The Emily Derivative
Chapter 01, The Babysitting Corollary
Penny brushed her and Leonard's daughter's hair as Leonard sat and watched with a big smile on his face.
"You know, Emily, except for your auburn hair, you look just like your mom," Leonard said.
"I know, Daddy," Emily said. "You tell me that every day. Mom has some powerful dominant genes. My mitochondrial analysis says I have a Northern European, probably Scandinavian, maternal line. Those Vikings were tough dudes and dudettes."
"Sweetie," Penny said, "Please try to relax and have some fun tonight."
"Yes, Mom. I'll let Uncle Sheldon think he's babysitting me, but everyone but him knows I'm really babysitting him. You and Daddy don't need to pay me: That's totally unnecessary. I'm making enough with Uncle Howard's and my app business and my modeling and acting that I'm doing all right, not to mention the trust fund Daddy's Grandmama Emily left me. With what you're going to insist on paying me tonight, plus what Grandpa Wyatt and Grandma Patti paid me to re-program the milking machine interface at their ranch and what Aunt Sela is paying me to take care of Thunderbolt, I'll be able to get the new iPad 10. I try to spend any money I wasn't expecting on fun things, like computers."
"iPad? Don't let your Uncle Sheldon know you're buying anything Apple. I thought you were still an Android girl," Leonard said.
"Yes, the Android tablet has superior architecture and is much faster than the iPad, but I'll need the new iPad to test out new apps for our business," Emily said. "I mostly use my new Galaxy, but I have to be able to write for both. Remember too that we use the iPad at the school you make me attend, and I keep up with my lessons on the iPad when I'm acting or on a modeling gig. It's so ironic that Uncle Howard and I designed the software framework we use in the California elementary and middle schools, and I still have to sit in class when I'm not working and take the lessons on my iPad. It's such a waste of time. I know all that stuff."
"Emily, you're seven years old. You talk like someone who's 40 years old," Penny said as she caressed Emily's cheek. "Remember, your daddy and I have been having you attend school when you're not working with a tutor on location so you can be around normal children your age and make friends. We want you to have a childhood. Your daddy didn't. That's why we were skeptical when you wanted to have Kathy represent you and accept the modeling and acting jobs."
"Oh, mom," Emily said. "I have plenty of friends. Uncle Shauntay and I go shopping, and Aunt Sela comes out to the ranch and goes riding with me when you can't be with us."
"Those are adults, sweetie," Penny said. "I think the only children you associate with are Howard and Bernadette's daughter Mary Margaret and Raj and Alex' daughter Priya."
"Tell you what, sweetheart," Leonard said. "Your mom and I were talking, and, if you're that unhappy having to sit in school and having all the busywork thrown at you because you already know everything they're trying to teach, we'll think about having you do self-paced, online schooling after this school year—as long as you promise us you will try to have some time having fun with children your own age."
"Deal!" Emily said.
"Emily, sweetie, we didn't say we would definitely do it, just that we would think about it," Penny said. "Your daddy and I would never do anything that we thought would be bad for you."
As Emily crawled up into Leonard's lap, put her arms around his neck, and kissed him on the cheek, Leonard asked, "What are you and Sheldon going to do tonight sweetheart?"
"The same thing we do every night, Pinky, try and take over the world!" Emily said, laughing. [Singing] "We're Sheldon and the Brain, Sheldon and the Brain. One is a genius, the other's insane. They're laboratory mice, whose genes have been spliced. They're Sheldon, they're Sheldon and the Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain, Brain." She giggled just like Penny. "We'll probably do what we do every time I babysit him. He'll be working on his obsolete old whiteboard when I arrive, I'll correct the math, and he'll pout. Then he'll say something snarky about how Daddy received the Nobel Prize for his work with the Cern super collider and how Daddy was behind building the super collider here after he stole Aunt Alex from him. He still grinds on about how everyone ignores his valuable work in String Theory. He still has his nose out of joint over Daddy's second Nobel Prize, the one for his work with laser technology."
"Are you guys going to stay in the apartment all night?" Penny asked.
"Uncle Sheldon wants to go to see the re-mastered The Fifth Element with 18 seconds of previously unaired footage at the Astro II Theater with Uncle Howard, Aunt Bernadette, and Mary Margaret. Uncle Raj and Aunt Alex may join us. That's fine with me. I like The Fifth Element, even though that's the only one in the series without Mom."
"I wanted to see the one with the extra 18 seconds," Leonard said.
"Daddy, I can take you some other night. I won't mind seeing it again. We'll need to leave from supper at The Cheesecake Factory in time that Uncle Sheldon can stop off at the concession stand and spend all that money on junk food. I've told him it's sending him in the direction of an early heart attack, but does he listen to me? Nooooooo. He always tries to talk me into some candy, but I'll stick to the air-popped fava beans I talked them into having at the concession counter. They'll be playing the Lilly Potter movie with Mom starting at Midnight, so we shouldn't have too much trouble getting into The Fifth Element at 7:00 p.m., since everyone will be in line for Mom's movie."
"How do you get into PG-13 movies?" Penny asked.
"Uncle Sheldon starts pitching one of his fits as soon as they ask how old I am, and they always give up and let me see the movies," Emily said. "Besides, as I've quoted California law to them before, as long as you go to the movie with a responsible adult, someone my age is allowed to get into a PG-13 movie. I pretend Uncle Sheldon's a responsible adult."
Emily kissed Leonard on the cheek, crawled down out of his lap, finished packing her travel bag, and slung it over her shoulder.
"You know, Mom," Emily said, "I think it's so fascinating that Aunt Alex was madly in love with Daddy, but you made Daddy fall in love with you, that Uncle Raj was madly in love with Alex, but he couldn't talk to her. Whenever Uncle Sheldon brings up how Alex was his assistant, Alex reminds him that he didn't treat her very well, so she jumped ship and went to work with Daddy on the super collider and was part of the team that won the Nobel Prize when she had her Ph.D. less than a year."
Leonard asked, "Emily, what are you and Uncle Howard working on right now?"
"Daddy we're designing cloud applications for the Apple, Windows, and Android operating systems that are platform-independent," Emily said. "That way, you only have to buy a tablet, computer, watch, or phone with enough RAM and CPU speed to be able to send to and receive from the cloud. You'll be able to enable each app in the cloud and store your data there, so you won't have to load your device with so much memory or store the information on flash drives. Now that all the states except South Carolina have universal Wi-Fi, there's no reason to have to carry external storage. You'll only need enough hardware to input and display your data. We can interface with different biometric devices, such as the one I designed that you wear to alert you to an asthma attack and stop it by shocking your brainstem and can respond 1000 times faster than the current technology allows."
"Hasn't that technology been around for a while?" Leonard asked. I know I've been doing cloud computing and biometrics since about 2010."
"Not like this, it hasn't," Emily said. "Uncle Howard and I have optimized the stack and have developed a more stable compression algorithm. Our system is about 100 times more powerful than anything that's out there now, even the secret military applications. We've already been offered enough for the rights for my share to pay all my college expenses 10 times over. Ooh! Kitty!" she said as she pulled up a video of a kitten walking across a piano keyboard that her cousin Molly had sent her on her tablet email.
"See what I mean?" Penny asked Leonard. "I don't think she's seven: I think she's a 40-year-old little person who was switched with our daughter at birth. Emily, sweetie, please be sure to have some fun. All I ever see you do is program apps and go to your modeling or acting jobs."
"Mom, you know how much fun acting is," Emily said. "I get to pretend to be all these different little girls. Aunt Kathy said I have nailed how to pretend I'm a seven-year-old girl."
"You are a seven-year-old girl," Leonard said.
"You know what I mean, Daddy. When I do the modeling jobs, Uncle Shauntay and Aunt Jamie make such a fuss over me. Mom, don't worry about me: I am having a ball. The only thing I enjoy more than modeling, acting, and programming is playing with my Barbies."
"Emily, sweetie," Penny said, "You don't play with Barbies. You design new ones and sell them to Mattel."
"That reminds me: I submitted a model for the Rosalind Franklin Barbie, but I haven't heard back from the marketing people," Emily said. "Since I was able to buy the 3D Printer with the proceeds from the last Barbie I sold, the President Hillary Clinton Barbie—the one from her second term—I can spit out as many different models for new Barbie faces as I want."
"Who was Rosalind Franklin?" Penny asked.
"She was the first person who photographed the DNA molecule," Leonard said. "It was her photograph that let Watson and Crick figure out that DNA is in the shape of a spiral staircase. She should have gotten the Nobel Prize along with them, but, because she was a woman, she did not share credit for their discovery."
A half hour later, Emily walked into Sheldon's apartment with Leonard and Penny following along behind. "Line two," she casually said, looking over her shoulder at Sheldon's whiteboard as she walked over and put her travel bag on the coffee table. "It should be –j, not +j."
Sheldon stared at the board for a moment and said, "Well, that's just great. It throws off all the rest of my calculations."
"Uncle Sheldon," Emily said, "Why don't you start taking pictures of the board at each step and sending them to me so I can check over your work before you waste a lot of time? I don't mind. Or, even better, why don't you let Uncle Howard and me install a new virtual whiteboard that can interface directly with me, and I can keep an eye on you even when I'm not here? We could set up an identical one in your office, and the two could sync in the cloud. The display could also show up on your tablet and your Galaxy S-15 phone. That way, if you make a mistake, once you fix it, all your calculations will change to the correct ones."
"This is the whiteboard I have used ever since I got my Ph.D. It was good enough for me 20 years ago, and it's good enough for me now," Sheldon said. "Besides, I still like the smells from the markers."
"Yeah," Penny said, "I've always thought we could explain a lot of your behavior from all the marker fumes you inhale. How do you even get the markers anymore? Since everyone uses the virtual whiteboards now, I wouldn't think you could find them anymore."
"I have to order them from a place in Singapore," Sheldon said. "I have to order them in lots of 1000."
Leonard and Penny started for the door.
"Thanks, Sheldon," Penny said. "I'll pick up Emily in the morning if you can have her ready. We really appreciate your having her spend the night."
"You're welcome—as long as her morning ablutions don't interfere with my schedule," Sheldon said.
Penny and Leonard hugged and kissed Emily goodbye and told her they loved her. Penny whispered, "Thank you!" as she hugged her.
As Howard pulled the SUV out of the parking lot onto North Robles Drive, Emily dressed her Rosalind Franklin Barbie prototype in a lab coat she had sewn herself.
"That Barbie's pretty," Mary Margaret said as she brushed the hair of her Barbie of Penny in her outfit from The Tenth Element.
"Here," Emily said, "you take this one. I can make myself another one now that I have the face mold. I have other Barbies to play with tonight."
"Thank you, Emily. I still think the Barbies of Aunt Penny are the prettiest Barbies," Mary Margaret said. "I'm glad you sold them to Mattel."
"So, Emily," Bernadette said. "Are you excited that your mom and dad are attending the North American premiere of Lilly Potter and the Galloping Goblins tonight in Hollywood?"
"It's all right," Emily said. "When we attended the premiere in London, it was such a big deal. We were mobbed. Mom was so pretty. The photographers ignored everyone else on the red carpet to photograph Mom. I know there were some ugly things in the press over there about Mom being the first non-British actor to play a witch in the series, but she did such a convincing job of playing Lilly Potter's favorite Hogwarts teacher, Penelope Thistlebottom, that I think she won over the fans and even most of the British press."
"You didn't want to go with them tonight?" Howard asked.
"No, I'd rather spend time with you guys tonight," Emily said. "Besides, I didn't want to interfere with Mom and Daddy being able to attend all the parties all night. Mary Margaret and I haven't spent any time together in weeks, since you brought her over to visit us in France. I wish Aunt Alex and Uncle Raj's four children hadn't left after school to visit their grandparents in India. We could have a sort of reunion. I haven't seen all of you in one place since Mom and I spent those three months in France making The Tenth Element."
"Isn't it nice that the director cast you as Penny's daughter?" Howard asked.
"I was surprised," Emily said. "Apparently, we're believable as mother and daughter when they dye Mom's hair my hair color. Go figure."
"Are you going to be able to see your friends from the Lilly Potter movie?" Bernadette asked.
"Emma Watson promised to bring her children and stay with us while she's here. The children are with a sitter tonight. Aunt Sela is coming out to the ranch to ride horses on Sunday and wants all of us to ride with her. Aunt Emma has become very good at riding since Mom took her out while they were filming the Lilly Potter movie. I hope you guys can come too."
"How do you like living on the ranch?" Bernadette asked. "Isn't it nice to be able to see your Grandpa Wyatt and Grandma Patti every day?"
"It is so great," Emily said. "I'm glad mom and Daddy decided to buy the ranch next door. The ranch is so big that I have all this room to get fresh air. Grandpa Wyatt takes me out riding Sunshine every day."
The line at the theater to see the new Lilly Potter movie stretched around the block, even though there were six theaters scheduled to show it around the clock beginning at midnight. Howard led the group through the lobby and showed the ticket taker the tickets he had downloaded from the theater's web site for The Fifth Element. Emily was wearing her brunette wig to prevent people from recognizing her.
"There's Uncle Raj and Aunt Alex," Emily said, pointing to Raj, who was having Alex take his picture standing next to a life-size cut-out of Penny in her Penelope Thistlebottom witch costume. "What do you think, Aunt Alex," she said, moving next to Alex. "Don't you think that costume makes Mom look kinda Goth?"
"Hi, Emily," Alex said. "I think your mom's beautiful, no matter how they dress her."
"Those henna tattoos took forever to wear off," Emily said.
As predicted, Sheldon insisted he had to go to the concession stand. He spent an obscene amount of money on candy, popcorn, and a Big Gulp.
On the way home, Sheldon said, "You know, Emily, you have never signed the Honorary Uncle and Honorary Niece Agreement."
"Uncle Sheldon," Emily said. "Remember your agreement with Mom: 'Anyone who irritates Penny gets punched in the throat.' She said that agreement extends to me as well."
"Well, if you're going to be spending as much time at my apartment as you have been, don't you think an agreement is in order?"
"You're right," Emily said. She took Sheldon's notepad from his shirt pocket and wrote: "Honorary Uncle and Honorary Niece Agreement. To wit: If anyone irritates Emily, she won't correct their math anymore—and her Mom will punch them in the throat."
"Here, Uncle Sheldon," she said, "Sign it."
"I'm not going to sign that," Sheldon said.
"Then I'll tell Mom," Emily said. "What was that? I didn't quite hear what you just said."
"Nothing," Sheldon said, signing the agreement. "You're just like your mother."
"Thank you," Emily said.
"That wasn't a compliment," Sheldon said.
"Uncle Sheldon," Emily asked as they walked back into the apartment with Bernadette, Howard, Mary Margaret, Raj, and Alex coming up the stairs behind them. "How long have you lived in this apartment?"
"I have lived here for 20 years," Sheldon said, "ever since I finished my Ph.D. I had a series of roommates, and then your father, and then your father and your mother, and then Raj. It's just been Amy and me now ever since Raj and Alex got married. By the way, I need to remember to call Amy. I wonder how the neurobiology meeting is going in San Diego."
"Daddy says the apartment looks the same as when he was here," Emily said. "Thank you for keeping a bedroom for me."
"It does look the same, except that, once, your father bought the time machine from the movie. It was so great, but, then, your mother was such a kill joy: She shamed him about it, and he got rid of it," Sheldon said.
"Mom doesn't get science fiction," Emily said. "That makes it so ironic that she has made so many science fiction movies, from Tron 3, the only good one of that series, to all of the Element movies."
"My favorite movie your mother made," Sheldon said, "was when she played Eleanor P. Dowd in the remake of the movie Harvey. I really believed she was talking to a 6-foot-tall rabbit. That was the one for which she won her first Oscar."
"Daddy's favorite movie with Mom was when she played Han Solo and Princess Leia's daughter in Star Wars 7: The New Rebellion. I like how she would roll her eyes back in her head and make death stars explode."
"I liked her as Hildy Johnson in the remake of His Girl Friday," Bernadette said. "That was the first one she did with Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. I didn't think having someone with a reputation of being as sweet and wholesome as your mother in the Rosalind Russell character as a hard-boiled reporter would work, but it did. I think that was her second Oscar. I love how they had her in the 1930s hair, makeup, and wardrobe. I didn't recognize her."
"It was actually her third Oscar," Emily said. "Her second was for Heart Time, the first one she did with Sandra Bullock.
Emily had all of the adults sit while she showed Mary Margaret how to make her famous chai spice tea that her mother liked so much. She served them all and heated some of the homemade orange scones she had brought with her. She said, "The scones and the chai spice are Mom's favorites. She had them the first time when she and Daddy went to New York and met up with Grandpa Al and Grandma Rachel the week before they got married. I love making them for her. When I was staying with Martha Stewart, Aunt Martha taught me how to make both of them better than I was making them with my old recipes."
"Emily," Alex asked, "Is there anything you don't do?"
"Hey!" Sheldon said, "Excuse me. It's time for Dr. Who."
The group sat watching Dr. Who while Emily checked email on her tablet. After a few minutes, Emily did a "psst" at the adults and pointed to Sheldon, who was fast asleep. She got up, got a blanket, and put it over him.
"Poor baby," Emily said, "He's had a long day. I wonder if it has ever dawned on him why his rent hasn't gone up since Mom and Daddy stopped living here. Do you think it has ever occurred to him that Mom owns the building?"
"I'm sure your mom would let him live here rent-free," Bernadette said.
"Oh, he's too proud for that," Emily said. "So what she and Daddy did is they set up a retirement account for Uncle Sheldon with their financial advisers. Uncle Sheldon's rent payments go directly to that account. He is going to be doing very well by the time he retires."