InsaneJournal

Millie liked her boss quite a bit. In a way she had to because he was –for all intents and purposes-- the sole reason for her existence. But that didn't mean she didn't think he was the very definition of odd. She counted out the marshmallows as she dropped them into his cup of hot chocolate which he was drinking even though it was July and eighty-five degrees outside. Even Millie had pulled on her pedal pusher that morning instead of a full dress.

“...Five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven.” She watched as the last marshmallow plopped into the cup.

She'd made her own coffee first, only because if she'd made her employer's first it would have cooled past the 101 degrees exactly he liked his warm beverages served. There was a little thermometer that he had handed to her that was specifically to check the temperature of his drinks. It was red and had a yellow lightening bolt on it. Some cartoon reference that Millie didn't recognise.

Holding the two mugs carefully, Millie left the Center's communal kitchen and started on her way up to her boss' rooms. There was no elevator attendant and she had to set the mugs down, pull the gate closed, and pull down on the lever by herself all before jumping backward when the jerking movement caused some of her coffee to splash on her shoe. Thankfully the contents of the hot chocolate mug stayed put, because a splash would have meant having to go back downstairs and remaking the drink completely. God forbid there weren't exactly ten marshmallows in the cup.

And, hells bells, they were beginning to melt already.

Millie struggled her way out of the elevator once it had reached the twentieth floor, where one large apartment took up the entirety of the space. The elevator let her out in a small foyer in front of a heavy wooden door that was propped open. Still, she had to nudge it with her shoulder to actually get into the apartment. Her hands were full, but she knew better than to expect any gentlemanly aide. She could see the back of his skinny, brown head and knew he was probably too engrossed in staring down at the city to even consider helping her.

The door shut behind her and Millie cleared her throat. “Sheldon.” When there was no response she frowned. “Sheldon, I brought your hot chocolate. It's one hundred and one and I'm not going back downstairs to do it again.” Like heck she was. Millie started towards him and set the chocolate mug down on his bare desk. Well, she called it bare and he called it clean. It was one of the few things she could identify a use for in the apartment, which was filled with a disturbing amount of toys, glossy comic books, and other things she didn't always recognise. The only useful things were a few chairs, the desk, a chalkboard riddled with numbers and letters that seemed to form equations, and the bed in his room that she was never allowed inside.

The longer he took to turn around the deeper Millie's scowl became, and finally she let out an audible sigh.

That was when Sheldon Cooper finally turned away from the window and looked at Millie. “You are the spitting image of a young Mee-Maw.”

Millie continued to scowl, lines beyond her years appearing in her brow as she looked up at her employer. “I don't know who or what that is. The marshamallows are going to melt.” She pointed at the drink before lifting her own mug to her lips and taking a much needed sip. “I have guests downstairs waiting, but I wanted to let you know that that emergency you warned me about happened. Some vampires tried to break into the Center and the door's broken now, so I'm going to need to get that fixed.”

“Mee-Maw was my grandmother,” Sheldon answered. He picked up the mug with both hands and made it a point of very obviously counting the marshmallows in the cup. “This doesn't feel like one hundred and one degrees.”

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the red thermometor. “Here, you can test it yourself.”

“I will not.” He looked downright horrified and stepped back, still holding the mug. “That's been in your pocket. I will not put something that's been in your pocket into my hot chocolate. Christ on a cracker, you'd think you hadn't only cured polio fourteen years ago. Who knows what I could catch!”

Surely there was something she could have said in response, but Millie decided it was just best not to respond. His outbursts hardly needed to be fueled. “Like I was saying, the front doors are broken. Glass everywhere. I'd like to get it fixed and I'll need the money to do that,” she said calmly, sipping at her coffee again. “You obviously knew that something was going to happen.”

“Of course,” Sheldon said, clearly resenting that she'd stated something he found obvious. He stuck a finger into his mug, frowned, but then took a sip anyway.

“There was a lot of crime around. A huge spike, and it's not as bad this week, but I'd still be nervous to walk around at night.” If I ever left. “One visitor told me she was attacked by something called a Weevil. I don't know what to do for them, and that makes it very hard to do my job.”

“A weevil?”

Millie groaned internally, because it was apparent he'd simply stopped listening at the mention of weevils. “Yes, weevils. And I've heard about vampires, demons, flying robots, evil wizards--”

“Did the evil wizards have names?”

“No, I don't think so. But that's not the point. I'm trying to say--”

Sheldon held up a hand and pulled open one of the desk drawers. Millie didn't have to squint to see that it was filled to the brim with various bills. He pulled out a handful and held it out to her. “You can get your door fixed. I have the money.”

“Don't you think that should be in a bank?” She reached out to take it in hand anyway.

“I don't trust the banks, and you shouldn't either. You're thirty years out of an economic depression and everyone's just forgotten.” He shook his head as he closed the drawer again. “The curse of a country run by smaller minds than mine. You're all lucky I'm here.”

Sheldon was probably the smartest person Millie had ever met, but she would never tell him that. “How did you know that the crime would spike and those... things would come?”

“I brought them here, obviously, like I brought everyone else here.”

“Why would you bring things here that could hurt people like that?”

“To watch it all.” Another answer given as if it should have been perfectly obvious. “Iron Man fought a sentinel outside my window over the weekend! I've fixed Davies' dellusional thought that separating Torchwood was a good idea. Soon, I might even go and join the X-Men. Leonard is going to wet himself with jealousy when he hears what I've created. It's a Geek's Paradise. The Silver Age of comics. And he told me my infinite dimensional string theories were a –and I quote-- 'a colossal waste of time that could have been spent with friends'. He didn't think it was possible. Well guess what, Leonard? The bazinga's on you.”

Millie blinked. “Sheldon, I--”

He put the mug down on the desk and turned back towards the windows that showed off his perfect view of the city. “No one appreciates the work I put into these things,” he muttered. “Go get the door fixed, Millie.”

Gladly. Millie stopped herself from rolling her eyes. “Will do, boss. I'd appreciate it if you could keep your paradise away from the center's doors next time.”

“You're saucy,” she heard from behind as she pushed the heavy door back open with her shoulder. “Mee-Maw was never saucy.”