THE BEGINNING

It all began on a social networking site. She with no friends in her school wanted to be a ‘rock-star’ for all. She was a quite girl for everybody in the real world but in the virtual world there was a different life she was leading in a tender age of 15. I feel this is a phenomenon of most of the kids who are without friends or siblings. She in the absence of any person to whom she can vent out to, took help of a social networking site where she started connecting to different strangers in whom she found strangely her kin and peer.

She used to spend hours interacting with them – sometimes in virtual world and sometimes over phone. She thought of those friends to be more closer than her own family. She started believing in this virtual life. The result of her mental turmoil and confusion was seen when her results were out. Her parent’s were shocked to see her downfall and at once decided to take away even the little freedom she had over the virtual world. Soon her access to phone as well as computer was finished. The only connection to the world was broken. The decision was strict but her parents took it to get her back to her books. She became quite again with all the grudge inside her. Soon she took to her books and became all the more introvert. Her grades started improving and that satisfied her parents. They never tried to check on her personal life, thoughts and feelings. It went on like this and months passed by.

On a lazy Sunday afternoon while she was reading her textbook the phone rang. Her mother was busy with the household chores and her father was out for some business trip. Her mother called for her to pick up the phone and check who is it. She received the call and voice on the other side brought back her smile.