Geng sips his coffee and gazes out of the window and sighs. Heechul is sitting out in the garden with a rocking chair. He’s been out there so long that the rocking chair can’t even rock anymore since it’s sunken into the dirt. But Geng has learned the hard way that when Heechul goes outside with the rocking chair to sit with his flourishing tomato plants, there is absolutely no reasoning with him.

           “He hates me,” Geng mutters.

           “No, he doesn’t,” Leeteuk says kindly.

           “It’s the sixth month anniversary of the first time we held hands. All of the plants remembered. And now Mina’s upset because she doesn’t know how one of her daddy’s could forget something so important to her other daddy and thinks this is her fault sometime and so now Heechul’s mad at me and my baby plant is going to need therapy and she’s three and a half.” Geng drops his head onto the table. “I don’t deserve to have someone as wonderful as Heechul in my life. And I’m the worst plant parent ever.” He steels himself, then lifts his head. Leeteuk feels a chill from how dead Geng’s eyes are. “There’s only one thing I can do…I need to break things off with him before I make anything worse.”      

           “Yeah, that might be a bit of an overreaction,” Kangin says as he strolls into the kitchen. He yanks open the fridge, can’t find any beer, so he grabs the carton of milk and takes a swig, before going over to one of the herbs on the kitchen counter and bumping his fist against its leaves. “How’s it going, bro?” he asks. “Yeah, your Uncle Geng is pretty stupid sometimes.”

           “I can’t keep hurting Heechul like this!” Geng protests.

           “It’s the anniversary of the first time you held hands. Who even remembers that?” Kangin points out. Geng sighs.

           “I guess so.” He still looks dejected. Donghae and Eunhyuk are galloping around the house on some horse sticks they found the other day for Mina—she wanted to play Princess, so Donghae and Eunhyuk decided they would be her knights. Their sticks had special plastic cups taped to them so she could ride with them. With a loud neigh, Donghae parks his horse in the corner of the kitchen and attacks Geng with a wild hug.

           “Geng-hyung! Why are you so sad?” he asks.

           “He forgot the day he and Heechul first held hands,” Kangin explains. Donghae and Eunhyuk simultaneously gasp in horror.

           “Eunhyuk first held my hand on March 2nd at two thirty-seven in the afternoon after practice one day,” Donghae cries. “I could never forget such an important day! Oh no, Geng! What are you going to do to fix this? Where is Heechul-hyung?” Geng nods towards the window. With a look of fierce determination, Donghae once again leaps upon his noble steed and with another neigh, charges for the porch door to comfort Heechul. Geng watches as Donghae rides into the garden, although he trips and nearly topples right onto Heechul. A moment later, Donghae has his arms wrapped around Heechul, allowing his hyung to bury his face in his chest as he does his best to comfort him.

           “It’s over,” Geng says. “He deserves someone who will remember all of the important days. Do you think I could move into Ryeowook’s room?”

           “Geng, you are not breaking up with Heechul over this,” Leeteuk says firmly. “And Heechul will get over it.” Kangin snorts. “Ok, so he won’t, but you don’t have to end things. Relationships take work. Just go out there and talk to him. You’ve been through too much together to break up now.” Leeteuk pats him on the shoulder. “Just go talk to him.”

           Reluctantly, Geng goes out to join Heechul and Donghae. He can hear Heechul sniffling and the sound pierces him to his core. Then Donghae looks up at him and his expression of utter disappointment is more than Geng can bear. With a flash of smoke, Geng pineapples right there.

           As he falls, he almost lands on a sharp rock, but Heechul emits a cry of alarm and manages to catch Geng before he gets gashed open on the rock.

           “You saved me,” Geng whispers. “Even after I hurt you like this, you saved me.” If he hadn’t already turned into a pineapple, he would be a blubbering mess right now. “I’m sorry, Chullie. I…I don’t know, I didn’t think the anniversary of us holding hands would be so important to you. I’m not as sweet and sensitive as you—I only think about days like Valentine’s Day or White Day or birthdays or anniversaries of when we first started going out as…you know…things people have real celebrations for. Or the day we got Mina.” He notices that Mina is perched next to one of her favorite tomato-oppas. “I’m a barbarian. You know that. But it doesn’t mean I don’t love you, or don’t value every day with you—the seven months and two weeks and four days I’ve spent being your boyfriend. I’m so sorry, Chullie. Please don’t isolate yourself with the tomatoes forever.” Heechul looks down at the pineapple, calculatingly. But he hasn’t outright rejected Geng, so Geng feels a glimmer of hope. “What if I take you and Mina to see Frozen to celebrate our anniversary of holding hands? And I’ll get her some of the fertilizer she likes so much and I’ll get you a crepe and ice cream and we can get barbecue afterwards?” Heechul takes a moment to consider Geng’s offer, then nods.

           “Ok.”

           “Ok? Really?”

           “Yeah. And it’s Friday afternoon, so it won’t be that crowded since everyone else will have work.” Heechul suddenly frowns and Geng feels a spike of panic. “What?”

           “What did you say? Friday?”

           “Uh…yeah, it’s Friday.”

           “What’s the date?”

           “The Fifteenth. Why do you ask.” Heechul awkwardly shuffles his feet and pointedly looks anywhere but at Geng. “Chullie?”

           “Um…” Heechul clears his throat. “Well….you see…you may have held my hand on the, well, um….the sixteenth. Not the fifteenth. I got the days mixed up. So…um…” He bites his lip as he blushes. “It’s ok, Hannie. I’ll just…I’ll just go sit with the tomatoes now. And uh…maybe hand holding anniversaries are overrated. Anyways…it’s time for Mina’s nap, so I’ll just be going now—“ he quickly hands the pineapple over to Donghae and scoops Mina up and tries to run into the house before Geng has a chance to change back.

           “Heechul!”