Chapter 11: Regarding the Gift
Eiden, who had been relaxing in bed and drifting off to sleep, suddenly jolted upright like he’d been electrocuted. "Sasha’s birthday is tomorrow!"
"Damn! What do I do?!" He slammed his face into the pillow. "I completely forgot about it after all the crap that’s been going on... I remembered it before Linda rejected me or technically, didn’t but then all that cat-glowing-system nonsense happened." He groaned. "Why didn’t Sasha even say anything? Gah."
Panic rushed in like a broken faucet, and Eiden began brainstorming the entire night. His thoughts were running a hundred miles per hour, trying to juggle ideas while half his brain begged him to sleep.
The next morning, he looked like a corpse. Dark circles. Slumped back. Barely functioning. Still, he mustered whatever energy he had, forced himself to get washed and dressed, then dragged himself downstairs. Dally, his mom, was already at the table with breakfast laid out. As he sat down, groggy-eyed and dead inside, she smiled gently. "Sooo?" she asked playfully. "What are you planning to give Sasha today?"
" You know her parents has already invited us to the birthday party, " .
Eiden choked on his first bite of toast. "I... it’s a surprise."
"Alright then," she said casually, continuing her meal. Eiden sighed. That was too close. As he munched half-heartedly on breakfast, he whispered internally: "System-chan, suggestions please?" He always imagined the system voice as female it just sounded like that. But he also had a weird gut feeling it was sexless. Regardless...
❝ I cannot provide assistance regarding this matter. ❞
"Figured," Eiden muttered, not even disappointed. He’d asked more out of desperation than expectation. Still... what the hell could he give Sasha? It wasn’t like she lacked anything. She could afford all the stuff he couldn’t as he father Christopher Everine was a wealthy business man who owned serveral stock market as her mother was a former retired acteess Celine Everine who was quite wealthy herself as she still gets offer for ads for some famous products . And worst of all, he didn’t want to repeat himself. "I already baked cookies once. Took a whole-ass baking class for that. That was my ’homemade, thoughtful’ phase. Then I bought her a dog once. Which, okay, is a huge gift but she got attached immediately. So, not really a rich or poor issue."