Amy went to bed in Leonard's room again. It was harder than she would have thought to be so close to Sheldon, but separated by those thin walls. She wanted to sneak into Sheldon's room and see if he was dreaming about her again. Or maybe just cuddle up to him again. Instead, Amy stayed where she was and remembered how it felt to have Sheldon's arms wrapped around her.

If Amy had crept into Sheldon's room, she would have found him lying there still awake. It was rare that Sheldon had trouble falling asleep, but when he did, Amy was usually the reason. He was having trouble forgetting the dreams from the night before.

Those dreams were getting worse, but Sheldon didn't know how to stop them. In the dreams they might be just holding hands or they might be doing much much more than that. Sheldon shivered when he thought about it. It was something that he never thought he would want to do, but his dreaming mind conjured images of him kissing her, of tasting her, of caressing her soft skin. There must be some part of him that wanted that kind of life with her. He supposed that part was getting stronger. What else would have led him to hold her while they napped on the couch or hugged her before going to bed?

The pair lie awake in separate rooms wishing, to some degree, that they were with each other. They each eventually fell asleep.

Sheldon woke up and looked at the clock. It was nearly ten. He overslept by almost two and a half hours, so he jumped out of bed to get his day started. If he hadn't been in such a hurry to get ready for his day, he might have noticed that the shower was already running. But he didn't. At least not until he was already in the bathroom.

"Sheldon?" Amy asked from behind the Periodic Table shower curtain.

"Um," Sheldon said. He knew he should leave the bathroom immediately, but his body wouldn't catch up with his brain.

Amy pulled the curtain back slightly to peer at Sheldon. He was standing there looking alarmed, but he wasn't making any attempt to leave. He just stared at her. He couldn't see much through the curtain, but he was still in the same room as a naked Amy Farrah Fowler. She looked so different without her glasses and with her wet hair falling down onto her bare shoulder. Sheldon felt like his brain had short circuited. Eventually, he snapped back into reality and ran out of the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.

Amy was a little shaken by what happened, so she hurried to finish rinsing off and getting dressed. She wasn't sure if she was just startled by his sudden appearance or hurt that he had run out so quickly. She didn't know why he was in there in the first place, but he ran as if she had hurt him.

Sheldon was sitting in his spot, still in his pajamas when Amy appeared in the living room. He couldn't quite meet her eye when she greeted him.

"I'm sorry. I didn't hear the shower running when I went in there," he told her while looking at the coffee table.

"It's okay. No harm done," Amy said, though she wasn't sure she believed it. He had been so affectionate the day before. It was like it had inflated her like a balloon, only to feel like she'd been deflated again.

He looked at her finally. "Really?"

"Yeah, Sheldon. It was an accident," Amy told him.

Sheldon tried to believe that. He was relatively sure that he hadn't heard the water running before he opened that door, but he never made mistakes like that. He had superior hearing and usually paid enough attention that it was so unusual for him to just barge into the bathroom like that.

Sheldon nodded and went to take his own shower. He spent most of that time trying not to think about Amy. It would only complicate things.

When he came back out, Amy was on the other side of the couch from his spot. Sheldon found that he was disappointed by this. He wasn't sure what he would have done if she was next to him, but he felt that urge to touch her again.

"What are you reading?" he asked even though he could see that she was still reading his comics. Then he leaned over toward her as if to see.

Amy held up the comic to show him. She wondered why he was leaning toward her, but she turned the book a little bit so that he could see it. It looked like he was trying to read it from there, so she slid closer to him. "Do you want this one back? I can read something else," Amy told him.

"Um. No, this is fine. We can read it together," Sheldon said. Then he tried to do something that he had never done before; he tried to casually put his arm around Amy. Unfortunately, it didn't go nearly as smoothly as he hoped. Sheldon didn't lift his arm high enough and he accidentally bonked Amy on the forehead with his forearm.

"Ow. Why did you do that?" Amy asked as she grabbed her head where he bumped it. It wasn't hard, but it still surprised her.

"I... um... I... arm spasm," Sheldon said trying to cover.

"Arm spasm?"

"Yeah. Do you need some ice?" Sheldon asked. He looked really sorry and concerned.

"No. I'm fine," Amy said as she rubbed her forehead.

Sheldon wanted to try to put his arm around her again, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He was afraid he hurt her again. Instead, he just looked over at her and watched her start reading again. Sheldon didn't look at the comic book that Amy still held between them. He couldn't draw his gaze away from her face. His hand twitched as he yearned to reach over and touch her leg or hold her hand or just make contact with her in some way.

"Let's go to lunch," he said suddenly. "I'm starving."

"Um, okay. Where do you want to go?" Amy asked.

"Your choice. Let's go right now though," Sheldon said with a sense of urgency that Amy didn't understand.

She got up and put her sweater on before grabbing her keys. Sheldon just hoped that a little space between the two of them would help him regain control of his senses. He followed her down to her car and didn't notice where she was driving until she pulled up to his favorite Thai restaurant. He was too focused on looking out the window and ignoring her.

"Is this okay?"

"This is great," Sheldon said as he jumped out of the car. He still had too much enthusiasm and he was working to keep his distance. They walked in and sat across from each other. Sheldon felt better already. He would have to reach across the table to touch her. That was until she rested her hand on the table between them. She didn't mean anything by it, but Sheldon couldn't help but stare at it for a moment.

Sheldon didn't want to fight it anymore, so he just placed his hand on top of Amy's. She looked up at him, but neither of them said anything. Sheldon felt like an annoying itch had been scratched. He was still fighting his attraction to Amy. Her presence all summer had made him want her, and he had hoped it would lessen after Leonard's return. No such luck. At least he was able to confine it to the occasional hand hold for now. He was worried about what he would do when he wanted to hold more than just her hand. He would have been able to control himself if he knew that she didn't want more, but she had made it obvious that she wouldn't mind it if they were more physical.

They held hands until the food came. Sheldon thought it was funny that the more Amy seemed to understand how difficult physical contact was for him and stopped pressuring him, the more he became the one who wanted physical contact. What he wouldn't give for her to spontaneously kiss him like she had the day he gave her the tiara. He supposed he would have to continue initiating contact with her.