Penny looked up from her worn copy of 'Deathly Hallows' as her phone nearly vibrated off the end of her coffee table. She reached forward and retrieved it before it jittered its way to her carpet and looked at the Caller I.D before flipping it open.

"Hi, mom." Penny was already mentally preparing herself for the imminent guilt trip that was about to be laid on her.

"Hi, Penny. What are you up to?"

"Not much," the blonde answered, closing her book and tucking her legs underneath herself.

"I just got off the phone with your grandparents, and they're flying up on the eighteenth."

"Really?" Penny asked, surprised. Grandpa and Grandma hadn't left Florida since her brother graduated from high school three years ago.

"Yes, and they've asked if you're going to be coming home," her mother answered.

"Mom," Penny replied, gritting her teeth. "I can't just pick up and leave for two weeks. I have a job and… responsibilities."

Her mother chuckled on the other end. "I wish your father could hear you."

"Mom," the younger woman sighed.

"I know you're a big girl living in the city and can't be bothered to see us anymore, but…..we bought you a plane ticket for the twenty-second."

Penny paused before swallowing over the lump in her throat. "Thanks, mommy."

There was a long silence. "Penny, are you okay?"

"I…I don't know," she answered, her voice cracking.

She honestly didn't know, couldn't explain why she was sitting on her couch in the middle of the day, suddenly on the verge of crying on the phone to her mother. She'd been ever so slowly spiraling toward crazy for the last week, realizing her mistake every step of the way. There were only so many times Penny could second guess herself, question her own sanity before she knew it didn't really make a difference.

She was officially out of her mind.

"I just miss you guys," Penny finally continued, only partially lying. She did miss her family, talked to her siblings on a weekly basis even. But it wasn't the cause of her recent roller coaster of emotion.

He was.

It had started slowly. After he'd texted her back the previous week, Penny had taken to texting him occasionally throughout her day. Sometimes it would just be a comment on whatever heinous ensemble Howard was wearing, or sometimes it would be a running total of all the words Raj had said to her. She had somehow managed to never mention Leonard at all, afraid that she might let on that Leonard not only had asked to get back together, but now knew what Penny herself wasn't sure she knew.

This was why her head hurt.

"Penelope?"

"Why did you name me after the long-suffering wife? The one who patiently waited?" Penny asked suddenly. "You could have named me Clytemnestra." Penny sighed. "She's the skanky one who kills her husband, right?"

"Would we still be speaking if I'd named you Clytemnestra?" her mother shot back, laughter in her voice. Penny shrugged, forgetting her mother couldn't see her. "So, this is about a boy then?"

"Mom," the blonde answered. "How do you do that?"

"Who is he?" her mother asked, talking over her daughter.

Penny paused. "A figment of my imagination, probably."

Her phone vibrated in her hand, alerting her to a new text message. She pulled her hot phone away from her ear to glance at the screen.

There are chickens all over the place down here.

Penny couldn't stop the grin from creeping onto her face. She immediately texted back.

Brushing up on your tree-climbing skills?

She got a response almost immediately.

Wolowitz should not have told you about that.

Her fingers flew over the keys with practiced ease.

We don't have poultry running afowl ( hee) in Cali ;) You'd be safe here.

No, he wasn't Snuffleupagus after all. He was real and he…

Wasn't coming back to California until January. Penny deflated quickly. Belatedly, she put her phone back up to her ear.

"- and I started going back for every tiny glitch in that car after that. I couldn't stop myself."

"Yeah mom, I actually know how you met your husband. Thanks," she retorted dryly.

"So, this guy?" the older woman persisted nosily.

"Yeah, this guy," Penny echoed.

"What's he like?"

Penny frowned, thinking "He's…germaphobic, obsessive compulsive, awkward and…" Penny set her jaw. "And brilliant."

"You dating Monk?" her mother cracked.

"I'm not dating anybody," Penny remarked quickly.

A knock at the door startled her and she glanced at the clock. Howard and Leonard were doing some research thing at the university that evening, and she'd invited Raj over to drink margaritas and watch old episodes of 'Lost'.

"Mom, I have to go, but I…I want to come home for Christmas."

"I'll drop the ticket in the mail tomorrow," her mother answered quickly. "Love you, kid."

"Love you, too." She hung up the phone and rose from the couch to answer the door. "Hey Raj." He waved his hand nervously before entering her apartment. "You got it?" He held up a full bottle of tequila.

"Let's do this."

***

"So, do you think Christian is really dead?" Penny asked, setting her now-empty glass on the table.

Raj thought for a moment and looked away from the television screen. "It's hard to say for sure. There are many who believe it is merely Jacob acting as Christian, much in the same way Locke was used." He swallowed the last of his drink. "Also, Damon Lindelof is a nutbar." Penny nodded her head and smiled at the astrophysicist. "What's so funny?" he asked, smiling warily at her.

"Nothing, it's just….this, um issue of yours? It's a mental thing, right? Like you don't have the confidence to do it on your own or something?"

Raj shrugged. "Why do you ask?"

Penny took a deep breath. "I…didn't open that tequila bottle."

"What to you mean?" Raj asked, his grin frozen on his face.

"These margaritas have been virgin," she further explained, arching her eyebrows. Raj squeaked and scooted away from her. "No, you can't…." He had a look of terror in his eyes. "You can't stop talking to me now, Raj." He shook his head. Penny shook her head. "No, I need to be able to talk to you. I have no one I can talk to."

"Is this about Sheldon?" he let out suddenly before slapping his hands over his mouth.

Penny's eyes went wide. How did everyone know this? She hadn't put on her sandwich board in days, so why was it that everybody she knew suddenly could read her like a book? "Whu?"

Raj looked down at his empty glass on the coffee table for a moment. "You shouldn't have tricked me, Penny," he remarked hesitantly.

"I know, sweetie." She rubbed his arm comfortingly. "I'm sorry. But I need you to be able to talk to me and be my friend even when you are sober occasionally. Look," she said as she gestured between them. "Nothing terrible has happened yet."

He looked at her, easing the tension in his shoulders. "You're right," he answered.

"See? Just think of me as one of guys from now on."

Raj shot her an incredulous look. "I don't think that will work."

Penny cocked her head to the side. "Yeah well, right now, my crazy mental problems trump yours, okay?" He gave her a small smile. "So, how did you know?"

"Leonard may have mentioned that he thought you had been tricked by Sybok." Penny shook her head, confused. "Evil mastermind from 'Final Frontier'," he finally supplied, a look of embarrassment on his face. "He sort of brainwashed….people."

"Of course," Penny added sarcastically.

"For the record," he continued, "I don't think your brain has been taken over." Penny's eyebrows rose. "It seems more like you're chasing." She rolled her eyes. "If you're hooked on heroin, you can tell us Penny."

"It's just that he's…gone." She threw her head back. "I know that once I see him again, I will be right back to being annoyed by him." She thought for a moment. "I'm almost sure about that."

"Wow," Raj noted after a moment. "This is kinda freaking me out."

"Freaking you out?" Penny answered, grinning. "Try being on this side of it."

They settled back against the couch as the next episode started. They watched silently for several minutes, side by side.

"So, what brought all of this on?" Raj finally asked. Penny reached toward the remote and hit the pause button.

"I've been trying to figure it out," Penny replied, sighing. "The thing is, ever since I moved in and Leonard developed that crush on me-"

"Dude, that was not just a crush. He's in love with you," Raj supplied.

Penny paused uncomfortably. "Okay. Well, anyway. Sheldon has been kind of…against the idea of me and Leonard from the beginning."

"Yes," Raj agreed. "Because he knew it would affect him. It's always all about him, Penny."

"But, when Leonard was dating Stephanie, Sheldon wanted them to stay together." She chewed her lower lip. "He even came around on the whole Leslie thing, but when I started dating Leonard, he was talking about us breaking up from the beginning."

"Yes," he answered.

"He basically told me that he and I couldn't be friends if I dated Leonard." She swallowed over the lump in her dry throat. "He said he didn't want to be my friend at all."

Raj let out a breath. "I thought something had happened. He got kind of weird….or, weirder."

"And then I kind of kissed him-"

"What?!" the Indian man squeaked.

"-and then….he left. And we haven't talked about it, and….and I miss him." Penny leaned forward and put her face in her hands. "I feel like I'm not in control of my own brain anymore."

"That's kind of what it sounds like, too."

Penny rubbed her hands over her forehead. "I think I need to make another batch of not-so-virgin margaritas."

"I'm up for that," Raj piped up quickly, seemingly happy to change the subject.

Penny rose from the couch and grabbed their empty glasses before approaching the kitchen counter. She'd just opened the tequila bottle when her phone buzzed once. Placing the bottle back on the counter, she picked her phone up off of the arm of the couch.

1 New TXT Message.

Holding her breath, Penny opened the text.

It is completely understandable that you miss me so much. I've become an integral part of your life.

Penny gasped loudly, bringing her hand up to her mouth. Now he was reading her mind? She quickly went back to the last message she'd sent him.

We don't have poultry running afowl ( hee) in Cali ;) You'd be safe here.

She in fact had been telling him that she missed him and wanted him to come home, but had been sure he wouldn't be able to get that out of her message. But he had, and-

Her phone buzzed again.

Tell Howard if he sends me the video of the baby dancing to that Beyonce song one more time, he will get an additional strike. It is also fair to say your sentiment is reciprocated.

She could barely register most of the message, focusing on only the last four words. He missed her, too. Penny let out a shuddering breath and realized her hand was shaking. She felt something deep inside of her click into place and knew there was a call she needed to make.

Somehow, she had memorized the number over the past few weeks, and her fingers found the correct buttons deftly. It rang twice before it was answered.

"Howard, I need you to do something for me."