A fictional story about fictional characters.
*****
Penny was almost immediately in a deep funk. She had just said "good bye" to her neighbor, Leonard Hofstadter, and watched him turn his back to join his fellow nerds on a three month scientific adventure at the North Pole. As soon as she had closed her apartment door Penny had come to the surprising sudden realization that she was actually in love with the adorable nerd scientist, and she missed him already. Ever since she had moved across the hall from Leonard and Sheldon Cooper, the "head nerd" as she had labeled him, it had been no secret that Leonard was infatuated with her, but until now she had not realized how deeply her feelings had grown for him. Leonard had devoted every day to being nice to her and trying to win her affections, but she had always thought of him as just a friend...until now. For the past several months he had been her friend and confidant...the one person who was always there for her; and never judgmental. He had supported her in every venture, and assured her that her acting career would someday blossom, no matter how many failures she had endured.
Well, no time to sort out her feelings right now, she had to get ready for her shift as a waitress at the Cheesecake Factory. Several months ago she had emigrated to Pasadena from her family farm in Nebraska with the sole goal of becoming a world famous actress...now she would settle for an actress who could actually support herself by acting. The acting jobs had been few and far between despite countless interviews and try-outs. Seemingly like all aspiring actresses, she had been forced to take a waitress job to pay the bills. The Cheesecake Factory wasn't bad and the manager, Mike, was very understanding about her auditions and scheduling.
As she was changing into her cheesecake Factory uniform, Penny admired her body in the mirror. She wore a skimpy, low cut bra to cradle her perfectly shaped 35 C breasts, with matching purple lace g-string panties riding high on her flared hips. She smoothed moisturizer along the length of her incredibly shaped legs, seeing no need for panty hose. As she gazed into the mirror, she chuckled to herself thinking that if Leonard ever got a glimpse of this body he would have to reach for his inhaler. She applied a tiny bit of eye shadow and lip gloss to her angelic face which was perfectly cradled by her long blond tresses.
They had recently hired a new waitress, Bernadette Rostenkowski, who taken the job to pay her way through graduate school, and they had become fast friends. Penny had taught Bernadette the finer points of being a successful waitress: such as unbuttoning the top two buttons of your blouse for male customers (three on a Friday or Saturday night) to increase your tips. Bernadette needed no help in that regard, as she possessed an incredible "rack." Coincidently, Bernadette was a microbiologist who was studying at Caltech where the nerds were all employed. Despite the difference in their IQs, Bernadette never made Penny feel inadequate and they had rapidly become quite close.
On slow nights they would often lean on the bar engaging in "girl talk," and sipping wine or an occasional margarita; often bemoaning about their love life, or lack thereof. On this night they were on that very subject and Bernadette asked Penny about possibly introducing her to the neighbors she often mentioned. Penny laughed when thinking of Sheldon on a date and told Bernadette that she actually thought of Sheldon as being asexual, and that she had never seen him display any emotion. At the mention of his name, Bernadette began to laugh and informed Penny that it must be the same Sheldon Cooper who was a professor at her university because she had heard many stories about the temperamental, egotistical doctor. When Bernadette inquired about the other neighbor, Leonard, Penny quickly replied, "oh, you wouldn't be interested in him."
"Oooo, it sounds like someone else has their eyes on Leonard," Bernadette teased, making Penny blush.
"What...no, I mean...I don't know...maybe," Penny sheepishly replied, "I have been thinking about him a lot lately." "He is just the sweetest, most thoughtful man I have ever met...but he is just so different from the men I usually date," she added. When Bernadette asked about their friends, Penny explained, "well, Raj is another physicist who is pretty nice but he has a problem: he can't utter a word to a female unless he is drinking. He has never talked directly to me. The other member of the quartet is Howard...and he's just creepy; a real lech. Every time he looks at me I can tell he's undressing me with his eyes."
Their conversation was interrupted by Mike and a large, black man (who reminded Penny of the classic gang "enforcer"). Mike introduced him, "ladies, this is Bruno. He is my replacement. As you know, Cheesecake Factories are all company owned, not franchises, and from time to time they transfer managers around to keep everyone sharp. I have enjoyed working with you and I have every confidence that you will work just as hard for Bruno." Both Penny and Bernadette were crestfallen at the announcement because Mike had been the perfect manager: totally accessible, open to schedule changes, and virtually invisible. He had been like an absentee manager; as long as things were running smoothly, he just let them be. The working atmosphere had been totally relaxed and they were anxious about changes.
Bruno was a huge man, about six feet six inches tall with a rather large pot belly...Penny thought to herself that doughnuts must be his favorite food..or cheesecake. What really worried her was that when he looked at her, she got the same uneasy feeling she had when Howard stared at her. Bernadette must have had the same feeling because they looked at each other with the same apprehension in their eyes. When he shook hands with them, their tiny hands were dwarfed by his. He was truly an imposing figure with his shaved head shining under the harsh restaurant lighting. He was smiling, but it was more like a leer and Penny had an immediate ominous feeling. She thought he looked more like a gang member than a Cheesecake Factory manager.
Probably used to this reaction, Bruno assured them that he would not be invoking mass changes, and that there would be opportunities for advancement based on performance reviews. As the two men moved on to other staff introductions, Penny and Bernadette looked at each other and began to giggle. "I felt like a dwarf next to him," Bernadette blurted out, "he should have an eye patch and a parrot on his shoulder."
"Oh, God, he'll hear you," Penny giggled, "seriously though, did you see the way he looked us up and down. I think he counted every freckle in your cleavage."
"Yeah," Bernadette responded, "I hope he won't be trouble; but I did like the part about advancements...let's hope that means raises."
For the first week or so everything went smoothly with the new manager; pretty much status quo. He even agreed to let Penny tend bar part time, which delighted her because it was mostly men at the bar and they always attempted to impress her with larger tips. Waiting on tables, she was restricted in how much she could flirt with the customers because the dining room was a family oriented area, and she didn't normally dare to unbutton three buttons; but at the bar she could expose a little more skin and cajole some bigger tips. Penny was certainly not a wiz at remembering the recipes for all the different cocktails and mixed drinks, but the bar had a laptop computer where she could easily research the ingredients.
As her first week behind the bar progressed, it seemed to Penny that Bruno was spending more time there than when the other bartenders were on duty. She chalked it up to him making sure she was learning the job properly until certain patterns began to develop. There was, of course, limited space behind the bar and it was a tight squeeze for two average sized people to squeeze past each other, but when one of the people was a man of Bruno's size, it was nearly impossible. He seemed to make excuses for going from one end of the bar to the other, every time putting his hands "innocently" on Penny's hips as he passed behind her in the restricted space. It was not her imagination that he actually began to pause when he was directly behind her and grind his crotch into her buttocks. Often it felt like there was a salami stuffed into his pants, and she came very close to objecting, but she really was making considerably more money in tips tending bar and she didn't want to jeopardize it.