Page 140 of From Drummer to Gamer

Was he okay?

Did he miss me?That was the main painful thought of them all.

Because I missed him so fucking much.

Every second of every day, he was the only thought in my mind. And that look in his eyes kept clawing at my heart over and over again. And ever since that day, I hadn’t slept for more than a couple of hours.

My only companions were a splitting headache, tired eyes, and a weak body.

When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t recognize the person I had become. In just two short weeks, I had lost a lot of weight, there were constant dark circles under my eyes, and my hair fell like crazy from all the thinking.

I was a shell of a person who was once living.

Barely existing.

“Sierra, have you heard back from any of the colleges?” Mother turned her questioning to me.

We were all huddled up in the dining room for what was probably my least favorite part of the day.

The Chan family dinner.

And my mother’s insistent interrogations.

“No,” I said in a less-than-enthusiastic tone.

“Is something wrong? You look sick, sweetie,” Mom’s tone softened, like they did whenever we got sick. But was it even worth caring only when we were sick? What about the other times?

“I’m fine,” I replied, pushing my noodles around the plate. I had no idea why she suddenly cared when I’d been exactly like this for the past fourteen days.

“Yes, kiddo. You do seem down,” Dad added with a frown. Somewhere in this past week, the softness that my Dad usually had in his eyes for me returned. But only now, I didn’t have the strength to care.

“I’m not,” I mumbled.

“Okay, if you say so,” Dad said softly, attempting a smile.

And the sound of forks hitting the plates ensued once again, followed by my mother’s questions.

“Sierra, have you looked through all the materials I gave you?”

“No.”

I heard a sigh leave her lips while I kept forking and unforking my noodles.

“Look, Sierra. I know you had your break, but it’s time to get serious. That’s the only way you can get into an Ivy League because just with your high school grades, you’ll get nowhere.”

I nodded.

“Also, Tin keeps calling me. I have told him multiple times that you won’t be returning to New York, and he had the audacity to say how stupid I was being. I just don’t understand how you could have surrounded yourself with such uncultured people, Sierra. But thank God, they are out of your life now,” Mom admonished like she couldn’t believe people like those exist.

A beat passed, and I kept staring at that one white spot on the pristine, dark wooden table.

“Tin is not uncultured,” I said in a voice I didn’t recognize. “He is my best friend.” It didn’t matter if I ignored them or didn’t speak to them for the rest of my life; I wasn’t ever going to let anyone talk about my friends like that.

I could feel Mom frowning at me. “Fine,” she muttered but didn’t add anything else.

And once again, the clash of the forks returned.

But my mother didn’t stop.