Chapter 337: I'm Just Speculating
Ron was sleeping on the far left of the bed, Penny was to his right, and Rajesh was to Penny's right. If you had to find something in common among these three unrelated people, it would probably be that none of them were wearing much clothing.
Well, at least Ron was wearing boxers. He had just lifted the covers to take a look and felt a little more relaxed, but no matter how hard he tried to recall, he still couldn't remember what happened last night.
Could it be that the three of them hooked up together?!
"Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!" Penny kept muttering like a broken record: "God, please hear me—nothing happened last night, okay?"
Ron and Rajesh nodded in unison, then frantically searched the room for their clothes, which were scattered everywhere, and threw them on haphazardly.
Of course, Sheldon, like a Swiss watch, woke up promptly at seven every morning. However, when he walked out imagining himself eating cereal and watching TV in his usual spot, he found his couch already occupied.
"Leonard, what are you doing here?"
"I live here," Leonard replied, rubbing his eyes.
"That's not what my paperwork says." Just a day earlier, Sheldon had Leonard and Rajesh sign an apartment swap agreement, making Rajesh his new temporary roommate.
Poor Leonard sat up from the couch: "Priya's going back to India."
"That's a separate issue," a knock came at the door. Sheldon walked toward it impatiently, adding before reaching the doorway, "Rajesh is getting along very well with us; you can't just disrupt that."
"What are you doing here?" Sheldon opened the door to find Howard standing there.
"I didn't sleep all night. I had a fight with Bernadette, and she gave me this expensive watch." Howard rolled up his sleeve, revealing his new timepiece.
A Rolex—pretty pricey. At Howard's income level, it would take at least three to five months' salary to afford it, yet this was only Bernadette's monthly stipend.
Yes, that's right—Bernadette no longer had to work as a waitress like Penny. Her original purpose as a waitress was to pay for grad school, but now she had completed her PhD in microbiology and was even offered a six-figure job by a major pharmaceutical company.
Howard's resentment was understandable.
However, this particular emotion didn't compute in Sheldon's unique thought process: "Leonard, did you understand what he was saying?"
"Of course," Leonard replied weakly.
"Go talk to him," Sheldon said, pointing to Leonard on the couch. But Howard had only taken two steps when two disheveled figures emerged from the bedroom. One was Rajesh, who had somehow destroyed all his clothes last night and was now wrapped in a blanket. The other was Penny, hair a mess, clutching her high heels, trying to make as little noise as possible.
Unfortunately, her plan backfired. In an instant, the eyes of all three people in the living room were drawn to this bizarre pair.
Leonard jumped up from the couch in shock at the sight before him: "What the hell is going on?!"
"Ha ha! It's not what it looks like!" Penny laughed nervously, leaving Rajesh, still wrapped in a blanket, bewildered, and quickly weaved between Sheldon and Howard back into her apartment.
"What does it look like?"
Sheldon muttered to himself, but his words were immediately met with a response.
"How should I know? Hey, isn't it Monday morning? Why do you guys look like you're not going to work at all? Is CalTech closed today?" Ron walked down the stairs to the apartment door, looked inside, and saw Rajesh looking shocked. Before he could speak, Ron blurted out, "Rajesh, what's with that outfit? Is it some kind of Bollywood thing?"
After saying that, he glared at Rajesh when no one was looking, and Rajesh immediately shut his mouth.
He swallowed back the words, "Didn't we all sleep together with Penny?" At the same time, he was full of questions. They were just lying in the same bed—how did Ron end up at the door?
If Ron knew what Rajesh was thinking, he would definitely sneer dismissively. What a joke! Don't forget, my job is being a CIA operative! How many agents have you seen who use doors in emergencies?
We all use windows!
While Penny and Rajesh were still in a state of panic, Ron had already gotten dressed. While the two were discussing their cover story, Ron had already opened the window and climbed down the apartment building's fire escape. He then came back up the stairs, pretending to have just returned from his morning jog—which happened to be his usual time—and everything went smoothly without arousing suspicion.
For a professional operative, this was child's play. If all the world's cheating spouses could learn this skill, Jerry Springer would have no material left.
"Ron, did you hear what Penny said? 'Not what it looks like'? Then what is it?" Sheldon said, as Rajesh's blanket accidentally slipped off. "Rajesh, don't you want to find some pants to put on? Aren't you freezing with your legs bare?"
"My pants are at home."
"What about the pants you wore yesterday?"
"I..." Rajesh was speechless. He couldn't very well say he tore them all up during some drunken interpretive dance, could he?
Rajesh cast a pitiful look at Leonard. This was his apartment, and since the two were about the same size, and Sheldon and Ron were too tall for him to fit into their clothes, only Leonard's clothes would work.
"Come with me, I'll find you something to wear." Even though Leonard was still annoyed with Rajesh, they were friends after all, and besides, he had been sleeping with Rajesh's sister, so he took the initiative to pull Rajesh toward his bedroom.
"Poor Leonard."
"Poor? I really don't understand what's so pitiful about him. Aren't I the most pitiful one? My perfectly good morning has been ruined by you people, my cereal has turned to mush, and I've missed the new episode of Doctor Who."
While Leonard got up, Sheldon quickly sat down in his spot and turned on the TV, trying to catch the last bit of the Doctor Who episode. As for the bowl of cereal that had turned to mush, he had no intention of touching it anymore.
Howard asked curiously, "Do you have any idea why Rajesh and Penny came out of Leonard's bedroom practically naked?"
"Maybe they just spent the whole night discussing sustainability and decided the fashion industry is too harmful to the environment, so they're planning a nude protest starting today?" Ron calmly met Howard's suspicious gaze. "Why are you looking at me like that? I'm just speculating about those eco-warriors."
(End of Chapter)
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