The stuffed animals lined the shelves of my bed stand. Their eyes, which once had glowed with curiosity and imagination, now only shined with a dark plastic tint. They stared at me from where I sat at my desk. They were not alive. I knew that. But that didn’t stop me from turning my gaze away from their frozen cat faces, and back down my music theory final. The guilt of growing up and realizing that I was forgetting them was more painful than studying a drum solo.