[Kokopelli25]

CHAPTER 5

Ellie looked around, and without thinking walked to the stage at the end of the room - only a couple feet higher than the rest of the room, there was a podium in the center looking out over the room, and another off to the side that could be used when two students were debating each other. She stood behind the one set up at the edge of the stage and imagined she was back in high school, addressing her classmates. The podium covered her up to mid-torso, leaving her chest, shoulders, and head exposed and visible to the entire room. Anyone sitting close to the stage but to either side would also be able to see that her legs were bare, though not much more than that if she stood right up against the dark wood of the podium.

The thought of exposing herself like that to people she knew was starting to get to her. Instead of being nervous and scared, a sort of nervous excitement gripped her. She had been walking stark naked through her school for what - at least 20 minutes by now. Far longer than the brief moment she initially thought she might try.

Emboldened, Ellie stepped down from the stage, took her phone wristlet off, and looked around at the tables. She started to walk through the room, picturing who used to sit where when she was a student. The cool guys who didn’t pay as much attention to her back then as they probably would now if they could see her. Her friends across the room who she’d gossip with, only tonight they’d be gossiping about their naked friend.

As she came full circle and found herself near the double doors, she glanced out into the dark hallway. Of course there was no one there - she was the only person in the whole building. She had a wild idea, but first things first. Returning to the podium area, she set her camera on the edge of the stage, propped against the podium. After lining it up just right, she set the auto-timer on the camera app and turned around to walk back to the desk, but before she got there from behind her she heard the camera shutter “click”. Shocked, she went back to her phone and realized the timer had a 3-second default. Setting it to 10 seconds she tried again, this time getting to the front table in just enough time to turn around and climb up. With her legs crossed and her arms over her chest, she gave a timid smile just as the camera snapped a photo. She hopped down and checked her phone. The photo was perfect - without actually showing her private parts, it was obvious she wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing.

Standing there she hesitated...with one bare foot rubbing the back of her other leg, she thought about whether she could take the last half step, and decided to go for it. She put the camera back on the stage and set the timer for 10 seconds again, but this time when she climbed up to sit on the front table, she didn’t cross her legs and didn’t cover her breasts, instead putting her arms out to the sides, gripping the edge of the table as if to force her hands not to instinctively cover her body. She gave the same timid smile as the camera took one last photo.

Hopping down she picked up her phone and quickly looked through the photos. She deleted the two from downstairs that only showed her from the shoulders up - the lighting was horrible and the reason she ventured upstairs in the first place. That left two shots, no three - the one of her bare backside as she walked away from the stage. Even though she was moving, the photo turned out surprisingly well. Although it captured almost her whole body, from her head to her knees, you couldn’t tell it was her. The next two you could, and they had turned out just as well.

After staring at her naked body for a moment, she decided to send at least the first two to Natalie, though when she went to attach them to a text, there was no cellular service available. The school wi-fi was open access, so she connected, quickly clicked “agree” on the standard user agreement that the district used, and then sent them as two separate texts, one photo each so they’d send faster, and then after a brief pause, she sent the third one.

For a moment after the third message was sent she panicked, wondering if Natalie would be careless with her phone - would anyone be around her when she saw the photos? She was pretty sure she could trust Natalie not to purposefully show them to anyone except maybe Caroline, but would she accidentally leave her phone unlocked someplace her brother could find it? Ellie remembered the story Natalie shared their freshman year about her brother catching her sunbathing naked, and how she was never sure whether she could trust that he hadn’t taken or shared any photos.

It never occurred to Ellie that it wasn’t Natalie’s family and friends she should have been worried might see her naked photos...