A series of one-shots exploring how our beloved Shamy celebrate their wedding anniversary every year. Takes place firmly in my "Shamyverse," and reading of my Book Club series is essential. Also references my other stories. 100% pure, over-the-top fluff.

The Anniversary Evolution

Year One

Sheldon did not know that societal norms dictated the exchange of gifts for one's wedding anniversary until Penny had informed him a couple of days after Christmas. How odd. Wasn't the pleasure of spending the rest of one's life beside the only other perfect person on the planet gift enough? But he had just spent a month watching Amy slavishly following every Christmas ritual, and cajoling him to participate in most of them, so he knew this would be expected of him. There was not a single romantic superstition in the whole world in which Amy did not want to participate.

The month of January was spent in indecision. What should he get her? Penny had also told him the gift should be romantic, not practical. It should, in some fashion, be tied to their love or shared history or some such nonsense. He became so desperate he even asked for ideas from his friends, who proved to be as useless as he anticipated they would be. Then, one day, he opened a secret untitled document on his computer that he had been using to vent his . . . thoughts for almost a year now, and it occurred to him that all that overly emotional, illogical claptrap was perfect for Amy. It was just the sort of thing she would love. She would lap it up eagerly and probably cry. The more sappy and the more ridiculous, the better. He had discovered the golden ticket.

But now there was a different problem. And it was entirely of his own making. If he had been calm, cool, and collected that fateful day none of this would have happened out of order. This is exactly what happened when one doesn't make the proper plans, when one allowed their heart to run away from their mind.

Valentine's Day. How he hated that holiday! Oh, how he loved it! She was his, she was his, at last, she was his. His very soul had cried out for her, and her soul had become his. Things were whispered in the dark, between the brushings of skin, and he felt that he had found a missing part of himself deep within her. That night, unexpectedly, they pledged themselves to each other in a union stronger than anything he had ever known. They were soul mates, in every meaning of the words. Legal marriage, that was a mere semantic, a practical necessity for their mothers, for the insurance companies, for the bank, for society. Everything that needed to be said, everything that needed to be promised, everything that needed to be done, it happened that night.

Except . . . standing in the bland room, a stranger asking them questions, feeling Amy's hand tremble as she tried to slid the ring on his finger (another romantic superstition!), seeing the look in her eyes when she said "I do" . . . something else changed. This wasn't just a semantic, a practical necessity for their mothers. This wasn't just signing a form for the State of California, this wasn't just a thing all their friends seemed to be doing. His heart pounded in his chest and he knew this was just as great as the words whispered in the dark between the brushings of skin, this band of metal on his finger (oh, how he loved it!) was his way of crying out to the world "I am my soul mate's, and she is mine!"

Not that he would tell her any of that, of course. How absurd, he wasn't a hippy. But still the question lingered: the 14th or the 20th?

It was Amy, of course, who solved this dilemma, just as she always did. She was reading in bed, her eyes hungrily shifting back and forth across the page. When he got in beside her, she hadn't even turned to look at him.

Sheldon brushed her hair away from her shoulder and rested his cheek there. "What are you reading that is so engrossing?"

There was a pause before she answered. "Love Letters of Great Men."

"Is it that good?" he asked, smirking internally. Oh, yes, my gift is perfect.

"Napoleon may have been a megalomaniac, but he certainly knew how to write," she replied. She put her Kindle down. "Do you ever wonder that if some of the most famous people had written novels instead of whatever they did, what those books would be like? What if Winston Churchill wrote a whole novel as good as his wartime speeches, for example?"

"I never thought about it. Do you not find our Book Club selections compelling enough?"

She turned to him. "Oh, no, that's not what I meant. I love Book Club. Just a thought exercise, I guess. There's plenty of love in our Book Club." She took off her glasses and pulled away from him to set them on the bedside table with her Kindle. "Sheldon, I've been thinking about Valentine's Day."

"Yes?" he perked up.

"Well, it's so close to our anniversary, it seems silly to go out and celebrate two nights in one week. How about we just stay in for Valentine's Day, since our anniversary is arguably more important? We won't make a big deal of it."

"We could have spaghetti with hot dogs and Strawberry Qwik again," he volunteered. "Yes, let's do that. It sounds like fun."

"Fun? You hate Valentine's Day."

"Mmmm," he leaned closer to whisper in her ear, "you've changed my mind . . ." Her earlobe felt like velvet and he brushed her skin . . .

Valentine's Day came, and Sheldon was awake earlier than usual. Now that the day was here, it felt wrong not to acknowledge it somehow. He slipped out of bed, careful not to wake Amy, and went to the living room. Her Kindle was on the island, and he flipped it open to read a paragraph. Good, I'm not the first brilliant mind to dissolve into emotional claptrap. It's a good thing we only read fiction for Book Club or Amy would -

He sat up straighter before getting up and going to his desk. He wrote them quickly, and then placed them all over the apartment. One Post-It on her toothbrush, one on her favorite mug, one on her hair brush, one on her glasses . . .

"I love you more than Lady Trent loved Jacob."
"I love you more than The Doctor loves River."
"I love you more than Mr. Rochester loved Jane."
"I love you more than Marco loved Celia."
"I love you more than Sherlock loved a mystery."
"I love you more than A.J. loved Amelia."
"I love you more than Lord Maccon loved Alexia."
"I love you more than I love Flatland."

But she found the last one much later, after she had brushed his skin with so much love and they were late to work.

That night, after dinner and the movie, between the brushings of skin, he whispered once more, "I love you and you are so beautiful and you are more important than anything I have ever discovered and I feel like my heart is the Tardis it's bigger on the inside . . ."

Six days later, she surprised him in his office, holding a package and giddy with suppressed excitement.

"Amy? What's this?" he asked, coming around from behind his desk.

"It's your anniversary present."

"But we're celebrating tonight. I'm wearing a suit and everything. And I don't have your gift here."

"I know. There's a reason. Hurry, open it, you're wasting time." She thrust the package out at him.

He took it and opened it, Amy watching him closely. He noticed she kept glancing at her watch. "Wait, slow down," she suddenly said.

"But you told me to hurry up!"

"Don't slow down that much. Keeping opening."

Sheldon rolled his eyes and returned to opening the package. "A watch! Thank you, Amy, it's very nice -"

"Hurry, hurry, hurry, take it out!"

He lifted the watch out of the box and -

"Wait, hold still!" Amy's eyes were glued to her own watch, her other palm lifted in the universal stop signal. "Okay, when I say go, turn it over."

"Turn it over?"

"Go! Now! Now!"

Startled, Sheldon flipped the watch over. It was engraved: 31557600. He looked up at her, meeting her grin with his own. "The number of seconds in a year. And right on time, I presume?"

She hugged him right there, in his office, and, although he was mortified that someone would walk by and see, he hugged her back with equal ardor.

Later, after a fancy dinner, sitting on the sofa, he had presented his scroll to her. At first her brow wrinkled in confusion, but, just as he expected, she lapped it like a kitten laps up cream and she was crying by the end, happy tears streaming down her face.

"Oh, Sheldon," she whispered, and he pulled her for another hug.

By then it was 31,579,837 seconds. The best 31,579,837 seconds of his life.

If you haven't already read Sheldon's gift to Amy, it's my story entitled Ramblings of a Neurodegenerative Mind: An Anniversary Present.

I also include the same disclaimer I put on my After Dark series: some will be serious, some will be funny, some will painfully short, and some will be mundane. Because that's life. Despite its faults, I hope you enjoy. Thank you in advance for your reviews!