Chapter Four

Leonard turned off the TV and sighed. This was the night everyone usually went to The Cheesecake Factory, but he knew that that probably wouldn't be happening tonight. Who knew where Sheldon was tonight?

Leonard picked up his phone and texted Penny to see if Sheldon had gone to The Cheesecake Factory without him. A few moments later she replied, 'idk. im sick, not working 2night." He frowned and walked over to the refrigerator to find something to eat. There wasn't much in there, and he wasn't very hungry, so he scratched that idea. Maybe Sheldon is in his room… he closed the refrigerator door and slowly walked down the hallway to Sheldon's room. He knocked on the door but there was no answer. He opened it slowly and poked his head inside. Nope, no one there. If Sheldon isn't here, and he's not at The Cheesecake Factory, then where is he? Leonard walked back to the living room and picked up his phone. There was another message from Penny: 'can u come across the hall 4 a sec?'

"Who are you texting?" Sheldon questioned.

"Leonard," Penny replied and set her phone down. Sheldon looked worried.

"Why?"

"He wants to know where you are," Penny said just before she took a sip of a soda. She watched Sheldon as he went from worried to super worried. "Don't worry! I said I don't know where you are!" Sheldon glanced down at his watch.

"You work at the Cheesecake Factory tonight," he told her.

"I know that, Sheldon." she rolled her eyes. He didn't think she was that dumb, did he?

"You should have left an hour ago."

"I called in sick."

"But you're not sick."

"My boss doesn't need to know that."

"But Penny I-"

"Look, Sheldon. You asked for my help. So I helped. And helping you ended up taking a while, and you sure don't seem to wanna go back to your apartment and face Leonard. So I called in sick… To help a friend."

"Still, that doesn't mean you should lie," he murmured. Penny threw her hands up in defeat and then grabbed her phone again. She typed out another message to Leonard: 'can u come across the hall 4 a sec?' She was done helping Sheldon. He was just being plain annoying now, and that meant it was time for him to go home.

Sheldon heard a few knocks on Penny's door and wondered who it could be. "It's open!" Penny called to the person behind the door. Then the door opened. Sheldon's heart stopped. Leonard stood in the doorway.

"Uhhmmm… hi?" Leonard said and stared at the two people that sat on the couch. Sheldon couldn't talk. Why was Leonard here? Who told him to come over here? And why couldn't Sheldon talk? Oh yeah, he thought, the answer to that last question is written on that piece of paper sitting next to me… WAIT!

Sheldon lunged at the piece of paper that said 'Sheldon loves Leonard' and hoped he could cover it up before his roommate saw it. After he had wadded the piece of paper into a ball so that Leonard couldn't read it, he threw it across the room under Penny's dining table. Leonard looked confused, but Sheldon couldn't tell if he had read the paper or not. There was a long silence and Penny bit her lip nervously.

"Well this is a little awkward…" she finally muttered and turned to Leonard. She made an interesting facial expression that Sheldon didn't understand, but Leonard seemed to.

"Sheldon, sweetie," Penny turned to face him, "I think it's time for you to go home."

Sheldon blinked a couple times and let the words sink in before he nodded his head like a child. He picked up his jacket and bag and walked past Leonard to the apartment. As he unpacked his bag he heard Leonard come in and sit down on the couch silently. Sheldon didn't want to turn around, he wanted to run to his room and pull the covers over his head. This was waaay too awkward for someone like Sheldon to handle.

"Leonard?" Sheldon said after about five minutes of awkward silence. They were sitting next to each other on the couch and Leonard had been waiting for Sheldon to build up enough courage to say something.

"Yes, Sheldon?" Leonard responded, keeping his gaze at the dark TV screen.

"Did you see what that paper said?" Sheldon hadn't pulled his gaze away from the blank TV either.

"What paper?" Leonard finally turned to Sheldon.

"The one at Penny's," Sheldon didn't turn to face the other man. He seemed too stressed out to even be having a conversation with someone.

"Uhhmm, no. I didn't see it. Why are you asking? What did it say?"

"I was just…wondering if you happened to see it before I…" he stopped talking for a moment and turned to Leonard. "It had irrelevant information written on it. That's all." There was something about Sheldon that didn't seem right, he was making a funny facial expression and he was twitching. He's trying to lie. Sheldon can't lie. This is what happens, he twitches.

"Don't lie to me, Sheldon. What did it say?" Leonard crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows as he waited for Sheldon's response. Sheldon opened his mouth like he was going to say something, but he didn't. Not one little peep escaped his mouth, he couldn't talk.

"Sheldon? You okay?" Leonard asked. Sheldon closed his mouth and frowned. He opened it again and tried to say something, but still nothing came out. He made the sort of frustrated expression that Raj made when he tried to speak in front of women. Great, Sheldon has selective mutism too. Now what do I do?

"It said… it said…" Sheldon finally peeped out. Oh, phew, no more mutism to deal with. Just Raj.

"What? What did it say? For god's sake, Sheldon! It can't be that big a deal!" Leonard wanted to make sure Sheldon told him before going mute again.

"Yes it can!" There was the old Sheldon. The Sheldon that just had to argue with everything. But Leonard knew a way past that. Years and years of living with Sheldon will teach you a couple of things, like shortcuts in an argument.

"What could be such a big deal that it made you stop talking?" this question would get Sheldon so worked up that he would blurt out what he was avoiding. Leonard felt so clever.

"It said that I love you! That's what's such a big deal!" Sheldon exclaimed and then realised what he said. His eyes got huge and he seemed frozen in place. "I-I-I mean, I er, it said… No! Uhh, it didn't say that, well it did but I," but he had to stop stuttering because Leonard leaned in quickly and pressed his lips against the other man's. Sheldon's eyes automatically fluttered shut. Leonard seemed to be making a habit of shutting Sheldon up in this fashion.

Sheldon felt Leonard's hand wonder up and down the back of his neck as they kissed. If it had been anyone else, Sheldon would have pulled away immediately. He would have pulled away as soon as the kiss began if it hadn't been Leonard. Speaking of touching, Sheldon's usual hate of touching seemed to dissipate with Leonard. Which was a little odd in general, because Sheldon had never liked anyone touching him. He could hardly tolerate it from his own mother! But with Leonard it just seemed so…right.

Which brought up another odd point that he hadn't thought of until now. Sheldon had always considered himself to be asexual. That idea just shattered. Sheldon was most definitely attracted to Leonard. Sheldon Cooper, attracted to someone? Does that even make sense? Is that logical in any way? And does that mean that, because of one person, he would be considered gay? Stop it, he told himself, stop asking questions you can't answer!

Sheldon discovered that he had lightly laid his hand on Leonard's back absentmindedly; it was almost exactly the same way he had the first time Leonard kissed him to shut him up. The shorter man scooted in closer little by little. He seemed to understand that Sheldon would be needing this to go slow. Leonard knew that if he rushed anything it could lead to a panic attack, and those were definitely not fun.

The slowness gave Sheldon time to adjust to the physical contact that he wasn't used to. Sheldon felt a feeling deep in his stomach as Leonard got closer to him. Penny had called the feeling 'butterflies'. In fact, she had been quite adamant on calling it that. 'Butterflies' of all things. Why butterflies? Why such a silly name? It's not like butterflies would flutter around in your stomach even if they did manage to get in there alive… Stop it Sheldon! he scolded himself for getting so distracted again. He got so wrapped up in scolding himself that he didn't realize how much his arm was starting to hurt. He was now realizing that 'lightly' putting your hand on someone's back is almost the same as holding it up in the air for a while. He relaxed his arm a bit and felt relief run up his arm to his shoulder. Automatically, his mouth opened the slightest bit, like when someone would usually say 'ow'. But Sheldon's mouth was a bit preoccupied. Whoops.

Leonard didn't know that when Sheldon opened his mouth it was an accident. He felt Leonard's tongue dart across his lips and his whole body tensed. Sheldon mentally whacked his head for being so uncareful. Even Sheldon Cooper knew that a hand on his back and a slightly open mouth would encourage Leonard.

This was going so wrong. And it was all because he was so damn inexperienced. If he ever asked himself why people should kiss, he finally had his answer: so they would know what they were doing and they could avoid stupid mistakes like this with people they cared about.

Stupid mistakes…people you care about… suddenly it hit Sheldon like a train at full speed. He was kissing his best friend. And if anything, absolutely anything went wrong, that friendship could go down the drain. And now Sheldon was realizing just how much that friendship meant to him.

Before he had met Leonard, he had gone through countless lists of possible roommates. But Leonard was the only one who passed the test. Leonard was the only true possibility. And Leonard hadn't left when he saw Sheldon's schedules, he hadn't left when Sheldon had given him strikes, he hadn't left when Sheldon got mad at him for touching his food.

Maybe that's why Sheldon hadn't given Leonard a strike last week when he started whistling, maybe that's why Sheldon was actually okay with Leonard touching him, maybe that's why Sheldon had began liking Leonard in a more-than-a-friend way. Because Leonard was the only one who had been crazy enough to put up with Sheldon. Leonard was the only one could put up with Sheldon. Leonard was the only one who had stayed, and Sheldon couldn't screw this up or his best friend might slip away.

A/N I'm baaaack! Did yah miss me? xP Anywho, I was looking on tumblr and someone made a post that had a bunch of pictures of Leonard and Sheldon and then in the middle it said something like, 'Dear Leonard, forget about Penny and get together with Sheldon, already!' And to that I say amen, because the truth is, they would be amazing together. I've always liked the Shenny idea, but I'll admit it's not practical. Shelnard is, though! Something like this story could totally happen! And I've read some other Shelnard ffs and they seemed pretty realistic too! (When will the writers get a clue?)

I wanted to tell you all that I have found a song that fits this story a little too perfectly, it's called 'Accidentally in Love' by Counting Crows. You should check it out. I'm pretty sure there's actually a Shelnard video to that song. (Pretty, awesome, right?)

Anyways, thanks for reading, I love getting reviews, but then again who doesn't? ;) Luv y'all! OH YEAH, and the super duper cuteness should be coming in the next chapter xD chapter five will be beautiful, you'd better read it when I put it up! (lol)