The way her lips felt against his gave Sheldon a feeling he didn't know he was capable of having, the deep ache that hit his stomach as soon as their lips met, the tingling down his spine with the slightest movement of their heads, the desperate want to be able to stop time so that he could stay there with her in that moment forever. He didn't understand the feeling, was it normal to feel so much during one kiss? was he sick? he didn't know, all he knew was that he enjoyed being with her, kissing her, holding her and all he wished for in that second was to be able to turn the train he was on around and go and see her.

He had left as he felt there was no other option for him anymore, he had lost the comic book store, his passion for his job, his favourite tv star and now he was going to lose Leonard as a roommate. He needed to clear his head and take some time away from Pasadena, he had decided to go to Texas to see his mother and to try and make up for lost time with her, things had been a bit awkward since he had witnessed her having coitus with some man she knew from church, they had only been phoning each other once a week for a quick catch up rather than the usual alternate daily chat. But all he could think about during his journey was Amy, how he was already regretting leaving her behind without telling her where he was going, without saying goodbye, he decided to phone her.

The phone rang twice before she answered-

"Sheldon?"

"Hello" he replied quietly

"Penny and Leonard told me you left, where are you going? are you safe? have you got enough money? I'm really worried about you sheldon" she sounded sad, he hated it, he wanted to tell her where he was going, he wanted to tell her to meet him there, he wanted to tell her that he missed her already but instead he said

"I'm sorry, I'm fine, I just need some time to think, I don't know where I'm going to end up right now but as soon as I find a place to settle I'll let you know" he decided her didn't want her knowing where he was going right now incase she came and got him, he knew he'd end up going with her and pushing all his troubles to the back of his mind but he knew he needed to face them, to get himself together and start making decisions about what he wants from life without the influence of anybody else's opinions.

"Ok well, know how worried I am about you and that I want to be able to talk to you as often as possible, I'm going to miss you so much Sheldon" Amy said trying to stop her voice from showing the tears that were starting to fall down her face and failing.

Sheldon felt his heart sink, he would miss her too, more than she would ever know.

"I know, I will call you on a regular basis to give you an update on my whereabouts, I'm going to go now, I don't like hearing you sad, goodbye Amy"

she took a deep breath, composed herself and quietly said "bye", she hung up the phone and decided to get an early night, being with sheldon in her dreams was better than being awake and alone, so alone.

Sheldon had got to his mother's house two hours ago and was greeted by Missy at the door, he was mortified, he had wanted to get in and go to him former bedroom and just lay in bed for a couple of hours and escape from the world but he was forced into a tedious evening of family conversation, games and general interaction. He had been holding baby Joseph for the last 20 minutes so he was able to excuse himself from having to join in with any more unbearable games. Mary could see that something was troubling Sheldon so had asked if he wanted to go and get some sleep and that they would resume family night at another time, gratefully he stood, passed the baby to Missy and said goodnight.

In his bedroom his thoughts returned to Amy, the last time he had seen her she was trying to cheer him up by giving him an option to live with her if he felt like he couldn't cope with living alone, looking back at it now he can see that he overreacted, he had stormed out after sarcastically stating that they should also get engaged, start a family and live their sunset years together, he knew he must have upset her, what she was suggesting completely reasonable. He wanted to skype her so that he could see her face, hear her voice but he decided against it after thinking about the way her voice had sounded earlier on the phone, he didn't want to see her as upset as she had sounded.

In that moment his mother walked into his room, she had a mug of hot chocolate in her hand and placed it on the bedside table next to him, she sat on the edge bed and started to stroke his back, as he laid curled up over the cover.

"What's the matter, Shelly? why did you come here today?" she said comfortingly

"Everything is going wrong, I'm losing everything I care about and there is nothing I can do to stop it from leaving, I just want to be alone" he said as he turned over so he was facing the other wall, away from his mother

"Come on shelly, talk to me, nobody should be alone when they're feeling down"

"Mom please, just go, I don't want anybody right now" he lied, he did want someone, he wanted Amy.

"Alright baby, well if you decide you do want to talk then I'll be in the lounge, ok?"

"Ok... thank you for the cocoa"

"You're welcome Shelly"

She left leaving the door slightly open, she would make sure to check up on him before she went to sleep, she was worried about him, she had never seen him so down, she decided she would phone Leonard and catch up with what's been happening.

When Amy woke up she looked at her phone to see if she had any messages from Sheldon, she felt her heart race as she saw that she had a text message, but her excitement was quickly lost when she saw that the message was from Penny, it said

"Hey sweetie, how r u doing? missed u at dinner tonight, we r all worried about u xxx"

Amy smiled slightly, she thought back to all those years ago where she was alone with nobody but her mom for company, now here she is with 5 amazing friends and a boyfriend who she was completely enamoured with, then that was it, her mind was on Sheldon, she felt so sorry for him, he had lost so much he loved and just at the time where he needed comforting she tried to get him to agree to living with her, she had only made things worse, maybe she was the reason he had left.

She felt her heart sinking to her stomach, it changed to fear, he was away thinking things through and only now she realised that, that also meant that he was thinking through their relationship and where he wanted it to go, if he wanted it to go anywhere. She couldn't bare to think of a life without him as her boyfriend, he was the centre of her entire world and only now was she beginning to see that. She was in love with Sheldon, irrevocably so.

She sat up, this was the first time that she had actually admitted it to herself, she didn't know how to process this information, she knew she couldn't tell Sheldon right now, he was far too vulnerable.

Sheldon woke up wondering where he was, he was confused and sad, everything quickly came back to him and he laid there staring at his ceiling. He started to try and come to terms with the idea of sticking with string theory, he was completely on the fence about what to do, he didn't want to leave Cal Tech but he also didn't feel passionate about string theory anymore to carry on researching it. He decided that the best thing to do would be to look back at when he first read a book on string theory, how excited he got and how he was so sure that he would be the one to prove the validity of what he was reading and earn himself a nobel prize. He imagined himself in that position now, standing on that podium clutching his nobel and how happy he would feel knowing that he stuck with it through the hard times, he remembered Penny referring to this hard spot as a break up but it got him thinking that all relationships have ups and downs and when you love something you have to stick with it so that you can move forward and be happy, he knew deep down that he had now made his decision and although he would probably be back and forth on the idea for a little while he had decided that he was going to stay at Cal Tech and carry on his research with String Theory, he sat up feeling relieved. One day into his break and he had already solved one of his problems, maybe he would be back in Pasadena a lot sooner than he originally thought, he began to think of the remaining issues that were troubling him, or maybe not.

Hey guys! thank you so much for reading! please please please review and let me know what you think, I'd love to know your opinions!

I will be uploading the next chapter with in the next couple of days! We'll get to see how Sheldon copes without Amy and how he is coming to terms with the loss of PP! any suggestions are highly welcomed and if I use your idea I will thank you in the comment like this one! I plan on this being around 5 chapters long but knowing me I'll get another idea whilst writing and end up having a much longer story than originally planned, but I hope you stick with me and enjoy reading this story as much as I have enjoyed writing it! :) x L x