Author's Note:

Hello again! I've returned!

Thank you very much for your patience as I've stumbled my way through this fic. I don't know if I mentioned this here before, but when I first started writing this I envisioned it being about 5 chapters. Obviously I was wrong. But I did make a decision recently to start wrapping this thing up, so you're getting more than the 5 that I originally thought, but I'm pretty sure it's going to be less than 10. I hope that's not super disappointing news or anything, but clearly I've had trouble staying on top of this fic and I want to finish it up so I can start fully focusing on other Shamy projects.

Thank you to Stark for once again looking everything over. And thank you, reader, for sticking with me this far. Enjoy the new chapter!

Chapter Six

Amy flipped the business card over and over in her hand, Dr. Sheldon Cooper's contact information disappearing and reappearing from her view as she did so.

I'll email him. Flip. I won't email him.

I'll call him. Flip. I won't call him.

It reminded her of that old game she used to play as a lonely child, plucking at flower petals and wishing for some boy to notice her.

He loves me. Flip. He loves me not.

She huffed, disgusted with herself, and set the card down on her desk.

At the coffee shop, after Sheldon informed her that his ride was on the way, he told her how much he had enjoyed their conversation that evening. How rare it was for him to find someone intelligent to converse with. She had agreed. Prior to her monetary windfall, it was hard for her to find someone to converse with, period. Even now, most only spoke to her in hopes of receiving some of her money.

But he hadn't mentioned anything about donations last night.

His statement about how she should be working in a lab echoed through her mind ever since he said it, mainly because it was a thought she'd had herself many times. She missed the research she used to do at UCLA dearly, but so much had happened since she left. Faisal's inheritance was a heavy burden weighing her down, preventing her from making the great leap backward to the scientist she used to be.

Sheldon didn't see things that way, though. Or at least, he didn't seem to.

She drifted back to the game they invented, postulating an alternate world that differs from their world in one key aspect. It had been a fun thought experiment, but thinking back on it now caused an ache in her chest. What if she didn't want to just postulate? What if she wanted to make a real change in this world?

In a world where I didn't accept Faisal's invitation to Riyadh, where I stayed in California and started work on a new study, where we met under different circumstances, what would Sheldon and I be to each other?

Colleagues? Friends? More than friends? The possible answers swirled in her head, and she was somewhat startled to realize that all those options sounded pretty good. She wasn't supposed to feel that way, not after the way he had spoken to her when they first met, but things were different now that they'd spent more time together. She had seen different sides to Dr. Cooper, and she was starting to like what she saw. But how could she make something happen? How could she bridge the gap between that and the reality she currently lived with?

Amy's eyes drifted back to the business card laying on her desk

The next thing she knew, she was typing up an email.

Greetings Dr. Sheldon Cooper,

In a world where feathers are a form of currency, for how much would the Hope Diamond be appraised?

Respectfully,

Dr. Amy Farrah Fowler

Before she could overthink it, she clicked send.

It wasn't meant to go this far.

After his nightmare and requisite cold shower, Sheldon had vowed to himself that he was done, completely done, with Amy Farrah Fowler. It didn't matter how intellectually stimulating he found their chat at the coffee shop to be, if it was somehow stimulating him in a different way then he had to call it off. He would not speak to her, he would not even entertain the thought of her, and if he ended up running into her in a public place again he would remove himself from the situation as quickly as possible.

And then he got her email.

He shouldn't have opened it. He should have sent it straight to the junk folder and blocked her, but he was weak about these things. A knock (or three) at the door required an answer, a ringing phone required one to pick it up, and an email required a typed reply. And anyway he knew the answer to her question.

He probably didn't need to send her another question himself, though. But that's how a game is played, isn't it?

So her one email turned into two, and then four, and then twelve, and then it was really just more convenient to text at that point.

Sheldon tried to hide it from his friends, but that proved futile. It seemed they were specifically looking for signs of a connection between himself and Dr. Fowler, and it didn't help that Amy was always so clever in her communications with him. What was he supposed to do, not laugh at her amusing pun about the dry cleaners? He couldn't stop himself from visibly reacting to her texts.

But he really should have put his foot down when, a couple days later, Penny asked him when he planned on seeing her again.

"I don't," he had answered.

"How do you expect to secure our funding without seeing her?" Leonard asked then.

"Yeah, I don't think cyber sex is going to cut it," Howard piped up.

Right. Because that's what they thought this was about. That's what this all was supposed to be about. The physics department donation. The physics department donation that neither one of them had brought up in any of their communications.

"I'm working on it," he told them all. Because that was easier than admitting the truth.

The truth being that he just genuinely liked Amy. That the money no longer mattered to him. That he didn't need that incentive to want to keep conversing with her.

That he was starting to suspect he didn't have a brain parasite after all.

None of that could be shared with his friends. It was better that they thought he was purely motivated by the donation. And so, he ended up taking their advice and asked Amy out.

They went to the zoo to see the koala exhibit. They went to the science museum and took turns pointing out all the inaccuracies. They ate at the Cheesecake Factory when he knew Penny was not working. They met up multiple times over the following week, and every time had been lovely.

"Amy's still holding out on you, huh?" Howard asked over dinner at their apartment one night.

"Oh, um, yes," Sheldon answered. "We have yet to have coitus."

"That's strange," Leonard said. "Why would she want to drag it out like this?"

"I know I wouldn't want to spend more time with Sheldon than I have to," Howard said.

"Don't you see? Her heart hasn't healed completely from the loss of her prince," Raj said. "She wants to move on, but she's afraid of betraying the memory of her former love. Give her more time."

"Yeah, I don't think that's what this is about," Penny spoke up.

"Right, this is about the donation," Sheldon said, his eye twitching.

"I think I know what the problem is." Howard turned to look straight at him, making his stomach sink. "Amy doesn't understand whatever mating dance your species has. You haven't been forward enough."

"I don't know, Howard," Leonard said, frowning. "How well has that ever worked out for you?"

Sheldon tuned them out, instead thinking over his last few interactions with Amy. Platonic, for the most part, though she had made a few semi-romantic overtures. The last time they'd seen each other she'd reached for his hand as they walked together and for a moment he'd forgotten himself and held her hand back. The incident inspired another vivid dream that night.

He had to keep resisting her, though, because if he ever did give in and have coitus with her, that would be it. She would have what she wanted and she'd make her donation, his friends would find out, and then there would be no reason for them to keep seeing each other.

And he needed to keep seeing her.

So to sum up, his friends had to keep believing he was trying to "seal the deal" with Amy, but Amy had to be kept at bay so they could keep spending time together.

Good lord, when did his life get so complicated?

"Sheldon?"

He startled slightly at the sound of his name, almost dropping his chopsticks back into his moo shu pork.

"What?"

"When are you going to see her again?" Leonard repeated the question he hadn't heard.

"Actually, she's going to come visit me at work tomorrow," he announced, puffing up a little. Seeing his mind in motion was sure to impress her, and he was looking forward to it greatly.

"She wants to see you at work, that's a good sign," Raj gave his approval.

"She must still be considering the donation then," Leonard said.

"Or she wants a little afternoon delight on Sheldon's desk." Howard punctuated his sentence with a low growl and Sheldon turned away so he wouldn't see his reddening face. It hit just a little too close to that first sex dream he'd had about her. But then he realized something that made him look back over at his friends, one of them in particular.

Penny had hardly said a word through most of the discussion, and when he looked to her she already had her eyes on him. It was unnerving.

"Is there something you wish to add?" he asked her.

"No, no," she said. "Just, good luck tomorrow."

Amy was happiest she'd ever been in her whole life.

She used to think nothing could beat the day she'd successfully defended her thesis and earned her doctorate, or the day she'd accepted that research position at UCLA, or even the day that she finally moved out of her mother's house. But no, none of those held a candle to the way it felt to have a true friend.

She walked down the halls of Caltech with a spring in her step, buoyed by the anticipation of seeing Sheldon again. She knew this feeling was due to the rush of dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin in her brain, which most laypeople described as falling in love, but she had made her peace with that.

No alien parasites, not that she ever put any true stock in that anyway, just the beginnings of love.

"So do you think today's the day?"

Amy stopped when she heard a familiar voice. Just ahead, the door to one of the labs was open, and the voice was coming from inside. It was one of Sheldon's friends, the short one without the doctorate.

"I don't know, Howard."

She recognized Leonard's voice next.

"It's gotta be soon, right?" Howard again. "I know if it were me, my balls would be bluer than blue."

"Well, Sheldon's not you," Leonard said. Amy's brow furrowed. What were they talking about?

"I gotta say, I'm going to be a little disappointed when it's all over and he finally does sleep with Dr. Fowler," Leonard was still talking. "He's been so preoccupied with this mission, he didn't even notice I went six minutes over my bathroom time last night."

"Be grateful it even happened at all," Howard said. "And now that you know about this little loophole in Sheldon's programing, maybe you can exploit it again later. You'll never get him to be in an actual relationship like a normal human, but he's willing to fake one for research funding. That's huge."

Every sentence they spoke hit her like a bullet to her back, leaving an exit wound where her heart should be. It took her until that moment to remember how to work her legs, but once she did she turned on her heel and went back the way she came, the opposite direction from Sheldon's lab.

So that was it then. All that time they spent together, all the emails and text messages. It was all just some long con to get her money after all. Sheldon was planning on ditching her as soon as she gave up the goods.

Amy supposed it shouldn't have surprised her. This was how every relationship she'd had in her life had gone. Growing up, the kids at school were only nice to her so she'd do their homework for them. Even though they were going to get married, Faisal had only really been interested in the work she could do, they hadn't had enough time together for it to be anything else. Why would Sheldon be any exception?

Later on she would go back in her mind and overanalyze all of this, the way she was feeling and every interaction. She could already see herself back in her apartment, at her desk, rereading those studies about how the brain responds to rejection the same way it responds to physical pain. But right now her only goal was to get back to her car. Unfortunately, when she rounded the corner, she encountered a new obstacle.

"Ah, Dr. Fowler! What a surprise to see you here!" President Siebert stopped so suddenly his shoes squeaked on the tile.

"Oh, h-hello." The last thing Amy wanted to do at that moment was exchange niceties with him, but she was too polite to completely brush him off.

"I'm glad I ran into you," he said. "Walk with me, there's someone else I'd like you to meet."

"I was actually just going . . ." But she found herself falling into step beside him, once again heading back in the direction of Sheldon's office, but this time they took a turn down a different hallway.

"He's one of our other physicists here. I would have introduced you sooner, but he was on leave the week of our fundraiser," Siebert explained. He stopped in front of a closed office door and knocked. The nameplate read Barry Kripke, Ph.D., Amy was able to read it just before the door opened.

"Hello," the man on the other side of the door, presumably Barry, greeted her with a leer.