Slightly shorter chapter here, and we're getting into the later stages of this fic. I'm thinking in the ballpark of 20 chapters, but it depends on how I break up the scenes.
Florence had just succeeded in jimmying a stuck Snickers bar out of a vending machine when she and Sylvester heard someone calling her name. They turned in unison to see a group of four walking toward them: a man, a very tall woman, and two other women closer to Florence's height.
Sylvester watched as Florence gave each of them awkward hugs, with only the tall woman seeming comfortable with the greeting. Considering easily had a foot on Florence, it made the encounter awkward nonetheless. He figured she was probably glad she was no longer wearing the mismatched Girl Scouts outfit.
"Florence. I was so pleased to receive your e-mail stating you were coming!" Said the man. "I hope you've noticed my English has improved immensely since the last time we saw each other."
"Your English has always been perfectly fine, Duscha," Florence said. "My Spanish is, I'm sure, just as horrendous as it was in Illinois."
Duscha gave a chuckle, and Florence suddenly seemed to realize not everyone had been introduced. "Oh," she said, retreating a step and putting a hand on Sylvester's back. "This is Sylvester. Sylvester, this is Tara Bondy, Dr. Dana Graham, Dr. Chana Wolowitz, and Duscha Perez," Florence said, gesturing to each person as she spoke their name. "They're currently doing work on sustainable ammonia production, and Dana also leads a committee working to increase visibility of female and nonbinary chemists."
"Chana Wolowitz," Sylvester said. "You won the Charles Goodyear medal, didn't you?"
"I did," she said. "The second woman ever, right after Judit Puskas."
"Congratulations," Sylvester said. "What an honor."
"I consider the accomplishment greater than the honor," she replied, "but thank you."
Florence coughed and cleared her throat. "Tara, how's the family?"
"Excellent. My mom and wife's work has made massive leaps forward in the past year. There's talk of nominations for a Nobel." Tara gave a little laugh. "Joan jokes that she may have the most successful relationship with a mother in law in the history of the universe."
"Oh Tara," said Dana Graham, "you're just as brilliant a mind as either of them. I can easily see a Nobel Prize in your future as well."
"Successful family," Sylvester commented.
"I'm…I'm sorry," Duscha said, "Florence, you've told us Sylvester's name, but not who he is. He works for you, I assume."
"Oh, no," Florence said with a laugh, "he's my boyfriend. We also work for the same company out in Los Angeles."
"Right. Right." Tara nodded. "You work for that computer place that was called out to that fire at the foster home."
Dear God, Sylvester thought. Surely that wasn't the only context through which they'd heard about Scorpion?
"They also created that fake uterus for a premature deer," said Chana. "It was referenced in a podcast I was listening to on the internet. Florence, that was Scorpion, right?"
"It was," she said. "Before my time, though."
"That was fascinating," Chana said. "You could probably win some sort of award capitalizing on that. Search and rescue situations, natural disasters, it could benefit from mobilizing that technology and making it more accessible."
"We don't really look for – " Sylvester cut off when Florence stepped on his foot.
"So…" Tara said. "Sylvester. I don't believe I've heard of you, though I do focus more on the accomplishments of women in this field. What is it that you do? I'm sure it's fascinating and I'm always ready and willing to go down another rabbit hole of study."
"Oh, my strength is mathematics," Sylvester said. "Statistics, probabilities."
"They call him a human calculator," Florence said proudly.
"Ah. So not a chemist."
"No. Though I'm familiar with it."
"Tell them your chemistry joke," Florence said, lightly jabbing his arm with a finger.
"Oh." Sylvester cleared his throat. "When it comes to problems, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of – "
"The precipitate," Florence's four friends chorused.
"Everyone has heard that joke," Duscha said, giving an amused laugh.
Tara gave Florence a knowing look, then looked back at Sylvester. "She must really like you, homeboy."
"May be the fresh meat, too," Tara said. "Are we sure he's at least eighteen?"
Sylvester could tell that the jesting was light hearted, but he suddenly felt an urge to impress. He searched his brain. "Well, I have a lot of friends who find that joke funny, you know?"
Dana raised an eyebrow. "Oh yeah?"
"Yep. There's…" he took in a deep breath, hoping his mediocre singing skills wouldn't totally fail him, "antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium, and hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium, and nickel, neodymium, neptunium, germanium, and iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium…"
He paused for breath. "Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium, and lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium, and gold, protactinium and indium and gallium, and iodine and thorium and thulium and thallium. There's yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, rubidium, and boron, gadolinium, niobium, iridium, there's strontium and silicon and silver and samarium, and bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium, and barium…"
He stopped to take another breath, and realized two things – how ridiculous his lead up to the song was, and how perplexed the four appeared as they silently regarded him.
Chana Wolowitz turned to Florence. "Well. He is cute when he tries."
"We have to get to Dr. Ali Kahn's demonstration, and we want to eat first" Dana said, "but it was great to see you, Florence. And good to meet you Sylvester. Making the Ice Queen break down a little bit."
"Great to see you, Lady," Duscha said, raising a hand as they began to move off.
"Yeah, you too," Florence said. She watched them go, rounding the corner, then turned to Sylvester.
"So – "
Florence grabbed his arm and started walking. "Come with me."
He followed her, letting her half lead, half drag him to the end of the vending machines, and then around the corner. No people were milling about back here. He was about to ask her where she was taking him when she whirled around, grabbed the front of his sweater, and pulled him down low enough so she could mash her lips to his.
Sylvester was startled, but he kissed her back, wrapping a hand around hers as it still gripped his shirt and putting the other one on her side. She pulled back, grinning up at him. "Busting out that song? That was hot."
Sylvester felt suddenly cocky. "Oh? You like that, huh?" She giggled, reaching up for him, and he leaned down to kiss her again. "I'm taking that as a yes."
"You may take that as a yes," she said with a grin. "Now, do you want to go to Dr. Kahn's demo with me?"
"Are you asking me out?"
"You may also take that as a yes."
Their hotel room only had one bed, but by this time they were used to sharing. She'd spent more than one night at his apartment, and he would soon be unable to count the number of times he'd slept in her bed unless he was barefoot or wearing sandals. Which wasn't that often. But still.
"I think my friends liked you," Florence commented, glancing up from her laptop.
"…they did?"
"Oh yeah, that's like for them."
"They all seem very esteemed."
"They are. They're nice people and they genuinely want to help women advance in science, which obviously, that's an important cause. But they also consider success based on letters after your name, or medals or awards. They're very driven for accolades because they feel that's the only way to truly be taken seriously. And I know I baffle them in that way, that I've basically given up that life to work for Scorpion."
He sat on the edge of the bed. "Do you ever want to go back to that?"
"Not really. I like the work I do now. I like the people I work with now. You remember how I was when we met. I am naturally like that, at least somewhat. That life brought it out of me. It's competitive and there's not much room for anything else. It encouraged me to bottle up and be defensive, which fit right into my wheelhouse anyway. I'm sure there was more to it than that but I mean, I'm not the best at the whole self – reflection thing." She closed the laptop. "That's why Scorpion is so good for me. It's why you're good for me. Everything about my life now encourages me to be better, instead of validating my flaws."
"I think you're better at the self – reflection thing than you think you are."
Florence came over and sat beside him. "You make me feel comfortable, Sly."
He ran a hand slowly up and down her back, trying to think of a response, but all he could do was smile. Their eyes locked, and he wasn't sure how much time had passed when he noticed how intensely she was blushing.
I'm not her consolation prize.
The realization was the very thing that made him grasp that deep down, that doubt had still been there, even after everything. He'd caught that doubt on his radar one last time, as it was on its way out.
They were going to be okay.