Dear Diary

I offered to drive the Admiral home because he took a cab to the restaurant. As we left he stopped at the front and picked up his suitcases that he had left with the maitri'd. We got into my car and on the way to McLean when I suddenly realized a problem. The plants! But before I could say anything he spoke…

"I know you don't usually do too much for your birthday but I thought that I would surprise you at least."

"You did. And in more ways than one." I saw his questioning look and knew that I had to tell him. "Well, I feel terrible about it. I didn't mean for it to happen."

"What is it, Sarah?" he asked tenderly.

I quickly glanced at him before looking back at the road. "Admiral-"

"You called me AJ on the phone," he said.

"Yeah, I did. But it's different seeing you in person and calling you that. I'll try though," I smiled at him.

"Good, now about this thing that you feel so terrible about. Nothing happened to my truck did it?"

"No. No, your truck is fine. I even started it a few times so that the battery wouldn't die."

"The house is fine?" he asked, trying to get me to talk.

"Yeah, the house is fine." I took a deep breath trying to get the courage to tell him. "It's your plants. I killed all your plants." I refused to meet his eyes, as we said nothing for just over four minutes. We were nearly back at his house when I finally spoke, "I'm sorry, AJ. I warned you that I would probably kill your plants. That's why Harm bought me that book. He knows that I am so bad with plants that he called every week to see if I had gone herbicidal yet."

"Herbicidal?" AJ asked.

"Yeah, he calls me the Herbicidal Maniac," I said sadly as I pulled into his driveway. He still said nothing as we both got out of the car. "I went to the local nursery and I spoke to a nice girl named Lisa and she said that they should be getting in new ones like yours in tomorrow. She has them on hold as a matter of fact."

"You spoke to a girl named Lisa. Blonde, pretty?" he asked with a smile.

I nodded then was surprised as he began to laugh. I turned away to leave but he caught my arm.

"Sarah. I'm sorry," he said as he ran his hand down my arm. "I'm not laughing at you. It's just that I met Lisa a few weeks ago." I looked up at him questioningly.

"I met her the day before I left, when I went to buy some plants so that I had an excuse to have you in my house."

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