Knowing (takes place after Northanger Abbey)
Walking toward him, she gave the smile and look she gave when he had pleased her. But how had he pleased her?
"Look, he's almost asleep," she said.
Sheldon looked down. Indeed, Jacob's eyelids were hovering near closure. Oh, I pleased Amy by putting him back to sleep.
"Do you want me to take him?" Amy asked.
"No, I'll hold him. You said never to wake a sleeping baby," Sheldon replied.
Amy had heard it before, although not often, this slight but sharp recurring beat deep inside her. She always ignored it. Most recently, she had heard it more frequently with every coo she uttered. She continued to ignore it.
But that night, after the initial joy from the words she had overheard Sheldon say subsided, it was strong. It lingered, no matter how hard she tried not to look over him holding Howard and Bernadette's infant son while they watched television. Tick tick. He would grunt in his sleep, and Sheldon would look down at him, alarmed. Tick. Sheldon said his arm was tired and she took Jacob back from him, the heaviness warm in her arms. Tick. She sat down and involuntarily bent slightly to take in his soft, powdery aroma. Tick. She ran her hand across the downy almost-hairs of his head. Tick. She let him take her finger firmly in his grasp, his tiny fingernails the definition of perfection. Tick. Every few minutes, she unwittingly stroked his cloudy soft cheek with her finger. Tick tick tick tick tick.
She heard a knock on the door, and their friends were back. There was a flurry of activity and thank yous and good-byes until they were gone. Tiiiicccccck.
"Amy?"
"Hmmm?" She turned away from the door.
"I asked if you wanted to watch something else." Sheldon frowned. Her lack of focus annoyed him, she knew.
"Oh, sorry. Yes, let's watch something."
"Proposals?"
"Whatever you want."
He cocked his head slightly before releasing it in an almost shrug. "Very well."
And then they were in their spots, watching Castle on the DVR. Amy took his hand, and he clasped hers back, as they sometimes did. After a bit, she let go of his hand and curled up instead, laying her head in his lap. She felt his body almost imperceptibly tense for a millisecond and his head dip as he looked down at her because this was not something they did. She wondered if he would ask, she could feel his query hovering in the air; but it passed and he turned his face back toward the screen, resting his hand on her shoulder.
Her shoulders relaxed from a tension she did not know they had. She did not want to discuss it, not even with Sheldon. Sheldon, dear Sheldon!, never had a man been so loved. But never had a man asked more questions. The entire world was intriguing to him, so many things to discover and learn about and know. Normally, almost always, she savored his questions, questions she knew he would only ask her. But saying she did not want to talk about it would not be an acceptable answer, it would only frustrate him and elicit more questions. He hated it when she said that.
She did not want to discuss it because she could not explain it. It wasn't that it was irrational; it was a widely accepted belief, the psychological phenomena caused by a proven physical mechanism. But conventional wisdom wasn't easy to explain. It wasn't about the hard and fast rules of physics, it was about metaphysics.
When their show ended, Sheldon turned off the television and announced it was bed time. So it was.
"Go ahead, I'll be there in a minute. There's something I want to do first," Amy said. She went to her computer, and Sheldon went to the bathroom although she thought maybe there was subtle pause before he walked away. No, she must have imagined it.
She waited, aimlessly checking Facebook and Intstagram, until she heard him leave the bathroom and go to the bedroom. Only then did she go brush her teeth and her hair, taking longer with those nightly tasks than necessary.
Sheldon, of course, was waiting for her. He was lying in bed, but his arms were folded behind his head in an entirely unusual pose for him. It was almost enough to make her smile, but she was not in the mood to smile. She suspected he had counted each extra second she had spent coming to the bedroom and puzzling over them, and he was trying to look casual.
Amy also noticed he was wearing pajamas, and this eased her. She was not in the mood for that, either, so she put on her flannel night gown and crawled into bed.
"Good night, Sheldon," she said and rolled on her side, facing away from him, trying not to the think about the look she had seen on his face in the split second she started to roll away from him.
"Good night, Amy," he replied and he turned off his bedside lamp, throwing the room into darkness.
They lay still for several minutes, each lost in their own thoughts, although Amy was trying her best to push her thoughts away from her and replace them with something else. Eventually, Sheldon rolled toward her and wrapped his arms around her, although she couldn't deny he waited longer than normal and his arm felt hesitant.
"Amy?" He whispered in her ear.
"Yes?" She almost sighed, thinking she was going to have to talk about it after all. But she didn't sigh; there was something there, something soft in his voice, that stopped her.
"Roll over. I want to tell you something," he said gingerly.
She did. He brought one hand up and caressed her cheek with the back of it, before resting his palm in her hair. Even though the dark made his blue eyes look black, she could see the intensity in them.
"I love you." He brought his other hand up and griped both sides her face, with gentle force. Not painfully, but with enough pressure to make her notice. He put his forehead against hers, not just touching but pushing a tiny bit. "I. Love. You. I love you. I love you. You. You."
She knew, then, that he has heard it, the faint tapping in her soul. He was telling her so. She did not know, though, what else he was trying to tell her. She did not know if he was trying to sooth it away or if he was promising it would come some day. She did not know if he even knew. Whatever it was, he did not know the words, so he told her the words he did know.
She did know that he meant it, that his love was a force he could not express, just as she knew he meant whatever this other thing was he could not express. She did know that her entire life was spent waiting for those moments, lying with him in the dark, and even now her days were filler between them. She did know that she loved him with such devotion it swam around her and through her, and the sound of it rushing in her ears had the power to drown out all other sounds. Sheldon was, is, will be more than enough.
As she nodded, he released her and caressed her cheek one more time. She buried her face the crook of his neck, and fell asleep there, hearing only the sound of his breathing.
AN: Thank you for your reviews.