After beating Bleu in the dance competition, I felt like was on top of the world. It was like unwrapping a pack of Portable Monster trading cards and seeing the entire pack was full of shiny ultra rare Flamelizards, on my birthday.

But not everything was perfect. The vibe was just a bit off.

After nailing my masterstroke, the epic ass slap that reverberated throughout the world, I figured I'd be basking in the glory of victory. Like, imagine being the hero who just saved the kingdom, but instead of flowers it was all the cutest girls in school blowing up my phone.

But a big ol' cloud of drama was hanging over everything, courtesy of Bleu.

Bleu, my sometimes-friend-sometimes-competitor-sometimes-I-don't-know-what, was not exactly throwing a parade in my honor. Apparently, she felt some sort of way about her butt getting slapped in front of the entire school. She'd barricaded herself in our hotel room and refused to let me in.

Frankly, I was ready to apologize. Having screwed up so much in my past life, I was an experienced apologizer. But she wouldn’t even give me a chance. All of my texts were left unread, and my calls went straight to voice mail.

Oh well, if she’s not going to be mature about this, there isn’t much I can do.

Just as I was considering if I should break into the room, another questline appeared in the form of an anonymous text message.

Now, I’d already had a bad experience with anonymous text messages since entering this world. The mysterious H. Had been harassing me since I entered the Leaderboard Academy of Gaming, cohercing me into doing a lot of things I’d never wanted to do.

But this text message, it was quite different.

{ unknown number: “Hey there, cutie! ;) Saw your moves at the tournament. That Ass Slap? Epic level stuff.” }
{ Chance: “Whoa, who's this? Do I know you?” }
{ unknown number: “You don’t know me, not yet. But I’d like to get to know you. Let’s meet up”}

This was certainly intriguing, but I had to be a little cautious after everything that had happened.

{ Chance: “Meet up? I don’t even know your name. You’re a girl, right?” }

There was a pause of a couple minutes after that simple question. To me, the hesitation was an answer itself. This was certainly a prank or a stalker.

At least that’s what I thought until I got the response.

After 2 minutes, this anonymous person sent me an entire folder full of photos of a hot, naked girl. The face wasn’t visible for obvious reasons, but I could tell that all the pictures were of the same girl.

{ unknown number: “Call me Mindy. Is that enough, or do you need to see more? ;)” }
{ Chance: “Let’s meet up ASAP.” }
{ Mindy: “Meet me down at the south beach in 45 minutes. And come in your bathing suit, I’d like to get a good look at you.” }

Admittedly, there were a few alarm bells going off. But I was so vexed by the situation with Bleu that I figured this would be the perfect way to get my mind off the situation.
And who knows, maybe hanging out with this hot girl on the beach would be enough to make Bleu jealous.

So, I get to the beach, and it's empty. I mean it’s emptier than a server for dead MMO. Perfect for a secret rendezvous, or a horror movie. Flip a coin.

I looked around and didn’t see this Mindy anywhere, so I texted her.

{ Chance: “So… I’m down here by the water. What’s the plan? Sun-bathing? Building sandcastles? Swimsuit competition?” }
{ Mindy: “Think more... liberating. Ever tried skinny dipping?” }
{ Chance: “Skinny dipping? Like, as in... no swimsuit skinny dipping? ” }
{ Mindy: “Yep, that's the one. I’ve always wanted to go skinny dipping, but I’ve never had someone to go with :(. You’ll go with me, right?” }

Now the alarm bells were starting to really go off, and they wouldn’t shut up. This Mindy, who I’d never even met, wanted me to strip down in the middle of this private beach.

Normally, I’d assume this was just a prank and not even respond. But I’d given my number out to a few girls the previous night, so Mindy could easily be one of them.
Was this my luck magic in action? Or was I walking into a trap?

{ Chance: “You’re crazy. We’ve never even met. Why don’t we go on a nice date or two and get to know one another first?” }

There was a brief pause before Mindy responded with the hottest picture yet. I still couldn’t see her face, but she was holding a blue bikini by her teeth, like a dog with a bone. And the rest of her impeccable body was there for all to see.

{ Mindy: “What’s wrong Chance, am I not attractive to you? I guess I could just ask your friend Matt to go with me…” }

She knows Matt?

{ Chance: “No, no you’re plenty hot enough. I’ll do it.” }

And with that, I prepared to take a leap of faith.

I looked around and didn’t see a single person on the secluded section of the beach. Just the waves doing their thing, whispering secrets to the shore, probably gossiping about the nutcase about to go skinny dipping.

I look around – still no one.

I start undressing, feeling like a contestant in the world's weirdest game show. Every piece of clothing feels like a layer of my sanity peeling off. I'm half expecting a candid camera crew to jump out any second.

There I am, in my birthday suit, feeling as exposed as a peeled banana. I take a deep breath, tell myself it's now or never, and dash for the water. It's a weird mix of freedom and "What the heck am I doing?" The water is cool, refreshing, and thankfully oblivious to my current state of undress.

As I swim, waiting for Mindy to arrive, I'm half expecting a mermaid or a submarine periscope to pop up. But it's just me, the water, and the big, open sky. It's thrilling, liberating, and just a tad ridiculous.

A few minutes passed as I waded in the water, trying to understand how life had brought me to such an absurd point.

That was when I got a sinking feeling.

I’ve been had.

But I wasn’t sure yet.

I waited, bobbing around in the ocean like a human buoy, waiting for the mysterious Mindy. Every sound made me jump, thinking, "Aha, finally!" But nope, it's just the ocean doing ocean things.

Thirty minutes passed. By then, I wasn’t just treading water anymore; I was treading disappointment. And cold. My fingers are started to look like raisins having an identity crisis. So, without any other options for my delusional mind, I finally admit it – Mindy's a no-show. Maybe she never existed. Maybe she's a figment of my overactive, slightly romantic imagination.

I drag my disappointed self out of the water and run through the list of suspects. At the top of the list is Matt. Sure, he wasn’t very smart. But he was clearly jealous of all the attention I’d gotten from girls after winning the dance comeptition.

But then my roommates came to mind. Perhaps Amber was jealous that I’d beaten her. Perhaps Pail was jealous of all the attention I was getting from girls. Or maybe this was Bleu’s revenge for the ass slap. This had their fingerprints all over it.

Covering myself, I walk back on to the beach as I'm mentally preparing the world's saltiest revenge. As I get back to where I left my clothes, I’m met by the nastiest surprise yet.

And then I saw it. Or rather, don't saw it. My clothes were gone. Vanished. Kaput. In their place? A pair of tighty-whities that looked like they were designed for someone half my size. I'm talking comically tight. The kind of underwear that would make a wrestler feel overdressed.

My heart didn't just sink; it did a full-on Olympic dive. I was played. Played like a fiddle at a country hoedown. I snatched up the tighty-whities, holding them like they're radioactive.

This is my "outfit" now. What a nightmare.

Frantically, I grab my phone to text the number back.

At first, I was relieved to get a response, but I was even more enraged when I saw what the response was.

{ Chance: “What the hell, Mindy? What did you do with my clothes? You were supposed to join me!” }

{ Mindy: “You really are gullible, Chance. Taking your clothes off at a public beach just because a cute girl told you to? That’s so pathetic. Out of all the things I’ve asked you to do, this was the one thing I didn’t think you’d go along with, but it was the easiest to get you to cooperate. SMDH” }

{ Chance: “Wait, you're THAT stalker? The one from school?” }

{ Mindy: “God you are slow… Yes, do you remember how I told you to behave on the trip? You didn’t behave, and here’s your punishment. You get to parade yourself in-front of the entire school in just a pair of underwear. I made sure they’re just a couple sizes too small. Hehe.” }

{ Chance: “Punishment? You’re sick!” }

{ Mindy: “You should be thanking me. I could have had you arrested for public indecency. Those tighty-whities are a mercy. ” }

{ Chance: “Look, I don't know what your game is, but this isn't funny.” }

{ Mindy: “It's not meant to be funny. It's meant to teach you a lesson.” }

{ Chance: “A lesson? What lesson? That there are crazy people out there willing to go to insane lengths over nothing?” }

{ Mindy: “You just don't get it, do you? You can't just walk around doing whatever you please without consequences.” }

{ Chance: “Can you just stop this? It's gone way too far.” }

{ Mindy: “No, Chance. You're the one who took it too far. Now you're dealing with the consequences. ” }

At this point, all seemed hopeless. This stalked had all the leverage, and it seemed was able to manipulate me to her will. I had to develop a plan to figure out who it was. But I still didn’t have much to go off of.

{ Chance: “...Can you send more pictures of your body, though? They were so hot. ” }

Mindy didn’t respond.
I figured that those hot pics she’d sent were the only clue I had to her real identity, and more could only help. But it was to no avail.