Hey, all! Wow, I didn't realize it's been so long since I updated. But don't worry; I got lots of time on my hands right now, so updates should be more frequent from now on. So without further ado, bon appetite!

It was one of those quiet Saturday afternoons, a true anomaly these days in the Fowler-Cooper household. With the girls getting bigger and bigger, so did the amount of mischief they could get into; they still couldn't quite get the smell of sulfur out of the bathroom walls. But with Lia and Josie out with Aunt Penny for the day, Sheldon and Amy had been granted a few hours of blissful silence to do as they pleased.

Which was how Sheldon found himself in his spot, working on his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize (he hadn't won it yet, but it was always best to prepare for the inevitable) as his wife sat curled up in the armchair, a large book of poetry in her hands that he knew was hiding the latest edition of the Thor comic book series. It was times like these that he had never loved her more.

Neither of them spoke, but Sheldon craved these small moments of quiet between them, the occasional smile shot the other's way. Married life wasn't always some exciting whirlwind of a romance, and it didn't have to be. All they needed in life was the company of each other and a plate of snickerdoodles between them.

But their oasis of peace was noisily intruded upon by two rambunctious little girls, the younger staggering beneath the weight of a large cardboard box. Before the parents had time to investigate the contents their sitter reappeared, carrying her own burden in the form of her eight-year-old son, asleep on her back, glasses askew.

"Special delivery for Dr. and Dr. Cooper," Penny panted as she hefted Sam a bit higher up. He responded with a loud, open-mouthed snore that showed off his braces-clad overbite. "Man, I think I'm getting too old for this."

"Or maybe he is," Amy suggested, closing her book.

"Oh, please don't say that," Penny pleaded, tilting her head back with a soft little smile towards her son. "I'd gladly take the hit of aging for the both of us if it meant he'd stay my little guy forever."

"Enough with the grownup talk!" Josie cried with an impatient stamp of her foot, an impressive feat considering the heavy load she was carrying. "Come and see what's in our box!"

"Well bye!" Penny said quickly as she turned tail and bolted up the stairs in a burst of energy that certainly hadn't been present a moment ago.

Sharing a confused look with Amy but quickly putting it behind him, Sheldon rose to approach his daughters, his wife close behind. "So what have you two got there?"

"Oh, you'll love it!" Amelia cried as her sister carefully set the box down on the floor. "We came across the box at the park and just had to take him home with us."

Him?

The answer to Sheldon's unspoken question came in the form of a high pitched mewl emerging from the box. Then two little ears poking out from the top of the box. Then a pair of big yellow eyes, then a soft pink nose, then finally two white paws grasping the side to pull itself up to full view.

A kitten.

"Oh, no you don't!" Sheldon shouted as he charged across the room and prevented Josie from touching the creature by snatching her up into his arms. "You are not touching that walking infestation of disease!"

"But Daddy…" Josie whined as she hung limp in the air, tucked beneath her father's arm like a sack of potatoes.

"Don't you 'but Daddy' me, young lady," Sheldon warned. "You might be skipping grades like most girls your age skip rope, but you still have the body of the six-year-old that you are, with an underdeveloped immune system that will not stand a chance against whatever pathogens this- this stray beast is carrying."

"But Auntie Penny checked him out before she let us take him, and she said he didn't have rabies or anything else like that," Amelia protested. "And she should know. She said she once had to take out half her family's herd of cattle because of mad cows' disease. Then the invited the whole town for a barbecue."

Sheldon's head shot up to stare horrified at Amy for a moment before turning back to his elder child. "That's it. You two are no longer allowed within a twenty foot radius of Aunt Penny. To be honest, I should have instilled this rule years ago." Setting Josie down with a stern look telling her not to try approaching the box again, Sheldon headed into the kitchen. "And the cat's going, too. Amy, what did you do with my carton of surgical masks?"

Before Amy could reply that she had hid them after he had tried wearing one to bed the last time she had gotten a runny nose, both little girls raced after their father in supplication.

"Daddy, pleeeeeeeeeease?"

Sheldon whipped around, a reprimand at the tip of his tongue, but stopped short at the sight of his two daughters. They stood side by side, eyes wide and innocent, bottom lips just barely protruding. They had perfected the art of shameless begging over the years, experienced enough to know just when to pull out the big guns, the foolproof trick that could without fail get to their father every time.

Resolve slipping already, Sheldon turned desperate eyes to Amy, pleading for her to step in and put her foot down. And step in she did, though not in the way he had been asking.

"I don't see any problem in getting a family pet," she said, and neither girl dared breathe as hope flared in their big bright eyes. "Sheldon?"

All three turned to face him, and the triple force of his little ladies' looking to him, two pairs of green eyes and one blue, finally made the most stubborn man on earth crumble.

"Fine," he sighed. Amelia and Josie both squealed and ran to welcome the newest member of the Cooper family. But of course Sheldon, being Sheldon, couldn't leave off without the last word.

"But first thing tomorrow morning, he goes straight to the vet!"

~0~0~0~0~0~

"Aww, he's soooooooooo cute!"

"Look at his nose!"

"I know, I just can't take it!"

Sheldon could do nothing but look on in sullen silence as Amelia, Josie, and Hiranya cooed over the girls' new feline friend. From Josie's arms- her pudgy little hands could almost completely encapsulate the critter, he was so tiny- the cat stared him straight in the eye from across the room, and Sheldon would've sworn the smug little thing was gloating.

"Do you think you could let him stay over my house once and a while?" Hiranya asked as she tickled beneath the kitty's chin.

"Well are you my best friend or not?" Josie replied matter-of-factly. "You can babysit next time we go to Comic Con. You'd like that, wouldn't you, Mittens?"

Mittens. When Sheldon had reluctantly conceded to keep the pet permanently once the vet had declared him healthy (twice; Sheldon had demanded a recheck because he was certain the doctor had missed something), he had suggested names after reputed scientists like Pierre Curie or Nikola Tesla, but the girls had insisted on Mittens because his white paws against his brown fur makes it look like he has actual mittens! Isn't that so cute, Daddy?

Unable to bear another second of his daughters fawning all over the four-legged heartthrob, Sheldon rose from his seat to join Amy in the kitchen, his wife sliding him a mug of tea perfectly on cue. He broke into a smile despite himself and quickly rubbed her shoulder in thanks. She always knew just what he needed.

"You should see him take a bath. He gets the bubbles on his nose and sneezes them off!"

"Really? Can we do it now, please, please please?"

All at once the growing smile turned corners as Sheldon watched the three little girls parade Mittens to the bathroom, knowing that they could be hours in there as they played with their new best friend.

"But today's Family Comic Book Day…" Sheldon trailed quietly.

Amy's heart ached at her husband's broken look, but at the same time he was being so utterly ridiculous she couldn't help but tease him just a little.

"Awwww," she cooed as she reached up to run her fingers through his smooth hair. "Is my sweet baboo looking a bit green-eyed today?"

Though he wasn't facing her, she saw Sheldon's eyes fluttered shut at her touch, never willing to admit both that he loved when she messed with his scrupulously perfected part and when she called him her 'sweet baboo'.

"You know that I've always had these heartbreakers for baby blue eyes," he murmured as he leaned forward to give his wife better access. "Inherited from my Meemaw, then passed down to my mother, then passed down to me and my sister, and subsequently passed down to our daughter Josephine."

Amy chuckled. Forty-four years on this earth, two doctorates and a Nobel Prize nomination under his belt, yet he still was as innocent as could be. "What I meant was that it seems you're a little jealous of our little intruder."

"That's preposterous," he claimed as he broke away to stare down at her. "I simply detest the concept of an interrupted schedule, as you well know, and all for the sake of the completely unnecessary bathing of a creature that already self-cleans just so three young girls can stimulate their prepubescent maternal instincts to spoil him rotten."

But even as he said this, Amy didn't miss the aneurism-inducing glare he sent in the direction of the bathroom, their daughters giggling in the distance.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Howard came to pick up Hiranya after dinner, and after an intense battle of 'please can't she stay just a little while longer' mixed with a bit of hide-and-seek and culminating in the engineer literally throwing his child over his shoulder to take her away (an impressive feat considering his height and stature), Amy was left cleaning the kitchen much later than usual.

She was still smiling over how the girls had insisted on Mittens having an honorary seat at the dinner table, but even more entertaining was Sheldon's adamant disgust at the thought. The two had sat on opposite ends, staring down one another all through the meal as if they were moments from drawing their weapons and dueling for the Cooper girls' hearts.

But what her silly old husband was failing to realize was that he had won the battle long before Mittens was ever in the picture. If only he knew how much they would look to him for approval on their experiments, how fast they would run to show him their good marks in school, how brightly their eyes would shine when he reads them Wonder Woman or Star Trek or Lord of the Rings. It was no contest: the exciting novelty of a new pet would wane with time, but Lia and Josie would always be wrapped around their daddy's finger, just as he was wrapped around theirs.

Speaking of which, Amy thought as she cast a disapproving glance at the dishes yet to be dried by a certain someone, where was Sheldon, anyway? Dreading what her missing-in-action husband could possibly be up to (images of him dangling Mittens by the tail from their four-story bedroom window instantly sprang to mind), she dried her hands quickly and hurried down the hall only to run into Sheldon standing just outside the girls' room. He was holding the doorframe in uncharacteristically deep thought as he observed the scene laid out before him.

Upon peering inside, Amy couldn't help the soft smile that settled on her face like a peaceful sigh. Their daughters were cuddled together in Amelia's bed, Mittens curled up between them, all three dead asleep. The kitten was purring in perfect content, and both girls were wearing drowsy half-smiles as they slept. Josie's glasses sat askew on her face, one violent snore away from falling off completely.

Sheldon glanced sidelong at Amy as she approached, but it wasn't long before his eyes were drawn back to watching his girls again. It was a long time before he finally spoke.

"…maybe having a cat won't be such a bad thing after all."

Grinning in success at him finally conquering his stubbornness for the sake of their children, Amy rewarded her husband by walking up and wrapping her arms around him, which he promptly returned, chin upon her head as they both turned to look at the daughters they had made together.

Josie had slipped deep enough into her sleep cycle to begin performing the odd little semi-snores she had done since she was a baby, eerily reminiscent to her father's trademark catchy laugh. Amelia swung an arm over in a subconscious attempt to pacify her sister, only to pull her in closer a moment later.

"We've done good, haven't we?" Amy said softly.

"No," Sheldon replied, eyes never straying from the sight of their girls. "We've done well."

"Good also works here grammatically."

"Well, it depends on the context. Did you mean-"

"Don't ruin the moment and just answer the question."

Effectively chastened, she heard Sheldon huff but still felt his lips turn up into a smile. "Yeah, we have."

With one last gaze inside, the two left their daughters in peace and moved down the hall to their own room, but the lull in conversation was broken once again after Sheldon opened the door and gestured his wife inside. "I still can't believe it took you so long to come around when it was you who bought twenty-five cats after our breakup."

"It wasn't a breakup," Sheldon argued as he shut the door, rolling his eyes upon recalling this many-a-repeated conversation from nearly sixteen years before. "We weren't dating at the time."

"Oh yes, we were," Amy said firmly, pulling her sweater vest over her head. "We just hadn't realized it."

Thinking back numerous teatime discussions, lunches together, trips to the zoo, and the depths of his affections for this woman even then, Sheldon could not argue the logic. "Point conceded." She grinned at him, but whether it was because she had won the argument or that he was currently removing his pants, he was unsure. "Getting back to your original statement, excluding the koala I honestly do not have a general fondness for animals, even ones as conveniently self-cleansing as the feline species. I only got Zazzles and the rest as a last resort in, well, uh…"

"Filling the void?" Amy teased, and her husband would have glared at her if she hadn't been taking her bra off at that very moment. It took a second or two of Sheldon staring stupidly at her before he remembered what he was going to say.

"Excuse me, Doctor Fow-" he coughed awkwardly to lower his pitch an octave or so. "Fowler-Cooper, but we all have our moments of weakness. And I'm not the only guilty one here, young lady. We have both had our times of, as you said, 'filling the void', back when we still had our heads buried in the proverbial sand."

"If by 'we', you mean 'you'," Amy pointed out as she poked her head from her nightgown, a far more lightweight little thing than the ones from before her married days, yet still covering her shoulders and knees.

Sheldon turned around to retaliate, but his breath caught in his throat at the sight of his wife, stunning in her simplicity. He knew she was at times insecure about her looks from the constant teasing of her youth, and now having the body of someone who had birthed two kids didn't exactly help matters, but he had always loved that she didn't adhere to conventional beauty. Like walking among the paintings of every other boring old Impressionist before coming across a Van Gogh.

Sheldon looked down at the button-up plaid shirt in his hands before putting it away, opting to wear only his white tee to bed. He had a feeling he wouldn't be wearing it for long. "Anyways, my point is that we both had our kryptonite. For me, it was cats. For you…" he grinned wickedly. "If I recall correctly, and I always do, you used to write stories about Little House on the Prairie, did you not?"

Amy, in the midst of combing her hair, swung around on the spot with her mouth hanging open, the comb still dangling from her tangled tresses. "How do you know about that?"

"I have my ways…" Sheldon began mysteriously, twirling his toothbrush like a magic wand.

"Penny told you."

"If there's one thing the doctorate-less Wolowitz has taught me, it's that a magician never reveals his secrets."

"Then Leonard."

His eye twitched. Bingo.

Amy faced her vanity again to remove the comb and hide her reddened cheeks, and just as she was beginning to plot the demise of the traitorous homunculus, Sheldon approached from behind and wrapped his arms around her waist, bending over just enough to rest his cheek against hers. "Don't be ashamed," he said, their eyes locking through the mirror. "I loved it."

Amy gave that small little smile that told Sheldon she was being shy, but pleased. It was one of his favorites. "Really?"

"Of course." He pressed a kiss to her ear, then whispered hotly into it: "Why did you think I named our first child Amelia?"

He left for the bathroom before Amy had the chance to respond. But just as he shut the door behind him, he heard the telltale hoo escape through the crack of the door.

Oh yeah, definitely won't need the tee for long.