Chapter 7

The group all sat down at the large kitchen table, while Hayley brought over the sandwiches, soup and salad and placed it on the table. With the appetizers already there, it was quite the feast for lunchtime.

Leonard smiled at his sister. "Wow Hayley, you really shouldn't have gone through so much trouble. But it looks really awesome. Thanks so much for having us over." He looked at the empty chair. "Where is Nate? I thought he was going to be here?"

Hayley bit her lip nervously as she ladled the soup into everyone's bowls. "Oh Nate sends his apologies. He's super swamped with work, so he couldn't make it today. But he said that he'll catch up with both of you soon." She nervously looked away, and concentrated on distributing the soup.

Michael grabbed his third sandwich, and dipped it into his bowl of soup and took a large bite. "Mmmm…Hayley…this is so good. You really are a good cook" He closed his eyes and smiled while chewing.

Hayley looked at her brother puzzled. "What is with you? Why are you eating so much? Is that your third sandwich? You've had a dopey smile on your face since you've come in…"

Emily pursed her lips. "Excuse me. Most normal human beings eat Hayley…especially when they exercise. Michael is smiling because he is happy. I'm sure you're unfamiliar with that particular emotion, because I'm sure you've failed to elicit it out of Nate. I keep my man very happy." Emily cooed stroking Michael's arm.

Hayley raised her eyebrow. "Oh really? Well I rarely see you smiling Emily. You just look like a constipated bitch half the time. What does that say about your happiness making skills Michael?"

Michael burst out laughing and grinned at his sister. He couldn't help it…he loved it when Hayley went into bitch mode…Emily could never match wits with her. Emily smacked Michael on the arm. "Don't laugh" she hissed. "You should be defending me." Emily put up her hand over her mouth and turned to Penny. "See…what did I tell you? Hayley is just awful" she whispered.

Penny smiled sympathetically at Emily and then glanced over at Leonard who was frowning at his siblings. He had mentioned something earlier about not being a fan of Emily, but he didn't go into it. Yesterday at the party, Emily seemed so warm and kind, as did Michael. They both told her that Hayley was this awful person, but Leonard had never mentioned anything too negative about his sister to her. Just that she was into her own life and friends. He did say that Michael was a spoiled brat.

She glanced at Michael….she could see that he had the makings of being a brat. Tall, good looking,cocky, a little too charming for his own good, she knew the type well. She looked over at Emily. Emily and Hayley had been at each others throats since they had arrived. The things she had said to Hayley had been quite nasty…it was not the sugar and spice persona that she had the previous night. Hayley seemed a bit harsh herself, but it seemed more in response to Emily than anything she had initiated.

But what about what happened with Phoebe when she came in? Emily had told her that Hayley had Phoebe so on edge with criticism all the time, that she was a mess. Then she burst out crying when she had thought she had upset Hayley? Perhaps Emily was speaking the truth…. One things was for sure. She needed to keep her wits about her with Leonard's family. It was amazing that Leonard turned out to be such a sweet and caring person growing up in this environment. It was actually a little bit puzzling. Why was Leonard missing that harsh edge that his brother and sister seemed to possess?

Leonard cleared his throat. "Well I was hoping to have a pleasant lunch with my brother and sister. Without all the bickering" he said pointedly.

Michael smiled and raised his water glass. "I agree. Let me take this opportunity to officially welcome Penny to the family. We are all so happy that you could spend this special time with us." Michael turned to Leonard. "And to Leonard, it's great to see you after all of these years…and let me tell you…you sure have great taste in women!" Michael winked at Leonard who gave him a confused look back.

The group all looked awkwardly at each other, and clinked their glasses. Hayley threw Michael a puzzled look at his last statement.

"Well it's so great to meet all of you too. I've been wanting to meet Leonard's family, and with us getting married soon, it's the perfect opportunity. Thank-you for this welcome lunch Hayley, and I'm really looking forward to getting to know you all better this week." Penny said with a warm smile.

Hayley sipped her water and smiled. "Welcome to the jungle Penny. It's so nice to finally meet you too."

"Oh I'm sure you'll find MOST of the family to be wonderful Penny." Emily turned to Hayley. "Where are those little cherubs Phoebe and Daniel? Therapy?"

Hayley glared daggers at Emily. "No. Not therapy. Daniel's on a playdate, and Phoebe is in the other room watching a movie. Why? Do you plan on apologizing to Phoebe for pushing her away when she gave you a hug?" she asked staring directly at Emily. Penny gave a shocked look to Leonard.

Emily laughed nervously as she glanced at Penny. "Oh Hayley, you are over exaggerating as usual."

"Actually she's not." Leonard interrupted. "I saw it with my own eyes I really can't think of a good reason for you to do that Emily."

"But, I –" Emily started.

"Let's not all jump on Emily here. I think she was just having a bit of a bridezilla moment, right hon? Em was feeling bad that Phoebe was upset, and wanted to see her today. Right?" Michael said tensely while looking at Emily annoyed. She was ruining any groundwork that she had laid down with Penny yesterday with her behaviour today. He glanced at Hayley who had a huge smirk on her face. Dammit she was loving watching Emily squirm. He needed to get Hayley out of the picture..and fast.

Emily looked lost for words. "Ummm….right." She cleared her throat. "It was really just a big misunderstanding…"

Hayley's phone buzzed on the table. She picked it up and a warm smile broke out on her face. She smiled and then got up and put the phone down on the kitchen island and went to check on dessert that was warming in the oven. Michael glanced at her phone. He needed to grab her phone before it locked and required a password. He picked up his cellphone and got up.

"Sorry I need to make a quick call" Michael announced. He swiped Hayley's phone underneath his and headed down the hall. He glanced at the phone. Perfect, it had not locked yet with Hayley's password. He quickly hit the home button glanced at the icons.

He started with text messages. She obviously just got one that made her happy. He opened the app, and at the top was a message from someone named Mitchell. Wow, there were hundreds of texts from this Mitchell fellow. He quickly started reading the messages. Michael frowned. There was nothing damning in those texts, they appeared all to be quite innocent. There were lots of messages about enjoying Hayley's original pieces. What could that be about? Other messages seemed related to Hayley's work. There was a lot of flirty banter between them though. Mitchell must be a colleague from work….and a very close friend. Perhaps there was something there after all.

He opened her email. There was nothing too interesting in there. Again a few emails from Mitchell regarding some study they were working on. He opened up her photos and quickly scanned through. Ugh….It was like any typical mother, filled with pictures of sickeningly sweet pictures of Daniel and Phoebe.

"What are you doing?" he heard in an accusing tone.

Michael turned around to see Phoebe glaring up at him. She was staring at him with a deep frown. "Why are you going through my mom's phone?"

"Oh hey Cutie! Oh my phone isn't working right, so I'm just borrowing your mom's phone to look something up.

Phoebe gave him a questioning look. Just then Michael's phone dinged with a text message. Michael glanced at it quickly. It was a text from Emily telling him to come back to the table.

"Your phone looks like it's working" Phoebe said.

Michael gulped and quickly put his phone back in his pocket. "Oh my text messaging works. It's just google. I'm not sure why it isn't working." His email made a ding as a new message arrived.

Phoebe frowned. "Well if you are still getting email, then your internet it working –"

"-Well, what are you watching here? Teletubbies?" he asked trying to divert the conversation.

"Teletubbies? That's for babies. I'm watching –"

"-Sorry Phoebes…gotta get back to the table, or they will think I'm being rude." Michael interrupted. "Maybe Emily will come join you later and watch your little cartoon with you." He quickly turned from Phoebe's annoyed face and headed back into the kitchen.

He returned to the kitchen to see Leonard, Penny and Hayley laughing. Emily was sitting there with a bored look on her face.

"Sorry about that, what did I miss?"

"Oh we were just talking about Hayley's Christmas essay on historical proof of why prominent psychiatrists make the worst parents. God did mother ever have it out for you that Christmas after reading that! I'm surprised she still graded it a B" Leonard laughed.

Hayley laughed. "It was so worth it to see the look on her face when she was reading it. It was well researched and written, I really should have gotten an A, but you know how she's biased. Michael could have probably drawn a rainbow and said I love unicorns, and that would have gotten an A."

Leonard snickered. "I know! I think a bunch of my essays garnered a much higher mark than I received." He glanced at Michael. "Oh to be the golden child."

Michael grinned. "Oh, it's not easy being this perfect."

Emily stroked Michael's arm. "I'm sure your essays were miles ahead of theirs. And as for playing favourites, I guess your mother passed that down to you Hayley? Is that why poor Phoebe is so on edge? You favour little Daniel?" Emily gave a little look to Penny. "And we can clearly see you favour Leonard over Michael here."

Hayley gave Emily an icy glare. "Phoebe is not on edge, I'm not sure where you are getting that from. I love both my children equally." She looked over at Leonard and Michael. "I love BOTH my brothers….more than you could ever possibly understand."

A cold tension filled the air as the three siblings looked at each other. Penny gave a little cough and put down her napkin. "Could you please excuse me, I'm just going to go to the washroom." She got up and exited the kitchen.

Penny sighed as she walked down the hall. There was so much tension between the siblings and Emily. Emily really seemed to be going out of her way to antagonize Hayley. Leonard had said that he wasn't overly impressed with Emily and she was starting to see why. Hayley seemed alright, except when she was bickering with Emily. The thought though that Hayley was being over critical of Phoebe was troubling her though. She could see the negative effect Beverly had had on Leonard, so it was not such a stretch to think perhaps Hayley was unwittingly doing the same thing to Phoebe.

As she approached the washroom, she saw a family room with a large built in TV with a cartoon playing. The wall had built in shelf filled with family pictures, books and DVDs. There was a small piano off to the side. She spied Phoebe on the couch watching the movie that was playing. She smiled as she gazed at her. Phoebe was simply adorable. She had the exact same brown curly hair as Leonard. She wondered if Leonard and her children would look like her.

Penny entered the family room. "Phoebe?" she said softly.

Phoebe turned from the movie and saw Penny standing there. A warm smile broke out on her face. "Hi Almost Auntie Penny!" she called out.

Penny laughed and walked over to the couch. She sat down beside Phoebe and glanced at the TV. "Despicable Me! I love that movie."

"Me too!" Phoebe exclaimed. "It's my very favourite movie." Phoebe smiled at Penny and stuck out her wrist that had a small bracelet on it. "I knew you were coming today, so I wore the charm bracelet you and Uncle Leonard bought me. I love it…it's so pretty. Uncle Leonard told me that you picked it out."

Penny smiled. "Oh I'm so happy you like it. You have lots of cool charms. Is that a little violin?"

"Yes! I play the violin. Mommy does too. She also plays the piano. And Uncle Leonard plays the cello. One day we are going to jam." Phoebe looked at Penny thoughtfully. "Uncle Leonard told me you were nice, and I think he is right. I'm told I'm a great judge of character."

"Oh sweetie, I think you are pretty great too! Listen, I want to tell you something. I want you to know that everybody loves you, and that you don't have to be perfect all the time to be loved. All you have to do is be yourself, and that is always good enough. So don't stress and worry, just be yourself and have fun. I know your mommy might push you to be perfect all the time, but she loves you no matter what. So don't stress if you feel like you're not sometimes."

Phoebe gave Penny a confused look. "What are you talking about?"

"You were really upset when we first came to the house. I've heard that your mom can put a lot of pressure on you sometime. I just wanted to make sure you were ok and let you know you don't have to be perfect all the time."

Phoebe went silent and was staring down at her bracelet. Her eyes darted towards the kitchen as Michael, Leonard and Hayley's voices rang through. She finally looked up at Penny. "Can I give you some advice?" she said quietly.

Penny looked at her surprised. "What? You want to give me advice? Well…..ok. What do you want to tell me?"

"Don't trust Uncle Michael. Or Emily….I just hate her. But mostly Uncle Michael. He lies…..he's not a nice person. He's spying on my mom" she whispered.

"Spying? Phoebe..I'm sure you just misunderstood."

"I did not misunderstand. You are new. You don't understand how things work in this family. Just please trust me. Uncle Michael lies."

Penny looked at her shocked to hear such serious words coming out the mouth of a seven year old. Why did she have such a deep mistrust of Michael?

"Hon? You ok out there? You've been gone for a while?" Leonard called out from the kitchen.

"I'm fine. Just chatting with Phoebe" Penny yelled back.

Penny squeezed Phoebe's hand and looked into her bright hazel eyes. "I trust you" she whispered. Phoebe returned her smile.

"I got to get back to the table" Penny said. Phoebe nodded.

Penny headed back into the kitchen and sat down at the table. She reached for Leonard's hand and held it tight. She looked across the table at Michael. He appeared to be such a happy go lucky guy. Cracking jokes, playfully teasing Hayley and Leonard. Was there much more to him than meets the eye?

Emily's eyes lit up when she saw Penny had returned. "Penny! I'm so glad you are back. I was going to ask your permission if we can steal away Leonard from you for the next few days? I really want him and Ainsley to create that fairy tale presentation for our wedding reception. Ainsley is an amazing artist."

Leonard cleared his throat. "Oh I don't know about that Emily. It's going to take a lot of time, and now that Penny is here in New York, I'd rather take her sightseeing, than be working on this last minute presentation. I'm not sure how good it will be, with this sprung on us as the last moment. I'm sure you want everything to look professional for your wedding. I'm sure your wedding planner already has something gorgeous put together."

"But Leonard!" Emily whined. "This was supposed to be from his BROTHER which would have made it special! You are here for MY wedding! Not some sightseeing trip with your fiancé!"

Michael shot Emily a dirty look and stood up. "Could you please excuse us for a minute. Emily and I need to talk." Michael said tensely. He grabbed Emily's hand and pulled her into the hallway. Hayley smirked and got up to tend to the dessert that had been cooling.

Penny turned towards Leonard. "Listen, you can work on the presentation with Ainsley. I trust you Leonard. If Emily really wants this for her wedding, maybe you should do it."

Leonard sighed. "I really don't want to. I'd rather be spending time with you."

"I know…me too" Penny whispered.

"How about this? I'll spend one day working on it with Ainsley. That's it. I don't want to waste any more time on it. Then we can spend the rest of the week seeing the sights. "

"Deal" Penny smiled and gave Leonard a light kiss.

Michael pulled Emily into the library. "What the hell are you doing Emily? Are you trying to undermine everything we set up?" he snapped.

Emily glared back. "I'm trying to get this plan moving along! How else are we going to get Leonard and Ainsley together?"

"God! You have the subtlety of a chainsaw. There were a million different ways I could have gotten those two alone together, without you acting like a whiny bridezilla! You were supposed to endear Penny to yourself. Instead you've been antagonizing my sister all afternoon, which makes Haley look like the sane one, and you like a raging bitch."

"Oh and we wouldn't want to upset your DEAR sister" Emily sputtered.

Michael looked at her coldly. "Yes she is my DEAR sister, and no you do not. What we should have done is get Leonard and Penny feeling all insecure about their relationship. To get them fighting. To set Leonard up to fail. All we've done is have you look crazy and vindictive."

"Excuse me! I didn't see you making inroads along that path! At least my comments about Hayley will get Penny thinking she is a terrible parent."

Michael shook his head in frustration. "Well anyways, I swiped Hayley's cellphone during lunch and looked through it. I think something is up with her and one of her coworkers Mitchell."

"She's hiding something?" Emily asked.

"She's definitely hiding something. I think it's the key to what truly going on with Hayley. I'm going to surprise Hayley at work and see what I can find out tomorrow. Maybe I can get some insight in what's going on in that head of hers."

"I'm going with you" a voice responded.

Michael and Emily both turned around startled to see Penny standing there. "Penny!" Michael exclaimed. "What are you doing here? What did you hear?"

"Oh Hayley asked me if I could call you back for dessert." Penny responded. She looked at Michael and Emily staring at her with a worried look. She went over to the library door and closed it. "Listen, I heard you say that Hayley is hiding something….and I agree. Poor little Phoebe. That little girl seems so stressed and upset. I want to help Phoebe, and if finding out what is going on with Hayley will help, then I want to come."

Michael looked at her cautiously. "Are you sure? I'm just worried about my sister….You don't need to get involved. I'm just concerned about my sister, and of course my little niece and nephew."

"I'm sure. I'm going to be your sister soon, and I want to help." Penny said confidently. "Besides, Leonard will be busy working on your presentation."

"….Well..Ok, then. We'll go tomorrow morning." Michael stated finally. Emily shot him a shocked look.

"Great" Penny confirmed. She smiled to herself. Phoebe told her not to trust Michael, and what better way to find out what he was up to than to observe him herself. Little did he know that Hayley wasn't the one in her crosshairs, it was him. She hoped that tomorrow would be enlightening.

A/N: Next Chapter, Ainsley tries to seduce Leonard, and Penny and Michael "spy" on Hayley. What will happen? I was actually not going to continue with this story, as I was told by quite a few different people that it was too focused on the original characters (Michael/Emily/Hayley), and not enough on Leonard and Penny. It's true, it's not. Then, I was going to just make it an original story, and not BBT. But I have the story worked out in my head, and the BBT characters are quite weaved into the story. So I hope you can accept that. While Leonard and Penny may not always have the primary role in this story, they are major players. That's just how I want to tell this story and how I see it in my head. Thanks.