Sasha’s thumb swiped her screen as the light illuminated her emotionless face, her eyes started to sting, since she had looked at her obnoxiously bright phone for too long. Every once in a while, Sasha would look up from her phone to make sure she wasn’t about to walk straight into another emotionless human taping away at their screen. No one walked fast to class, so the hallways seemed to be forever in a traffic jam as kids were so caught up in staring at the digital world in front of them. Sasha was dazed as she got into the backseat of her mother’s car after school. “How was school?” Sasha continued to stare at her newly updated twitter feed, pausing for a minute or two to come to a realization that her mother was talking to her, “Oh um it was okay, you know, it’s just school,” Sasha turned her attention back to her phone and swiped her finger down once more, trying to update her twitter for the tenth time that day. Once home, she went to her room, turned on her laptop, ignoring her homework and started a series of another forgotten show on Netflix. Sasha then settled to watch and again took out her phone, refreshed it, and hoped there was yet another long chain of new tweets to keep her occupied. After about a half hour she got bored, turned off her laptop, and texted her mom about the project she was choosing to ignore, I need poster board, Can we go to staples? Her mom replied, Sure we will leave in 10. The ride to Staples again consisted of the world whizzing by the window, but no one was paying attention.

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Sasha walked through the halls with her head up, conversing with her friends and laughing about the weekend they had just had. Nearby sun came through the window of the hallway nearly blinding students, but they didn’t care, they were happy it was sunny. Everyone seemed to have a spring in their step, smiling as they walked throughout the hallways, Sasha had a realization that there was no traffic jam, just students early for class. Peers were making eye contact with each other and smiling as they walked. The atmosphere had changed and students seemed to be happy. Sasha nearly skipped to her mother’s car, climbed in the backseat and had a long conversation about what both of their days were like. This time, Sasha opened the window to her mother’s car and let the wind rush in and the sunshine hit her face, not caring that her eyes were now all watery. Once home, Sasha broke her normal habit of isolating herself, and instead sat at the kitchen counter analyzing the way the sun shone through the window and hit the wood floor. “Any homework?” it was the question that Sasha was secretly waiting for her mother to ask. “Oh no, I finished my homework today during lunch,” Sasha was waiting for her mother’s response. “That’s great, I was thinking we could go out to dinner as a family tonight.” There it was the response she had hoped her mother would give. Sasha missed the dinners out at restaurants, but didn’t want to admit her longing for family time since all she had “cared” about was the digital world while the real world whizzed by.