A/N: Well, as I said in the intro to my one-shot "Melting Point," this chapter is a bit late. Of course, when I posted that, I was thinking a few weeks, not a few days. But yay productivity?

This chapter's title is, of course, a reference to Walt Whitman but more importantly to Jimmy's second poem in "Return of the Nanobots," which opens with the line "Cindy sings the body electric". Clearly there was no one with an English degree working for the censors, because, uh, yeah (and if you think my mind's just in the gutter… read the poem. Whitman was all about the physical). This is also the chapter where the T rating comes in. There's nothing too racy, but… well, you'll see.

Sadly, there'll only be one more chapter after this (though I'm entertaining the remote possibility of an epilogue), but we're definitely getting to the good part, so just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Roman de la Rivality

Chapter Four: "Sing the Body Electric"

Jimmy stood in front of his computer, nervously adjusting the collar to his worn T-shirt in the darkened monitor's reflection. Good enough, I guess, he thought uncomfortably. I mean… this girl's seen you ten feet tall in radiation-orange and with your molecules disassembled. Just this morning she saw you minutes after you'd caught fire and been hit in the face with 290 psi of water. She doesn't care what your T-shirt looks like.

He paused for a minute and looked pointedly at his reflection. "Plus," he forced himself to say out loud, "this is Cindy. Cindy. She doesn't care what you look like, and you don't really care what she thinks about much of anything, including how you look."

Even his reflection seemed skeptical at his forceful statement, and Jimmy shook his head and sighed as he turned back to his attempts to straighten the lab into a space at least moderately acceptable for company. He'd already used Goddard's vacuum mode to remove the empty chip bags and half-flattened cans of soda he'd left scattered around from his last all-night research session, activated VOX's camouflage sequence to conceal his top-secret experiments at the back of the lab, and sorted his assorted lengths of wire into assorted piles of wire.

He'd even straightened the pillows on the curving sectional sofa he'd bought a few years back for the nights where his research stretched into the early morning hours and he found himself sleeping in the lab. Jimmy frowned when he noticed the slightly rumpled blanket still bunched up on one of the cushions — between that and the pillows… He hurriedly folded the blanket and stacked it neatly beside the pillows. Don't want her to get the wrong idea or anything, he thought awkwardly.

But that line of thought led him back to those last few furtive glimpses of Cindy in her bedroom window, all pale curves and inch after inch of her exposed skin being uncovered by the midnight-blue silk of her dress…

He blushed even darker as he shoved the pillows aside with a fraction more force than necessary.

"Looks good, huh, Goddard?" Jimmy asked brightly, patting the robotic dog on the head.

Goddard barked an affirmative before scrolling a question across his output screen.

"Well… I mean, it's not really that important to me if it looks good," he said, a bit defensively. "I just… you know, when you have guests you want it to… not that Cindy's really a guest, I mean, she's… well, she's kind of…" He paused, at a loss for words.

Goddard barked and rubbed his head against Jimmy's hand in a comforting motion.

"Thanks, boy," Jimmy said, scratching him behind one ear. "Let's just hope Cindy can help me with this damn paper. Nothing else has. And it should help her get her mind off the dance, so… that's good. For her. You know." He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

A flashing light and doorbell chime at his computer keyboard alerted him to a presence at his clubhouse door, and he felt his pulse quicken. Just Cindy, he repeated to himself. Just. Cindy.

He activated the surveillance feed, and the screen flickered to life to show Cindy's unmistakable form leaning against the clubhouse doorframe, arms crossed, features inscrutable as she stared across the yard. She was clad in a pair of simple black yoga pants and a Retroville Science Bowl T-shirt, her backpack at her feet.

"Goddard!" Jimmy called over his shoulder. "Sleep mode!"

Goddard barked in protest, staring at the screen.

"You can make all the misguided remarks you want later, okay? For now, sleep."

Goddard barked again before curling up on the cushioned dog bed in the corner, his eyes and circuits dimming as he entered his hibernation cycle.

Jimmy smiled at him. "Good boy," he said, turning back to the screen and willing his strangely-fast heartbeat to settle as he activated the audio feed. "Cindy?"

Cindy smiled slightly to herself as she glanced up at the lens of the security camera. "Hey, Neutron," she said, "are you going to let me in, or are you just going to keep me waiting out here and hold out for another illicit striptease?"

Jimmy flushed again. This is becoming an extremely irritating habit, he thought to himself. "Very cute, Vortex. Give me a second, I'll bring you down."

Cindy's eyes widened slightly. "'Bring me down'? Neutron, I swear to God, if you're going to—"

Her words turned into a sharp scream as she suddenly sound herself plummeting down through the secret entry chute into his lab.

Jimmy turned in his computer chair and offered her an apologetic smile and accompanying shrug as she landed in an awkward heap atop a large mattress. "At least there's a crash pad there now," he said helpfully.

"Ugh," Cindy groaned, rolling her shoulders experimentally. "I can't believe you still haven't just put in stairs like a normal person would."

Jimmy crossed the room and offered her his hand. "You'd think you'd be used to it after all these years."

Cindy stared up at him for a long moment before taking his hand, pulling herself to her feet. "Been a long time since you've let me in," she said quietly. She raised her eyes to meet his, their hands still clasped together.

Jimmy glanced from her eyes to their joined hands. Since I've let her in. He thought back to Ms. Birch's assignment, to his newfound revelation about his own lack of comprehension, to the stirring he'd felt when he'd seen her at her window.

There was a moment of uneasy silence between them before Cindy coughed, rather obviously, taking her hand from his and setting down her backpack. "I brought over my paper and my notes," she said. "Just in case you wanted a reference guide or something for your revisions. You know."

"Oh. Thanks."

"You're welcome."

They stood awkwardly for a moment, several feet apart, not looking at each other.

"So," Jimmy began hesitantly, "I don't know if you're hungry yet, but I'm, um, heating up some frozen pizza in the reactor oven in back. Should be done in about fifteen minutes."

Cindy raised an eyebrow at him. "Frozen pizza, huh?" she said. "You sure know how to treat a lady."

"Hey," Jimmy said, reaching out to tug the end of her ponytail, "I promised you bad pizza and that's exactly what you're getting."

"A man of your word, huh?" she smiled and batted his hand away.

"You know me, Vortex."

"Unfortunately," she said, thumping him on the shoulder. "Where do you want me to set up?"

He gestured over to his computer, where he'd set out his books and notes. "The couch is probably the most comfortable, but…"

"I'm taking your computer chair," Cindy said firmly, brushing past him and sitting down.

Jimmy narrowed his eyes slightly at her. "The couch also has space-age memory foam that allows for the highest degree of…"

"It's even better than I imagined," Cindy said, swiveling from side to side and smirking at him.

"And you'd have plenty of room to stretch out…"

"Great lumbar support," she continued.

"Okay, I'm drawing the line at my chair, Vortex," Jimmy said tightly. "Up. Now."

"I don't think so," Cindy said, leveling him with a matter-of-fact stare. "You want my help, I get the important chair. Not up for negotiation."

"I really think you'd be more comfortable on the couch…"

"I think you'd be more comfortable with me on the couch. I will be more comfortable and much more amused watching you sweat over the fact that there's a girl sitting in your Genius Throne." She smiled at him as he shuffled irritably over to the couch and sat down heavily, glaring at her.

"Get out your paper, Neutron," Cindy said. "We've got a long night ahead of us."

Cindy sat with her head in her hands, not speaking, Jimmy's paper resting on the arm of the computer chair.

"Did you finish reading?" Jimmy asked, balling up his pizza-stained napkin and tossing it onto the paper plate beside him.

"Oh yeah," Cindy said flatly. "I'm finished."

Jimmy raised an expectant eyebrow at her. "Well?"

Cindy dropped her hands into her lap and stared at him in exasperation. "Well?" she repeated incredulously.

"Well where do you think I should start, Vortex?" Jimmy sighed, leaning forward. "I think I have a better idea of the creative aspects of the project Ms. Birch wants us to incorporate, but I'll admit I'm not sure which section I should address first."

"Which section," Cindy repeated. She slid the paper into her lap. "Just out of curiosity, did you read this as you were writing it?"

Jimmy frowned at her disdainful tone. "Of course I did," he said. "Reading and editing as you write is a crucial skill in the creative process. Even I know that."

"Have you read it recently?"

"Right before you came over. Now would you like to stop acting like you just read your own death sentence and tell me what I can improve?"

Cindy turned a page and held up the paper for his inspection. "Allow me to read you an excerpt, since you apparently need me to refresh your memory."

She scanned the page briefly and began reading. "'One of the major elements to the medieval poetic style is a careful itemization of the beauty of the desired object, or n. In this the poets at hand derive a rather simplistic mode of solving for the degree of desired lightness in the eyes of n (our example shall of course utilize the standard universal notation of c for light), which may be written as follows…'" She stopped reading and stared at him, incredulous. "And you really turned this in, huh."

"Why wouldn't I? It's a brilliant synthesis of abstract literary principles into easily-digestible science. It's even written in basic terms — if not for the absence of the creative portion, it's an obvious A. This is science for the layman, Vortex. We're talking mainstream publication worthy." He sighed and rested his head back against the couch, closing his eyes.

"'Moving to the consistent description of n's neck as 'swanlike,' we find an obvious integration of classic trigonometry in the usage of a basic sine curve...' For God's sake, Neutron, no one can understand this!" Cindy threw the paper at him in exasperation and crossed her arms over her chest. "Sine curves? Trig? It's poetry, you idiot. The author is head over heels in love with some girl and he has to actually stop and write down all of the ways she's amazing because he loves her and, oh look, she fits into every single ideal in the book because he loves her and that's all he can see."

"If you would have kept reading instead of throwing the paper at me, you would have seen where I consolidate all of the individual formulae regarding the poets' descriptions of beauty and extrapolate them to an overarching theorem regarding aesthetic perfection."

Cindy stared at him. "...you know," she said, "I'm really starting to think you didn't deserve an A-minus."

"Well, at least you understand," Jimmy sighed. "Now if only Ms. Birch could—"

"You deserved an F."

"What?"

"Literature isn't… it's not something you can just dissect into a formula!"

"That's not true at all! There's a reason some writing is called 'formulaic,' Vortex — like, I don't know, what Ms. Birch called my paper?"

"But 'formulaic' is an insult, you brainiac! Formulaic is for stupid romance novels and that sci-fi pulp trash Sheen reads! The stuff we're studying hundreds of years later is supposed to be revolutionary — either it writes outside of a formula, or it wrote the formula."

They glared at each other, not speaking for a long moment.

Finally, Cindy sighed and dropped her head into her hands again. "I don't understand, Neutron," she said. "Even you can't be this clueless when it comes to this stuff. Are you actively trying not to get it or something?"

"I'm trying to understand it as best I can, Vortex!" Jimmy said, raising his voice slightly in exasperation. "This is just… so outside my area of expertise. Everything in my world is concrete, no variations. But this is just chaos. And it's hard enough to understand without you lording it over me every two seconds that I don't."

Cindy sighed and leaned back in his computer chair. "All right," she said. "Maybe we need to change tactics. Start simple." She reached down to her backpack and pulled out her English textbook, flipping it open. "Here's what we're going to do – we're going to go over the poem from today's class. It has love, it has beauty, it has good poetic meter, and maybe the fact that we just discussed it this morning will help you get something out of it." She turned to the index and began searching for the right page.

"For Christ's sake, what do you think I'm going to understand from that poem now that I didn't get out of it in class, Vortex?"

Cindy leveled him with a sharp glare. "I don't know," she said, "how to talk to women? How to behave like a gentleman? How to look away from girls' open windows?"

"How many times do I have to apologize for that?"

"I don't know, is the current count less than or equal to three?"

"I even complimented you!"

"Oh, right," Cindy laughed humorlessly, flipping pages in her textbook. "What was it again?" She affected Jimmy's tone with scathing accuracy. "You looked, um, pretty okay. I guess. For a girl, ew." She rolled her eyes.

Jimmy scowled slightly at her uncomfortably accurate impression. "Well, it's not what I was thinking, okay?"

"You're a seventeen-year-old boy, are you allowed to say what you were thinking in polite company?"

"I don't know, go find me some and we'll find out."

Cindy glared at him and slammed her textbook shut. "Well, it's been about as much fun as usual, Neutron," she began, "but frankly I've had a bad enough day without you deciding to act like an ass again."

"…Cindy, wait."

She raised an eyebrow at him as she rose from the computer chair.

"…you looked… beautiful," Jimmy said finally, staring at his shoes in apparent fascination and attempting to ignore the burning flush spreading across his cheeks.

Cindy stared at him, slowly sinking back down into her seat. "…what did you say?"

"You… looked beautiful," he repeated. He closed his eyes and ran a hand awkwardly through his hair. "Honestly… when we were on the phone… I was trying to say it, but between you being mad at me for looking and me trying to understand this stupid assignment and just… the way you looked and…" He took a deep breath and forced himself to meet her gaze. "You looked beautiful. You really did."

Cindy slowly retrieved her textbook and settled it back into her lap, flipping it open. "Well… thank you," she said. "I know you're probably just saying that to shut me up and because of what happened with Reed and everything, but… thanks."

"You're welcome. And I swear I had no idea about… you know, Reed and/or everything when I said…" He gestured to his bruised cheek.

Cindy pulled the textbook a little closer to her. "Yeah," she said quietly. "…I'm really sorry about that," she said after a long moment. "Reed had only told me the night before, and you were just being so…"

"Yeah, I know," he smiled humorlessly. "I'm sure I deserved it on some level."

Cindy looked at him, and there was a hint of regret in her eyes. "You didn't deserve to have it bruise like that," she said quietly. She reached out slowly before drawing her hand back and biting her lip. "You know… I have some arnica gel at home. I use it after rough sparring matches sometimes — it's really good for bruises. I should have thought to bring it when I came over, but I was afraid that if I didn't move fast enough you'd decide that you didn't actually—" She glanced at him, blushing suddenly. "…anyway, I can… go home and get it now if you want."

His cheek still throbbed slightly, and anything potent enough to work on her karate injuries would have been likely been a welcome balm for the pain… but even though her house was just across the street, it suddenly seemed a long, lonely distance for her to travel.

And even though they'd somehow ended up fighting again, like they always did… he wasn't sure he was ready for her to go.

"I'll be okay," Jimmy said. "I could probably use another day or two of this bad boy smarting, anyway. Think of it as my punishment for not understanding how to be a gentleman."

"On paper or in practice," Cindy agreed, smirking and nudging his foot with hers.

"Hey, I'm trying here," he laughed, nudging her foot back.

"Took you long enough," Cindy said, tapping his foot again. She stopped suddenly, staring down at their feet resting side by side, knees barely touching, and averted her gaze.

"…so, um, the poem we were reading in class today," Jimmy offered, feeling the increasingly-familiar heat of a blush rising to his cheeks.

"…huh?" Cindy asked, gripping her textbook a little too hard.

"The poem?" he asked again, reaching out to touch the page with one finger.

"…oh, right." Cindy glanced down, embarrassed. "I… don't know where my mind went there for a minute." She laughed just a little too loudly. "Okay, Christine de Pizan. Right." She cleared her throat. "'Ever blessed be the day…'"

Jimmy watched her as she began to read, the rounding of her lips, the careful concentration in her brow, the touch of her polished nails against the margin of the page. "Now, see," she said after she'd finished, "this is the ecstatic side of the whole idealization of love thing, where she's just so overwhelmed with love that she just has to talk about how happy she is. And that's what all of these poets are saying — they're so in love that they just have to shout it from the rooftops and write it down because it's almost too much for them to even process. Get it?"

"…in theory, yes," Jimmy said, frowning slightly. "But isn't that just the basic pheromone effect?"

Cindy sighed and rested her forehead in her hand. "Boys are so stupid," she muttered to herself. "No, brainiac. If it were just pheromones they'd be talking about how beautiful the object of their desire is and nothing else beyond that."

"But, to be fair, they do a lot of that. That's kind of the point."

"It's not the point! It's just a big part of it."

"It's pretty much the only point."

"It's just symptomatic of the 'only' point, how are you not getting that?"

Jimmy dropped his forehead into his palm, mirroring her. "Look, Cindy," he began, "I'm really not trying to be difficult here, but I just have no idea what point you're trying to make. You're insisting that it's not pheromones, it's not just a physical attraction, but that's all they're writing about: physical perfection. I don't understand how there's some extra level of truth or poetic beauty I'm supposed to be getting here when to my eye it looks like the poets are just talking about the same level of intimacy as your standard crush."

Cindy stared at him, not speaking for a long moment, before she sighed. "…I honestly can't believe I'm about to say this," she said, "but do you remember when we were kids, how you felt when Betty Quinlan was around?"

Jimmy tilted his head in his palm and stared at her. There was a faded note of pain in her voice at the name, as if she were remembering the angry girl she had once been who had hated Betty with every ounce of loathing she could muster – and considering it was Cindy, that was a lot of ounces.

Betty Quinlan. It'd been ages since he'd thought about her. She'd been relegated to the same negative space all thoughts of girls and interpersonal attachments had been exiled several years earlier, and even more easily forgotten since she'd graduated the year before.

But he could still remember the open longing he'd held for her in his younger days, the complete cessation of cognitive function when she was around, his desperate attempts to impress her.

Cindy smiled sadly at the look on his face. "I knew you'd remember," she said. "You had it bad for her. And… it was the type of thing the poets were talking about. Try to remember the way you… the way you felt when you looked at her. Like… like she was your whole world. Like she was the most beautiful person, the most beautiful entity on the planet. Like there was nothing else that existed, nothing else that mattered as long as she was around."

Jimmy looked at her, inscrutable. "You were around," he said quietly. "You were always around."

"You never noticed when she was," Cindy said softly.

I'm noticing now, he thought to himself, stopping the words at the tip of his tongue at the last possible moment. And, he realized with a start, he'd been noticing for a long time.

He noticed when she chewed on the end of her pen in class as she contemplated a difficult formula. He noticed when she walked beside Libby in the hallways, laughing at some trivial bit of gossip. He noticed when she ran during track practice, all graceful lines and surefooted speed. He noticed when she was upset. He noticed when she was proud.

He noticed her. Always.

She was such a deviation from the supposed romantic ideal, in every way. She was dressed so simply, her T-shirt faded, a small stain at the knee of her yoga pants, her hair tied up in a messy ponytail, and she looked just as lovely as she had in her dress for the dance.

And he noticed her. Noticed her then, noticed her now. And, he was beginning to realize, he'd noticed her for a long, long time. Even when he tried not to. Even when he was caught up in his own accomplishments. Cindy was always there, to argue with, to compete against, to compare to.

And tonight… to help him. Even though he'd insulted her and dragged her down just because of his own wounded pride. Even though she'd been rejected by her date for the dance – a boy that for all he knew she genuinely loved, was the source of the feelings she was using to explain courtly love to him.

He hadn't forced her to come. He hadn't threatened or taunted or mocked her.

He'd asked. Partly because he needed help. Partly because she and her literary talents were likely the only hope he had of ever completing a successful revision of Ms. Birch's assignment.

But also because of the question she'd asked, the question he hadn't even understood at first.

He wanted her to be there.

Because… there was nothing else when she was around. She was brilliant fire, inspiring him as she infuriated him, driving him to create and succeed in a way no one else ever had – or possibly could. They argued, yelled at each other, competed, gloated, insulted, made each other miserable more often than not… but he found himself stealing glances at her with alarming frequency. He thought about her constantly, even if it was just to think about how to next surpass her intellect. He'd only just begun to truly appreciate her beauty… but he'd appreciated her for years.

Jimmy stared at her, his blood running hot and cold, every cell in his brain and body seeming to come to a stop as he finally allowed the long-dormant realization to materialize.

…I think I'm in love with her.

Goddammit.

"Jimmy?" Cindy asked hesitantly as he pressed his thumbs to his eyes as if in pain. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," he said in a tight voice. "Just attempting to calculate the probable square footage of hell and discerning the likelihood of an impromptu hockey game breaking out there right about now."

Cindy raised an eyebrow at him and leaned forward. "Seriously, Neutron, what's wrong? Too much time spent trying to understand human interactions for that big brain of yours to handle?"

Jimmy dropped his hands into his lap, staring at her wordlessly.

Cindy shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. "…Jimmy?" she asked.

"I think I understand it," he said quietly, reaching over to close the textbook in her lap.

Cindy smiled at him a bit uneasily and set the textbook aside. "Well, it definitely took you long enough. I've gotta say, I'm going to miss being the smartest kid in town again, but it'll be worth it not to have you wandering around school with that lost puppy look on your…" She trailed off as Jimmy reached out and took her hands in his. "…Neutron?" she asked, a bit fearfully. "What… are you doing?"

"I think I understand it now," he said, mostly to himself, staring down at their hands. "I wonder if they did."

Cindy laughed nervously, attempting to break the tension but keeping her hands in his. "Well, I mean, you have a guy like Petrarch who fell in love with a girl the first time he saw her and just wrote a bunch of sappy poems about her without ever actually telling her anything. But at least he didn't have a million headshots of her taped up around his lab." She shot him a lightly teasing smile, but his gaze was still intense and unwavering, and she shifted slightly in her chair.

Jimmy shook his head, attempting to clear his thoughts. "I can't believe I didn't understand it for so long," he said quietly. "It's so simple, really. Irritating, unfortunate, and probably unpleasant, all told, but simple."

"Neutron, you're acting even weirder than usual. What exactly are you—" Cindy's breath hitched as Jimmy raised one hand to rest lightly against her cheek.

There's probably some kind of courtly love protocol for this, he thought, staring into her fear-filled eyes. I'm probably supposed to apologize or tell her she's been right all along or ask permission or bow or, well, something.

But really… it'd taken him long enough. And how many of the poets had died before they ever had the chance to tell the objects of their affection how they felt?

Jimmy may have been reminded quite thoroughly of late that he wasn't the completely infallible genius he'd always considered himself… but he was smarter than that.

He squeezed her hand and, closing his eyes, leaned in to press his lips very softly to hers. Cindy was completely still against him, her hand limp in his as he kissed her, gentle and slow, one hand curving against her cheek.

She still hadn't moved as he pulled back to observe her shocked expression.

He'd imagined anger, righteous indignation, shouts and screams and another bruised cheek to match the first… but not the open-mouthed shock currently frozen on her face.

"…sorry," Jimmy said awkwardly, rubbing at the back of his neck with the hand he'd held to her cheek, a gnawing disappointment beginning to swell in his chest.

Cindy was silent, still staring at him, eyes wide.

"I mean… I know it probably looks like I'm just taking advantage of your emotional vulnerability because of the dance… not that we were talking about the dance or anything… but you know what I mean, it's not…" Jimmy sighed, pulling his hand away from hers and dropping his head against it. "I know you're… you know, probably still hurting because of Reed, even though frankly he's an idiot for—"

"I wanted to go with you," Cindy said suddenly, and Jimmy looked up to see her holding one hand against her mouth, tears shining in her eyes. "You idiot, I wanted to go with you. I always wanted to go with you."

Unsure what to say, Jimmy reached over and carefully thumbed away a tear tracking down her cheek. "Just remember, I'm kind of bad at this," he said, moving his thumb over her cheekbone.

"You're terrible," Cindy agreed, reaching up to grasp his hand in hers and narrowing her eyes slightly at him. "Did you mean it?" she asked, so quietly he barely heard it.

He dropped his forehead against hers and nodded, imperceptibly. "And I'm trying to understand for my paper revisions, of course."

"Of course." Cindy laughed and squeezed his hand. "Well in that case," she said, blushing furiously, "you can… kiss me again now. For research purposes."

Jimmy stroked his thumb across the back of her hand and stared at her for a long moment. "I could do that," he said quietly. "But I think I—" He stopped, frowning slightly, before tugging on her hand. "Come here," he said, bringing her over to sit beside him on the couch.

He leaned her back slightly so she was lying against the cushions, and she started, gripping his forearms and staring up at him with an expression somewhere between anger and fear.

"Trust me?" Jimmy asked quietly, reaching out to brush a few errant strands of blond hair away from her face.

Cindy was trembling slightly against him, but after a long moment, she nodded.

He laid her back fully against the soft, worn cushions of the couch, not sure where to put his hands and settling for placing them on either side of her head, staring down at her. Her eyes were dark in the low light, cheeks flushed.

Moving to support his weight against his elbows, he reached out and smoothed his thumbs over her the curve of her eyebrows, moving over to her temples, then back to brush lightly over her eyelashes as she closed her eyes against his touch.

"What are you—?"

"Shh," Jimmy said, fanning his fingers out over her cheeks as his thumbs firmly stroked her cheekbones. "Research."

Cindy trembled against his touch as he continued, moving his hands lightly along the sloping curve of her neck – unquantifiable. Jimmy shifted at her sharp intake of breath as he stroked one thumb over her pulse point, noting her elevated heart rate. He pressed a calming kiss to her cheek, silently reassuring as he slid his hands back to gently hold her shoulders, sliding back against the wings of her shoulderblades and back to map the strong shelf of her collarbone.

Jimmy dropped his forehead to hers as she lifted into his touch. He lightly drew his fingers over her sternum, stopping as they met the seam of her bra under her thin T-shirt. Cindy was still shaking, but her widened eyes and soft breaths didn't seem to indicate fear.

He resisted the temptation to kiss her, and the even stronger temptation to slide his hands just a fraction lower, and moved them along the sides of her breasts, flushing at the brief, inadvertent brushing contact, and smoothed his palms over her ribcage, pulling her closer to him. From there it was a short journey to the delicious sloping indentation he'd caught the barest glimpses of when her T-shirt had ridden up just enough at track practice. It was a bit higher now, and the exposed skin under his fingertips was soft and warm, rising and falling erratically with the rhythm of her unsteady breaths.

"You okay?" Jimmy whispered as he curved his hands around her narrow hips, stroking his thumbs over the tops of her hipbones.

Cindy stared and him and nodded breathlessly, before hesitantly reaching up and running her own hands down the strong lines of his back.

Jimmy dropped his head against her neck at the sudden contact. It was such a simple motion – her fingers lightly traced the curve of his spine, the corded muscles strengthened from his work in the lab. She very hesitantly toyed with the hem of his T-shirt before slipping her fingertips beneath, stroking the skin just above his belt.

He wasn't sure how much of this was research at this point, if he was being honest. He was settled awkwardly between her knees, his hands gripping her hips over the thin material of her yoga pants, hers clutching at his shoulderblades, as he finally leaned down to kiss her again, slow and soft, catching her lower lip between his teeth. He wasn't even sure if she was trembling or he was or they both were, and he wasn't sure how something so physically draining could be so pleasurable, but there was one thing he was sure of as he leaned back just enough to look down at her, her eyes dark, cheeks flushed, lips moist and parted, breath short and sharp.

This was his aesthetic ideal.

And, he was rapidly becoming forced to admit, this was love.

"I think…" Cindy said as they slowly pulled apart, "I think you're finally understanding it."

"Well, I mean, it probably was inevitable," he smirked, brushing his lips across her forehead. "When do I not understand something for an extended period of time?"

"Oh, of course, forgive me for assuming that the great James Neutron could ever fail to understand something. You're so impossible."

"And you're insufferable."

They shared a smile as Jimmy cleared his throat and righted himself on the couch, subtly straightening his T-shirt. "So, um… as much as I hate it, I should probably get back to my paper revisions. You know."

A flash of disappointment crossed Cindy's face as she leaned back on her elbows, unconsciously pressing her fingers to her lips. "Yeah," she said awkwardly. "Um…. do you know what you need to do now?"

He stared at her for a moment, features inscrutable. "Yeah," he said, eyes never leaving hers. "I think I do."

CONTINUED IN CHAPTER FIVE, "OF LOGIC AND STRANGE ETHEREALNESS"