Word Count: 1355
Summary: Definition of love. (Don't mind the apparent gigantic dialogue, it will all be understood in the end!)
Disclaimer: I don't own The Big Bang Theory or the characters.

"When I was young, maybe eight or nine, we read a poem in school. It was about love, about two people that wanted to be together but the world didn't seem to let them do what they wanted. I didn't understand what love was. To me, love seemed a foreign concept, even though I knew what the word itself meant. But I didn't know what it felt like, so I didn't feel the poem. When the teacher asked us what we thought about love, how it made us feel, most of us couldn't answer. Some would say that love was what people felt, people loved each other as their parents did.

I didn't understand that well enough. Sure, maybe once, a long time ago, maybe my parents did love each other. But at that moment, I didn't understand what love was. I thought that maybe it was because I had never really seen love at first sight, because my parents didn't love each other. Some might even question why and how they were even together. But who was I to wonder? I was just a young child.

It was only much later, by then I was around fourteen, we read another poem about love. Most people said they knew what love was, it was a feeling that people felt towards someone else. Some still mentioned their parents, others their girlfriends/boyfriends. I still couldn't grasp the feeling, since I never felt it before. My parents' relationship was only getting worse, my sister had been in a relationship but was very secretive about it, and my brother was a young child that was too young to know, just like I had been.

I was much older the first time I had a real girlfriend. But I still couldn't understand all those poems, all those words my teachers would tell us. To me, love seemed something complicated, but didn't seem to be a big word to the dictionary that categorized love as "an intense feeling of deep affection ". Deep affection towards what? Superheroes? Movies? Comic books? Was that it? Did I love something?

It seemed to me that for once the dictionary could've been wrong.

Love couldn't just be one definition.

I kept reading that definition, trying to find something else that would probably help me. The next definition was "great interest and pleasure in something". Again, I was interested in comic books. I took pleasure in reading them, made me happy. Was that love?

I decided to give up on that dictionary, knowing very well that it wouldn't be able to assist me. It seemed like love wasn't going to have a concrete definition.

Maybe love felt different from person to person. So twenty-two-year-old Leonard Hofstadter gave up on trying to find a definition to that word.

A few years after I gave up on finding a definition to a word that made some people so happy, and others so miserable – case in point, two of my best friends that always seemed to strike out on finding love – I met her. At first, it was simply what it was with every pretty girl I saw. A crush. Simple as that. That definition I knew. "Person you like and/or attracted to".

But after a few years, a few conversations, many mistakes and many Sheldon moments, I felt something that I had never felt before. But I never thought it could be love because I didn't know what that was.

I kept being friends with her, no matter how many times I tried to have some sort of a relationship with her. I had had relationships before. I knew what not to do. But I still screwed up the first time around, when I first told her I loved her even though I didn't know what that meant. I thought I loved her. I was almost sure of that.

It took a few more trials and errors, but we ended back together. After a few other people getting between us, a few mistakes we both wished to have not committed.

Sometimes in life, you go to bed with one idea of how the world is, and then the next morning you wake up and you have a completely different idea of what the world is.

One morning I woke up and found her in the kitchen, dancing, in her underwear and with one of my shirts on. I could only look at her, look at her dance, fascinated at how someone could be so pretty after waking up. And also how someone could move like that in the morning.

That same day, we went shopping. I hate shopping. But I love making her happy, so I would hold her purse as she picked things from the shelves and I would hold the bags of clothes she would buy. But before we got in the shops, we would walk hand in hand towards them, something that always made me smile. It was nice until she found a nice piece of clothing she would probably only wear once and she let go of my hand.

I only truly understood that I loved her when one day she was just watching TV. As simple as that. The dancing in the kitchen, her wearing my clothes, us walking hand in hand, that helped me fall in love. But seeing her just sitting there on the couch, I understood right there.

All those poems, all those times people would tell me I would feel it too, all those definitions I read. They meant nothing to me until I saw her just sitting there. She could kill me right there, I would die loving her. Truly loving her, not the love I claimed to have for her all those years ago. That guy, he didn't know what love was. But the guy seeing his girlfriend watch TV on his couch, he knew.

He knew that the next time someone would ask him if he knew what love meant, what love was, he wouldn't know how to give a specific answer. Because love isn't restricted to a few simple definitions. Love is walking hand in hand, love is dancing in your underwear in the middle of your living room, love is complaining about your roommate. Love is being able to complain about your friends, knowing that the other will probably know something you don't and will tell you about it. Love is playing Mario Kart until four am because neither of you wants to lose and let the other win, but you also don't want to let yourself get tied. Love is a lot of things. Love depends on the person defining love.

To me, love can feel different from person to person. To me, in my honest opinion, love depends on the person you are showing your love to. Love isn't just towards the person you might end up getting married to. Love can be towards that annoying best friend of yours that can make you pull out your hair that you still love. Love can be towards that friend that doesn't seem to find the love he wants and needs. Love can be towards that friend that is mean but has a nice heart. Love can be towards that friend you call when you want to play games because he's probably playing them already anyway. Love can be towards that friend that you can easily have one-sided conversations with that somehow seems to solve your problems.

Love can be towards someone that isn't even born yet, but you know you'll love. No matter what."

"Leonard is getting late," Penny tells me the obvious, I think, looking at the clock. 4:25

"But I'm not done yet."

"You can have this conversation later, can't you?"

"She needs to know this before she's born. It's important."

"I know it is. But I think it's better if she finds whatever you're telling her, herself." She smiles, and I can't help but smile back at her. "Also, her mommy needs her beauty sleep."

"No, she doesn't. She's beautiful either way." I smile at her and she rolls her eyes – playfully.

"You don't say that when I throw shoes against you." She raises her eyebrows and I just stare at her with a goofy grin. She's right.

I give her a kiss goodnight, and I kiss my unborn daughter too, which makes my wife giggle.

This. This right here is my definition of love.

The End

I loved writing this too much. I don't know why, but this was very interesting to write. Hope everyone likes this as much as I do!

Also, sorry for the ever inconsistency in publishing. I know sometimes I publish twice in one week and then go months without writing a single thing. I publish as the ideas come and my life allows me the time to write.