Disclaimer: All is Chuck's...
Part VII...
"So I'm never gonna dance again...Guilty feet have got no rhythm..." The 1920s vintage style "Postmodern Jukebox" version of "Careless Whisper" played...
Sheldon safely seen to and something of a truce now in effect, Raj and Lucy were rather happily dancing, Lucy to the gang's general surprise displaying considerable talent for Jazz Era style dancing...
Amy rather annoyed to have been pressed to stay by President Siebert himself after Leonard had, with Howard's help, managed to load the still wobbily Sheldon into his car to get him home...
...to safety...As Sheldon, rather remarkably having recovered quickly...To an extent...Had put it, once safely away...
"Sheldon? We thought you were really ill. Amy was scared to death..." Leonard, frowning...
"I was, just not quite so..." sigh... "Oh, you saw them, Leonard...They were going to divide me between them...Or at least..."
Leonard glanced at him, briefly...
"Road?!" Sheldon insisted.
"Sheldon, there's no traffic and I'm going 20 miles an hour at Amy's request to spare your tummy." Leonard sighed. "I hope this doesn't mean you take back your proposal...You're not gonna break Amy's heart, now? Claim you were too drunk to remember?...Cause some people you know can tell you..."
"Yes, I know Penny's made other drunken proposals...She means them you know...She's just frightened if you say yes too quickly." Sheldon nervously considering the potential for whizzing death as he stared out at the road...
"What?"
"And it was an acceptance..." precise tone. "Amy proposed. And a Cooper doesn't renege on a promise."
"Oh...Well...Good, good...I'm glad. You have to ask her too, you know, it's only right. A girl likes to be...Penny really meant it?!" Leonard, a bit frantic to get to the real meat of interest...
"Yes, of course she meant it. You're the best thing that ever happened to her." Sheldon frowned. "She's just terrified you might decide she's lost value after the deal is signed and she's off the showroom floor. That's car sales talk, by the way. Apparently that's the standard for metaphor in Nebraska..."
"But if she meant it..."
"She declared herself your fiancée officially, didn't she? Geesh, Hofstadter what more hoops do you intend to put that poor girl through? Now me, I accepted Amy's proposal, right off the bat..."
"Right off the what? Sheldon? She's been trying to move you two along for..."
"You mean to the stage of your sort of nightly coupling...Lot of good that's done your long-term relationship." Offhand shrug...
"Hey, don't knock it..." Leonard shrugged. "Maybe it's not the best way to build a long-term relationship but it's better than..."
"Yes?" Sheldon, coolly...
"Well...Sheldon..."
"The steadily increasingly complex web of spiritual and emotional intimacy Amy Farrah Fowler and I have established, with every prospect for continued development versus Leonard and Penny in the sack after yet another break-up and usually no closer mentally, emotionally, and spiritual than you were at the start..."
"That's not..."
"You couldn't even sense Penny's desire to have you, the said best thing in her life, with her always versus her terror both that one or both of you might find it too confining or limiting and run...She's more afraid of you in that regard, by the way."
"She told you that?"
"It's obvious...Lord, Leonard...For the man Amy calls the emotional center of our group, your empathic and emotional antennae seem to be dead where the woman you claim to love and cherish is concerned. I say again...Geesh."
"She really meant it..." Leonard beamed. "And it's really official?"
"I think she meant she wants you to ask again...And how can it be truly official till you or she have asked formally since you keep turning her down."
"I turn her down...?" gasp... "I've been asking her for years...She told me to stop asking..."
"Until...?" Sheldon, calmly...
"Until...She asked me...?" sheepish expression.
"There you go..." nod. "You may give your firstborn my name in appreciation...Shelly if it's a girl."
"Sheldon!" sigh...
Though of course...Sheldon Hofstadter does have a certain...
"Maybe the middle name...I'll see what Penny says."
"Ole ball-and-chain has us by the throat already, eh?"
"What about Amy? And what about Susan Stein? You faked that whole incident to get away from them?"
"Oh, no...I told you. I was very sick after Susan spun me...Surely you've seen me pass out under similar circumstances..."
True enough...Leonard pondered. "But you played it up..."
"I had to get away..." Sheldon sighed. "Susan might have..." nervous look which Leonard caught in the driver's rear view mirror...
Leonard suddenly braked...Startling Sheldon...
"What, what? Is the check engine light on? Did we hit a gerbil?" terrified look.
"A what? No...Sheldon Cooper?!...Did you lie to Amy about Susan Stein?!" grim stare...
Uh...
"No...Not...Exactly..." guilty tone...
Holy...
"Sheldon?! What happened between you and Susan?!" Leonard, stunned.
"I didn't mean for her to be my first..." Sheldon noted, sad tone...
Holy...
Lord, if only I had a pocket recorder or anything...Penny is never going to believe me...
....
"No, I'm never gonna dance again...Guilty feet have got no rhythm..." the song continued...Howard and Bernadette joining Raj and Lucy with their own attempt at vintage 20's dance...
Kripke, dancing past with an elderly faculty member shaking head at the sight...
"You're sure that blonde nymphet didn't slip out?" Amy hissed to Penny as they watched the dancers... "I mean of course the other blonde nymphet..."
"No, she's still here...Watching us, actually..." Penny noted, nodding to where Susan was chatting with her father and various faculty.
A number of male faculty quite eager to do so, it seemed...
"Good. I was afraid she'd find a way to slip out...I only stayed because Leonard promised to keep Sheldon safe...In every sense of the word..." grim look at Penny.
"I'm sure he will, Amy..."
"...I can't understand why President Siebert wanted me of all people to stay..." Amy frowned. "No one usually cares whether I show up, leave, or might be found locked and starving in a hall gym closet two weeks after the event."
Uh...Penny blinked...Shrugging...
"Well, tonight, Amy Farrah Fowler was the belle of the ball..." Penny patted her. "And didn't even Sheldon Cooper take notice..." demure nod and smile.
"He did, didn't he? Penny...I'd nearly forgotten! Oh, God! I'm engaged!" she cried...
"Well, after he asks you...That galoot is going to get things right if I have to hold him down and twist his scrawny..."
"Hell you will!" Amy frowned. "I've made the proposal, he accepted...Done deal...Don't you dare louse this up for me, bestie." Glare...
"Amy..." Penny, nervous glance round...
"Sorry, sorry...It's just...Penny, my life has reached its apogee...I'm dancing on air...I can't believe what's happening...Plus that bitch is standing ready to suck the life out of my joy..." Amy sighed, nodding to indicate Susan, standing with President Siebert and her father.
Dr. Francis chatting casually with various faculty and alumni but keeping watchful eye on his old friend and said old friend's daughter...
"Not if I can help it as to Dr. Stein..." Penny, firmly... "And you go right on dancing on that air, Amy, my best friend...Who deserves every good thing..." warm beam, pat. "Especially if she willing to save the world from Sheldon Cooper..." grin... "And Amy...Your life is just starting on the way it should be...Doing that climbing thing like in Leonard's experiment charts."
"Very good..." Amy beamed. "You are getting the science...Bit by bit..."
"Thanks..." Penny, pleased. "Yeah, I really think my problem was I needed glasses..."
"But please...Bestie..." Amy smiled. "No matter how good you get under Leonard's loving tutelage, don't ever stop being Penny? Though I see from that remark on your nonprescription glasses you haven't as yet."
"Not a chance..." firm nod.
"And you're engaged too! President Siebert was asking me when that happened..." Amy, happily..."When did that happen? And why didn't you tell me? We can do a double wedding...Oh..." she trembled excitedly. "I never thought I'd be married and now, a double wedding with my bestie! And I now could sing at our wedding...Well, that one song..."
Kripke, overhearing while pondering hitting on the arguably second and third hottest chicks in the room, slight sigh...
Not surprised by Fowler, despite tonight's amazing transformation but really...Penelope?...A true loss to the studly, even if it explains her and Hofstadter...
Not that there's anything wrong with that...Long as the University enforces anti-discrimination policies...
"Oh, that..." Penny, nervously.
"So did Leonard retroactively accept the last drunken one?...Good for him." Amy beamed. "We be setting a new trend, bestie...Well, actually Grandma did ask Grandpa Leonard while she held him at the farm."
"So that really happened? I thought you were kidding..."
"Oh, he was grateful later...Grandma had to save him from the floozy trying to take him for his financial position, after he'd spilled all in therapy. It was so romantic...Love at third session. Well, it took Grandpa another week in confinement, but..."
Hmmn...She looked over at Susan who was once again glancing her way, clearly anxious to see that her nemesis had not vamoosed in pursuit of the elusive Sheldonbeast...
History repeats itself, perhaps...Though I did propose first so my claim would be even better than Gran Mag's arguing to herself that she needed to protect her patient from himself...And floozy.
"Well, see Amy..." Penny began... "As to my engagement..."
"Dr. Fowler, Ms. Penny..." Dr. Francis had come over to them... "How is Dr. Cooper?"
"I'm just about to call to check..." Amy noted.
"Oh, before you do...Doctor." Francis smiled. "Could I possibly have a word alone?"
"Well..." Amy, anxious now...
Image of Sheldon gasping his last breaths, screaming her name...Oh, stable vitals or not, why the hell did I let that fool Siebert talk me into staying...Just like the goddess Fortuna to snatch him from me.
Hell, you cruel and merciless bitch, fight fair...She glanced over to Susan... Let me take my chances with her, don't pull this vicious stuff...Oh, please...Please...Clenching fists.
Besides I could take her...Just one careful nerve pinch and she's temporarily paralyzed and on a flight to Bangkok to resume her film career...
"I'll call Leonard, Amy." Penny offered. "You have a nice chat..." smile to Dr. Francis...
Yep, Ms. Dr. Hofstadter doin' her social duty, hostess with the mostess...I could get to likin' this...She beamed.
Though rather avoid having my bestie pin me down on this right now. At least not till I've talked to Leonard...
Still, maybe it's not all that bad a notion...Askin' them...
At least, when sober and not depressed by career failures...
"So..." Amy distracted and a bit at sea as to the social etiquette...
Still, on a night like this...
Her radiance rather impressive at that...
"...Dr. Hofstadter is so glad to have you here..."
"A wonderful boy...I hope to do some good work with him again...My finest pupil...And this time I really mean that." Smile, then serious look. "But Dr. Fowler...May I call you, Amy?"
"Oh, yes..."
"If we could move out of range of I think you know who..." he suggested, indicative glance toward the suddenly attentive Dr. Stein...His daughter momentarily distracted in an attempt to speak to Howard...Clearly a friend of the Hofstadter guy who'd carted Sheldon off...Who surely would have and would surrender his friend's address and phone number...
Bernadette firmly planted at his side, with brittle smile.
"Doctor?" Amy puzzled as Francis gently led her off...
"My dear, as a former student of and friend to your grandmother...I feel it's my place to warn you." Francis, urgently. "Your relationship to Dr. Cooper is in dire peril so long as Stein and his daughter are here. I cannot emphasis enough that you must keep them away from you and Sheldon..."
She blinked at him.
My...She eyed that earnest look...
He does have the reassuring air of natural command that makes one trust implicitly...Just like that Ben Kingsley guy...
"The Steins live to destroy lives, Amy...To ruin the happiness of anyone they can amuses them...And Susan has never forgiven Sheldon for rejecting her. Nor has her father, who delights in seeing his equally fiendish daughter torment and destroy males as he has females." Shrewd nod... "Forget the Frankenstein analogies, dear heart...You've heard of Dr. Fu Manchu and his fiendish daughter?"
Amy staring...
However only yadda, yadda, yadda "...Susan..." yadda, yadda, yadda... "...Sheldon..." yadda, yadda, yadda... "... rejecting her..." heard by her...
Hmmn...This may take a while to sell...Francis eyed her vague smile...
But they didn't call me "St. Francis Xavier Gandi..." in school for nothing...He renewed earnest look...