They sat in silence for a long minute. The refrigerator hummed. Somewhere outside, a dog barked. And for the first time that night, Sheldon didn’t feel the need to calculate anything.

She smiled. It was the real laugh smile. The nickel’s echo.

He didn’t open it. He already knew what was inside: three broken protractors, a 1993 issue of Scientific American with a coffee ring stain, and a lucky nickel he’d found the day he correctly calculated the trajectory of a fly ball at age six. Junk. And yet, he couldn’t put it down.

Sheldon woke up on the living room couch, still wearing the tiara. The morning light was gray and soft, the kind that precedes a Texas summer scorcher. Mary was already up, reading her Bible by the window.