Chapter 1

The living room was silent, but it was not quiet. The air was filled with the tiny, rhythmic sounds of tapping, clicking, and the soft music of videos playing on mute.

Leo and Mia sat on opposite ends of the sofa. They were fourteen-year-old twins, but tonight, they felt like strangers. Their faces were lit by the harsh blue light of their smartphones. This was their ritual. As soon as they got home from school, they fell into the "Scroll."

Leo’s thumb moved up the screen like a machine. Swipe. Like. Swipe. Swipe. He was watching a video of someone making slime, then a video of a famous gamer shouting, then a clip of a car crash, then a dance video. His brain did not have to think. It just had to react.

Across the sofa, Mia was doing the same. She was refreshing her feed, waiting for a red notification number to appear on her profile icon. Each time she saw a new "like" on her photo, she felt a small, quick spark of happiness. But the feeling disappeared as fast as it came, and she immediately needed another one.

In the real world, things were slow. At school earlier that day, the history teacher had been talking about the World Wars. To Leo, it felt like the teacher was speaking underwater. His brain kept demanding stimulation. He wanted to check his messages. He wanted to know who had commented on his post. He could not sit still. He felt like his skin was itching.

"Did you hear what happened in class?" Mia asked suddenly, her eyes still glued to her screen.

"No," Leo replied, without looking up. "What?"

"I don't know," Mia said, finally looking at him. "I wasn't listening. I was looking at a game tournament."

They both laughed, but it was a tired, hollow laugh.

They were not like this two years ago. Back then, they used to ride their bikes to the park, read books, or talk about their favorite movies for hours. Now, a book felt like a heavy, impossible weight. A movie felt too long. If a video on their phone was longer than sixty seconds, they felt bored. They skipped it. They wanted fast, loud, and constant change.

Their mother walked into the room. She held a basket of laundry and looked at her children. She saw two tired teenagers who looked more like statues than people.

"Dinner is in ten minutes," she said. "Please, can you put the phones away?"

"Okay, Mom," Leo said. But his hand didn't move. He kept watching a video of a cat falling off a table.

"Just one minute," Mia promised. But that minute would

turn into five, and then ten.

Their attention spans were shrinking. They lived in a world of ten-second clips, where they were always connected to everything, yet they felt disconnected from each other. Outside the window, the sun was setting, painting the sky in beautiful colors of orange and pink. Neither of them saw it. They were too busy watching a digital version of someone else’s life on a four-inch screen.

The dining table was an island of wood in a sea of shadows. In the center sat a bowl of steaming pasta, its aroma filling the room, but Leo and Mia moved toward it like sleepwalkers. Even as they sat, the invisible tether remained.

Leo’s phone was tucked into his waistband, the vibration against his skin feeling like a frantic heartbeat. Mia’s phone was face-down on her lap, a forbidden secret.

For the first five minutes, the only sound was the clink of forks against ceramic. Their mother, Sarah, watched them from the head of the table. She remembered when dinner was a battlefield of stories—Leo complaining about gym class, Mia reenacting scenes from her drama club. Now, it was a silent vigil.

"I saw Mrs. Gable today," Sarah said, trying to pierce the digital veil. "She said you haven't been by to see her dog in weeks, Leo."

Leo blinked, his eyes unfocused. He had just felt a double-vibration in his pocket. Two notifications. Maybe a DM? Maybe a tag? "Yeah," he mumbled. "Just been busy, I guess."

"Busy doing what?" his mother asked gently.

Leo opened his mouth to answer, then realized he couldn't remember a single productive thing he’d done since 4:00 PM. He had consumed three hundred videos, but his mind was a blank slate of colorful, meaningless static. "Just... stuff, Mom."

Suddenly, Mia’s lap lit up. A bright white glow escaped from under the table, illuminating her chin in a ghostly light. A string of rapid-fire pings echoed through the quiet room.

"Mia," Sarah sighed. "The rule is no phones at the table."

"It’s just Sarah-Jane!" Mia blurted out, her hand diving under the table to silence the device. "She’s crying because of the post I made. I have to see what people are saying or she'll think I'm ignoring her!"