Leonard and Penny

That morning, to compensate to Penny for getting her up so early, Leonard offered to let her open her Christmas gift from him early. She 'umm'-ed and 'aah'-ed for several minutes, torn between waiting until the special day itself and opening it right here and now. Eventually, she lost her patience and just peeled off a tiny corner of the starry paper. Upon seeing it was a box, her curiosity deepened and she unwrapped the whole thing to reveal a plain box. She looked at him.

"What's in it?"

"Just open it up."

"Alright."

She whipped off the lid and stared, open-mouthed at the contents. It was lingerie. But not any type of lingerie. It was black and shiny, the kind of thing a dominatrix might wear. It was very small. Too small, in fact. At the bottom were a pair of knee high black high-heeled boots. Penny didn't know what to say. Neither did Leonard.

"I didn't get you that." He said, puzzled.

"Then, what the hell?"

"I don't know, I..." And then realisation dawned on his face. "Oh, no."

"What is it?"

"Two weeks ago, the guys and I were wrapping our gifts. They were all of similar sizes. Oh, crap! You call Sheldon and I'll call Howard!"

"What about your mom?"

"OK, we pick up Mom and then we call the guys!"

Later

"Oh, you've given each other gifts?" Beverley asked. Walkiing over, she picked up the outfit and looked shocked. "Oh, my."

"Mom, we can explain..."

"It's alright, darling. No need. I'll explain it to you both later. I need to go unpack."

Penny groaned. "This sucks!"

"They're not answering."

"Oh, boy!" Penny muttered.

"Maybe it'll work out alright."

"I hope so." Penny sighed.

Sheldon and Amy

It was all Penny's fault, Sheldon decided. If she hadn't been such a bad influence on Amy this would never have happened. She, Amy had explained to him, had convinced Amy to go shopping with her and it had resulted in this.

"I think I'll go change now." Amy said to Mary Cooper. Sheldon had hidden himself in his room to change first and had emerged looking loin-burningly sexy in his suit. She rather nervously took out the dress Penny had gotten her to buy. It was deep purple, but it only came up to her knees and it showed off her breasts. However, it could be worn with black tights and that was what had made her buy it. It did look good on and Penny had showed her how to wear her hair up. The result was pleasing, but all the other women were well covered up even though it was warm. Still, she'd paid $70 for it, so she was going to wear it. She put on the purple high heels she'd gotten to go with it and self-consciously went back to the Cooper clan.

"Oh, sweetie, you look so nice!" Mary said, smiling broadly.

"I do? You don't think it's.."

"Oh, no! You should see what Missy's wearing."

Looking over at what she hoped to be her future sister-in-law, Amy had to agree. Missy had a black dress which barely went past her hips and was very low cut. Seeing Amy, she waved at her, smiling.

"Hello." Amy greeted.

"Hi! Wow, how did Shelly get you?"

Amy smiled. Probably Missy was just being sweet. Still it was nice getting a compliment. She spied Sheldon and walked over to him. He paled when he saw her.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing." Sheldon replied, trying to sound nonchalant. "Excuse me." He dodged past her and left the loud array of people. Shutting himself in his old room, he felt terrified. Why had he felt such a swoop in his stomach when Amy had walked over to him? Why were his palms sweaty? Was he sick? He hoped he wasn't sick. He hated getting sick. Perhaps he was getting ahead of himself (though he'd done that before and it had never bothered him). He decided his best bet would to be to call up someone in case this was an emotional repsonse. Leonard and Penny had asked him not to call them during Christmas. Supposedly they would be having coitus a lot. Raj was in India celebrating Karthikai Deepam, the Festival of Lights with his family. He didn't know if Raj would pick up. That left Howard and Bernadette. He picked a name and pressed Call.

Howard and Bernadette

"I thought Hanukkah had finished!" Joey shouted to his brother in law.

"It has!" Howard replied. "But we get together to open gifts and stuff."

"So, why now? It's the 22nd of December!"

"Because some people couldn't get here!"

"You have two Hanukkahs?"

"No. We had the real one at the right time. We just couldn't have gifts!"

"Oh, I get it!"

"You understand something? It's a Hanukkah Miracle!" Peter Rostenkowski said to his older brother.

"Oh, go fu-"

"WILL SOMEBODY GET GRANDPA? THE TURKEY'S NEARLY DONE!" Beulah bellowed from the kitchen.

There were plenty of cheers at this little announcement. Howard handed the baby he'd been holding back to its father who had been waiting patiently for the return of his child for the last twenty minutes. He then went up to his grandfather, but was interrupted by his cell buzzing.

"Hi, Sheldon."

"Something's wrong." Sheldon told him.

"What's wrong?"

Grandpa looked up in worry. "Is it the Nazis?"

"No, Grandpa, they can't find us here. It's my friend, something's bothering him."

"Amy made me feel funny."

"How did she make you feel funny?" Howard asked, taking a seat on the bed. He took up a toy plane and started playing with it. Noticing his grandfather was interested in the conversation, he placed the cell on loudspeaker.

"I had sweaty palms, a fever, and a swooping sensation in my stomach."

"Oh. Anything..else?"

"Well, I felt...throbbing in a very personal area."

Howard couldn't believe it. Was he hearing what he thought he was hearing? He didn't know what to say. Luckily, Grandpa was willing to help.

"Son, you're as horny as a bitch in heat." Grandpa said, matter-of-factly.

Deciding he'd need help explaining things to Sheldon, Howard left the room to call for Bernadette. When he came back with her, having informed her of the situation, his grandfather was explaining what he'd meant. Sheldon didn't believe it for a millisecond.

"Hi, Sheldon, it's Bernie." Bernadette took over the conversation, much to Sheldon's invisible relief.

"Bernadette, please tell this man that.."

"Sweetie, you must have known that one day you would feel something."

"But..I don't want to."

"That's not up to you. Honey, it's natural. Don't be ashamed of it."

"What can I do?"

"Tell her how you feel. She'll be happy knowing how you feel for her and you'll feel much better."

"You promise?"

"I do."

"Alright. Goodnight. Thank you!"

"Goodnight, honey."

"He's growing up." Howard smiled.

"Yeah." Bernadette sighed. Turning to her grandfather-in-law, she said "Turkey's ready."

"I'll be down in a bit, dear."

We are in for a very eventful Chapter Four! Tune in if you want to, and feel free to drop suggestions, like Tomasina did! Thank you and good day!

Love from Shania. xx