Dear Parents, this topic is meant especially for you.

It is about a problem that is becoming very serious for those who have children that have computers of their own, especially if the child has the computer in the privacy of their own personal room.

It is a call to awareness of a very dangerous and growing problem…..

Exploitation through the Internet, using it to lure our youth into some very dangerous, and sadly, sometimes fatal, actions through the use of flattery, romancing, and false promises.

This is an extremely serious situation that the parents of the world need to become aware of and begin taking action on.

I actually knew a family when I was younger that lost their only child to an Internet con artist. The person the child was fooled into trusting was a pedophile, and a murderer.

But perhaps the saddest part about the child’s story is that the parents only gave him the computer to keep him out of their hair, for they liked to party and the child was a burden.

They did not pay attention to the child’s activities or behavior, so they did not notice when he began to change, becoming secretive, slowly ceasing contact with his friends, and spending more and more time in his room with his eyes glued to the computer screen.

The parents paid no notice to any of this, but since I babysat the child sometimes, I noticed something odd about his behavior, even with me and with the family I was working for as a governess. The little boy was friends with the oldest of the three children I cared for.

Only once did I try to bring the boys gradually growing aloofness to his parents attention, only to be told to mind my own business. To this day I wish I had have said more.

I am a writer, and I wrote a story based on that incident. A simpler version of this introduction and the story that follows, somewhat modified, is posted on several of the sites on Zorpia. The story that was a result of the memory of what happened to that young boy that I took care of for that short time was the inspiration for the following story, which, appropriately enough, is called

A Dangerous Game

Melinda was fifteen, and she was one very happy young lady. Her parents had finally gotten her the computer she had been pestering them to get her for absolute ages. She had never been happier, for she had the one thing now that she wanted the most.