And The Winner Is...
by TheBucketWoman
Disclaimer: Don't own LWD or Jiminy Cricket or a Nissan.
Chapter Thirteen
Part One: Emily
She refused to smile. Sheldon sat next to her in an ice cold booth, the pleather sticking to her back and making her regret the low rise jeans. And he was making faces at her, crossing and uncrossing his eyes. He was ten seconds away from poking soda straws up his nose.
"Sheldon," she said.
"Yes, love of my life," he said, straws midway toward his face.
Dammit, she thought. Couldn't stay mad when Sheldon was being over the top cute like that. The corners of her mouth moved almost by themselves.
"Ahaaaa," Sheldon said. "I am the master."
"You're half-right," Emily said. Then, after a pause, she said. "I'm sorry I've been such a pain in the ass, babe."
"Eh," Sheldon said, waving it off. "Happens to everyone."
"I blew the whole audition," she said. "And Casey was amazing, of course. I really should be congratulating her right about now."
"Yep," Sheldon said. "You should."
Emily didn't move. Casey was a few tables down, giggling because Derek was tickling her. Suddenly Emily felt no particular urge to move from her spot. Let the cheap pleather seat weld itself to her for all eternity, she suddenly liked it just fine where she was.
"Emily," Sheldon said.
Emily sighed. "Maybe later," she said.
Sheldon shook his head in resignation.
"Then I guess I'll be right back," he said. He slid out of the booth and headed straight for Derek and Casey.
Casey gave him a hug even though she'd last seen him twenty minutes before. Then he and Derek knuckle-bumped, Sheldon almost completely missing Derek's fist on the first shot. He was clearly invited to sit for a couple minutes and Emily was left by herself in a room full of giggly theater people.
She took out a pen and played solo tic tac toe on her paper place mat for a minute. Until a sticky note fell directly into her line of vision.
Cut the crap, it read.
She looked up to see Derek sliding into the booth across from her.
"Exactly who died and made you Jiminy Cricket?" Emily said.
I wish I could say that you're only hurting yourself, he wrote. But you're making my girlfriend miserable which makes me miserable. I do not like to be miserable.
He had to put that practically under her nose to get her to read it.
"Is this supposed to mean something to me?" she asked. He scribbled the next note fast enough to make her imagine the pen smoking.
How bout this: Sheldon thinks you'd leave him for me in a second. One day he'll grow a spine and leave you if you don't cut the shit and treat him better, he wrote. Or at least he should
Well, that was just below the belt is what it was, she thought.
"Derek, I cannot believe that you still, after all this time, think everyone wants to get into your pants," Emily said. "Cause when I got to know you I realized that there just isn't much to you."
Derek's expression didn't change. He could've been debating the relative merits of steak fries versus curly. Meanwhile, Emily could feel her hair wanting to kick his ass. She wanted to embed one of her stilettos somewhere into him.
Derek shrugged and got up from the table. He collided with Sheldon on the way up.
Part Two: Sheldon
"Derek, what the hell?" Sheldon said as he dragged Derek toward the deserted bank of pay phones. He knew exactly how tired he sounded suddenly, he just didn't know how it happened so fast.
Derek sighed, and shrugged again.
"Seriously, what did you tell her?"
That you should grow a spine and leave her, he wrote and handed the pad to Sheldon.
At least he looks really guilty, Sheldon thought.
"Oh my God," Sheldon said. "Just...Oh my Gawd!" Derek tried to grab his arm. Sheldon pulled it away.
"How do you manage to run off at the mouth when you can't even freakin' talk, man? That is a talent I've never seen before," Sheldon said. "Do you have any idea how much trouble I'm in right now? Emily is never gonna forgive—"
There was the sound of the flat of a palm smacking a table, something that should be simple, but Sheldon jumped like it was a gunshot.
Emily has nothing to forgive you for, schmuck, Derek wrote. It's the other way around.
"I love how you think it's that easy," Sheldon said.
It is, Derek wrote.
This whole conversation was light years outside of Sheldon's realm of experience, so he couldn't begin to understand anything Derek was saying yet. He'd think about it later, preferably with the help of some ice cream.
"I think I'll go assess the damage right now," Sheldon said. "Guess I'll let you know what happens."
Derek nodded.
If you're still alive, he wrote, then let him head back to the table.
Sheldon began the long walk to the table wondering idly when it was exactly that his life would begin to flash before his eyes. As he got to their booth, he saw the waitress there trying to take Emily's order. Emily muttered something to get rid of her and she said she'd come back later. Emily's head was down and when he got to her, she raised it and he was met with two enormous red eyes.
"Can we go?" she said.
"Okay," he said. She headed toward the exit. Sheldon left a five on the table even though they hadn't ordered anything, and took off after her.
She leaned against his brother's Nissan waiting for him to unlock the door. He hit the keyless entry and opened her door, gesturing for her to go ahead. He went around to his side and hopped in to find her hyperventilating and crying hard enough to make him want to promise any and all of his future earnings if she'd just calm down. He pulled her close and let her cry it out right there in the parking lot.
"You think I'd leave you for Derek?" she said, in a tiny voice he hadn't thought her capable of. "You don't think I love you?"
"That's—" he began, but could think of nothing to finish the thought.
"I am so sorry," she said. "I let you think that I didn't love you. I am so sorry."
"S'okay," Sheldon said. "I'm just an idiot."
"You're not an idiot," Emily said. "Don't ever say that you're an idiot, okay?"
"Cause only you get to do that?" Sheldon said, smiling.
"Nope," she said. "Not me either."
"Ohh...kay" he said. Her sense of humor was on lunch break.
"So listen," she said. "I love you."
"I love you too."
"And I am on probation."
"Huh?"
"I'm on thin ice," she said. "You get to dump me if I screw up again within the next I dunno how many days."
"Emily," he said, rolling his eyes.
"Seriously," she said. "Promise."
"Okay."
"Say it."
"I promise to dump you if you screw up."
"Are your fingers crossed?"
Sheldon rolled his eyes again.
"No," he said. "Now are you ever going to kiss me? What do I have to go through? Jeez!"
Part Three: Casey
A tall, somewhat rangy boy in a baggy t-shirt and a baseball cap over his blond hair came in and went directly over to where the hostess was standing. She went off to get something, leaving him standing there, looking at the broken heart rate monitor machine that had been there since time immemorial. He briefly stuck his finger into it.
"Sam!" Casey said. He turned around and she waved him over to her table.
"Sup," he said. "Where's your idiot?"
"Sticking his nose where he probably shouldn't," she said. "I think he gets that from me."
Sam looked at her, puzzled.
"Long story," she said. "So how's work?"
"Not too bad," he said. He worked as a lifeguard at a day camp, (not Marti's to Marti's great dismay) and all week he'd emailed Derek stories about how little girls kept pretending to drown so he'd rescue them, and how he'd been made to monitor several ten year olds on a yellow bus, morning and afternoon.
"Have you been paid already then?" Casey said.
"Yep," he said, grinning. "Hence the good mood."
Derek came back to the table.
"Derek!" Sam said. "How ya doin, buddy! I'm in your seat, aren't I? My bad." He practically placed Derek into the chair himself. He was up to something.
"So?" Sam said. "Tell me, how has your week been? Don't hold back, buddy. Spill!"
Derek, of course, said nothing.
"Uh, huh," Sam said. "Just swung by your house, and Edwin let slip that you lost your voice again. He didn't know it was a secret. After all you've been emailing me every couple days and he had no reason to think you'd keep anything from me, us being best friends and all."
Derek and Casey's food came, and all three kids smiled at the waitress in sudden silence, until she left.
"Are you mad?" Casey asked.
"Nope," Sam said. "Not mad. Just...disappointed." He stared off into space for a beat, then dissolved into laughter.
"You're a dumbass," he told Derek. Derek nodded.
"How'd you do it?" Sam asked. Casey explained, doing her best to make Derek look as dopey as possible while she filled him in on their week, and cracking Sam up until the hostess showed up with his takeout order.
"Well, Case, break a leg," Sam said, getting up and pecking her on the forehead. Derek got up as Sam did.
"And you, dumbass," Sam said. "Try keeping me in the loop, huh?" Sam pulled Derek into a one armed hug, enjoying his right as the only one who got away with that.
Is this day over yet? Derek wrote after he sat down again. He put his head on the table.
"Not even close," Casey said as Emily and Sheldon came back in and headed right toward them.
"Casey?" Emily said. "Can we talk?"
"Sit," Casey said. Derek moved, and took Sheldon somewhere with him.
Emily stole one Derek's fries and toyed with it.
"I just put myself on probation with Sheldon," Emily said. "I screwed up really bad with him."
"What'd you do?" Casey said. This was news to her. She wondered what Derek knew.
"Underestimated him, took him for granted, let him be one big ball of insecurity," Emily said. "The point is I needed to fix it, and I'm trying. Now I have to see if I can fix things with you."
Casey wondered if she should play dumb here. She'd of course interrogated Derek until he'd dropped that one maddeningly small crumb of information, and she could intuit the rest, but Derek refused to confirm or deny and she didn't feel comfortable without confirmation. For all she knew, she had everything backwards.
"Um," Casey said finally, "I'm listening?"
"I threw a big huge fit when I found out you were going out for the play, because I thought you'd beat me, the way you always do," Emily said.
"That's stupid," Casey said.
"Maybe, maybe not," Emily said. "And don't say you don't always beat me because you do."
"How could you put that on me?" Casey said. "Do you think I wake up every morning and wonder to myself 'How can I beat Emily today?' Do you have any idea how that sounds?"
"Yeah, I do," Emily said. "Which is why I really didn't want you to know."
"And yet I do now, don't I?"
"Yeah," Emily said.
"Did you ever stop to think that I work my butt off to get what I want?" Casey said.
"I know," Emily said.
"So when good things happen to me, it's because I deserve them," Casey said.
"I know," Emily said.
"And anyway, you're an idiot," Casey said. "The cast list isn't out and we don't know if either of us even got in."
"And you say I'm an idiot?" Emily said. "You know you got Audrey. Shel either got Seymour or Orin, probably Orin. You can bet on it. And yes, you do deserve it."
"Um, thanks," Casey said.
"You're welcome," Emily said.
"So about this probation thing?" Casey said. "That is so weird that I'm surprised that I didn't think of it."
"Yeah," Emily said. "God only knows where I got the idea. Maybe you inspired me."
"That's almost flattering," Casey said. "Now, we should find the boys, cause they're probably starving to death."