of girlfriends, but seemed to have trouble getting them in the first place. Then, there was Howard, who seemed to act like a fifty-year-old pedophile, (who I tried my best to steer clear of, but more than once I'd caught him eyeing my chest a bit too eagerly), then, there was Stuart, who was shy and geeky, but calm and collected. Last but not least, there was Barry, a "loudmouth" as Leonard had described him, who spoke with a speech impediment quite similar to Bug's Bunny. Although odd, his friends were cute, and I pegged Raj as a guy Savanna would date. I was told he'd once had this weird phase where he couldn't talk to women without consuming alcohol.

"You know, I just think-" I began, but then I looked up to see- speak of the devil- Raj coming in. But a girl was in tow with him. She had red, shoulder-length hair, and wore a Barenaked Ladies T-shirt and ripped jeans, with spiked combat boots. The red hair looked too bright to be natural, I thought.

"Sophie!" Raj enthusiastically dragged the redhead over to our table. "How are you?" He seemed almost shy, and I smiled at his schoolboy behavior.

"Doing well," I answered. "How are you?"

"Wonderful," he purred, then nudged the girl. "This is Katie. Katie, this is Sophie."

"Hello," Katie said, smiling, and I saw she had perfect, white, I-had-braces-since-the-seventh-grade teeth.

"Nice to meet you," I said.

"Savanna?" Katie turned around to Savanna.

"Hey, Katie." Savanna grinned, shaking her now-cold mocha at Katie. "Small world, huh?"

"You two know each other?" I asked, amazed. People didn't get around in this city very much.

"Yep!" Katie rocked back and forth on her heels. "I've been friends with Savanna since our first year in college."

"Indeed," Savanna crooned. I frowned. This was something she'd neglected to mention.

"She is Leonard's cousin," Raj told me, "and Sheldon's girlfriend."

I choked on my water- irritated that Leonard hadn't mentioned that he had a cousin, and even more shocked that Sheldon had a girlfriend.

"You're Sheldon's...girlfriend?" I gawked.

Katie laughed. "I know. I was surprised, too," she admitted.

I blinked at her. "He'll barely look at me," I said slowly, "yet he has a girlfriend."

"He's like a cat," Katie said. "Very persnickety with what he likes."

I frowned. "So I've been told." I'd have to tell Leonard that I saw his cousin.

"What are you standing there for?" Savanna patted the seat next to her, as if she was her mom or something. "Join us."

We'll be here awhile, I thought, sighing. I'd planned to have a short visit with Savanna, discussing weekend plans, not have a social group.

In the next ten minutes, I learned that Katie and Leonard had been very close as little kids (and now) after her parents died, and Leonard's family took her in. They were practically brother and sister, even if they came from different parents. Either way, they were family. She came to Pasadena to stay with Leonard till she got her life together, and now was roommates with Amy, Sheldon's ex-girlfriend. (How awkward.) Sheldon and Katie had tried several times to have a baby, but failed.

"I'm trying now to adopt," Katie finished. "You know, in China they have wonderful adoption centers."

"Really," I said. Too much information, I thought. She was the type of person that would tell you all their business, whether you wanted to hear it or not.

I was stuck here for awhile.

I may as well have made the best of it.