Chapter 4
It was a good day to be Amy Farrah Fowler. That was probably the first time those words were ever in the same sentence but today it was true. While she was at the lab Mrs. Cooper called her mother informing of her night and what Amy was going through. Because of that her mother, surprisingly, bought Amy a new purple paisley blouse with a matching headband as an apology gift. She started a new bottle of dandruff shampoo that smelled like melon cucumber. And she had a fresh new pad of Dr. Scholl's in her shoes today, so she felt even taller. She was truly happy this morning, geared up and ready to head to schoo- Oh God! She had to go to school today. She completely forgotten about her Carrie themed prom night. Seven hours at school meant her suffering to avoid all the looks of pity, tone out the snickering, and combat the slew of hurtful comments. Whatever joy she had when she woke up was quickly replaced with dread.
She arrived at the school as early as possible to get where she needed without any students around. Peeking into the front door she only saw the janitor at the end of the hallway so she rushed into the front corridor and raced to her physics class. To her excitement she made it without crossing paths with any students or teachers. She hoped the same for when she entered the room. Before she could open the door she heard fumbling from inside. Drats! Someone was here. She decided to take her chances and enter, maybe the person inside didn't attend prom, or a kind soul who would sympathize with her. She concluded anyone in a physics classroom 45 minutes before class started was obviously someone who didn't care about petty after school gossip. Slipping her head across the threshold she saw Sheldon standing at the chalkboard. Yes! Maybe things were coming up Amy after all.
"Sheldon!" She girlishly squeaked.
"My God, woman!" He jumped at the sudden interruption and angrily slammed the chalk on the ledge. "Why are you yelling indoors? This isn't a rodeo, you know. It's school, a forum of philosophy, mathematics, and science where energy is shared between brilliant minds." He preached proudly.
"This isn't Ancient Athens or Egypt, Sheldon." She said with a dead enthusiasm, "It's East Texas. And besides ourselves, the only other brilliant mind here is that guy who knows how to get food out of the vending machines with a quarter on a string."
"You're right." Defeated "What do you want?"
"Nothing, I'm just happy it's you I came across first and not any of the other students. I really needed to see a friend."
"Shhh!" He leaped to the door and slammed it shut. "How dare you just throw around the "F" bomb like that?"
"Wha- I didn't say anything." Not this early in the morning! Amy wasn't prepared to deal with the school and Sheldon.
"Just because you've been in my house after dark doesn't mean you can go around saying we're…" he looked around like a squirrel in traffic, "friends. We have neither discussed nor signed any official friendship agreement."
"Friendship agreement?"
"Yes, a notarized document detailing the days I allow you to sit with me at lunch, how we may go about scheduling activities, the minutes I allow myself to listen to you talk and the hours you are blessed to listen to me talk." Her obvious confusion made him press on "How have you conducted any of your other relationships without contracts to keep them in their place?"
"Sheldon, we don't need a contract or any agreement, we can just be friends. We can hangout at each other's lockers in-between class, and we can sit with each other during lunch and in class, we can even do things outside of school, without any documented scheduling, and we can talk about whatever we feel for however long. Doesn't that sound nice?." Amy explained.
"Hangout? No documented scheduling? Talk for however long? Are you on drugs, woman?" Not only was she asking him to abandon his lifelong relationship obsessions but she was doing so after only spoken to him for a single night. What other nonsensical demands would she muster up if they were to become friends?
"Amy, I was in a friendship agreement with my mother for 5 years until I got to know her a little better and then we developed a maternal agreement. I was in a rock solid roommate agreement with my sister until she moved down the hall. And I'm still in an acquaintance agreement with my brother. You see now? Starting a friendship agreement with you will be something that takes years. I'm sorry little lady, that's just how this man rolls."
He gave her a look of pity and turned back to the board to finish his precious task. Usually, if someone treated Amy with this much opposition she would crawl back into her shell and scurry away. But there was something in Sheldon that, like a moth to a flame, attracted her.
But Sheldon wasn't a generic light , he was a powerful LED bulb that required much more care. Endlessly pestering him to become friends would do more harm than help. If she were going to crack him she would need to dig through her neurological bag of tricks.
"Perhaps you're right," she started "it was silly of me to believe someone as brilliant as you would want to be friends with some like me."
"Flattery will get you nowhere Ms. Fowler." Dryly.
"Oh, but it's true! You're the brightest boy- I mean- man I know. You're far more advanced than anyone in this town, your future endeavors will be exceptional and you're well on your way to being awarded a Nobel. You're like the Stephen Hawking of our generation! Pardon me...I mean you're the...Sheldon Cooper of our generation." Hook. Line and sinker. Amy could tell by the stillness in his back that he was devouring every narcissistic compliment she was feeding him. Like a siren to a sailor he was entranced by her spell. "I can't help but noticing one small blemish that places Hawking above you."
His head perked up
"A minuscule observation really. An imperfection, if you will. If I remember correctly Stephen Hawking, as brilliant as he is, has no problem engaging in social relations such as friendships. He even had a wife!"
His head slowly turned.
"Now that I think of it even other genius like Tesla or Einstein had relationships. To bad you couldn't get over your obsession- I mean ritual- of controlling all of your social relationships. You could have been considered one of the greats. I guess if you're not a genius like them, then you're regular like...like your brother, perhaps."
"OKAY! That is the rankest pile of malarkey I have ever smelt! I am not comparable to the same person who inhaled a pea through his nose and then spit at my face!" He huffed and began stomping in circles. He stopped and looked at Amy as if she were a new woman. "I am without a doubt a genius when I was 3 for our talent show I recited pi to the 100th degree. At 10 I competed in a science and math competition against graduate students and won. How dare you call me a less than?"
"I'm sorry Sheldon. I'm only stating what I observe...If only there were some way you could prove you can be a genius and a social being. An experiment, perhaps? In a controlled environment, with someone you knew. Someone as equally advanced as you, someone of the opposite gender..."
...
...
...
She could see him thinking but the blank look on his face and the silence made her nervous. Maybe she went too far? She didn't really know him yet and here she was exposing his deepest fears. Surely, he'll never speak to her again.
"Proposal" he started apprehensively "We conduct a 6 week experiment that would prove that I am capable of being academically and socially advanced. I will be the control and you the variable. At the then end of the 6 weeks we can decide if this is friendship if something worth continuing or not. Agreed?"
"Agreed."
"Good."
"Good."
