This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/doomedgeek on 2023-08-10 19:53:16.

It was a Wednesday morning, and I was exhausted.

I had been up late the night before.

I’d been looking for work and had got as far as downloading the application pack for a job. There were so many details needed, though. It was painful. So, for a bit of a break before I got stuck in, I went onto my favourite news site.

It was trash central and I spent a while trawling through the seedy gossip and the very unflattering pictures before following a link which took me to a forum discussing who was the worst actor of all time.

Then I kept clicking and scrolling and before I knew it, it was 3am and I was too bug-eyed to go back to the job application. I crawled into bed and woke up just after eleven.

I yawned and stretched and felt something click in my back. I winced and, trying to rub the middle of my back and failing, because no one’s arms are that bendy, I went to make coffee.

Only, I was all out of filter coffee. There was still some instant coffee left at the bottom of a jar. I tried scraping the dried granules out with a spoon but the dark lumps I got were not enough.

This was not a great way to start the week.

It was already a week I was dreading. If I didn’t find the money from somewhere to pay my rent by Friday, my landlord was going to evict me.

Thinking about this made me feel sick and I was holding my stomach and trying to calm breathe when my mobile rang.

I recognized the number. It was the credit card company. I’d stopped answering their calls last month but knew from the voicemails, texts and emails that they were about to hand my account over to a collection agency.

The call ended and a couple of seconds later I saw I had the icon for a new voicemail.

I put my head in my hands. This was so stressful.

If only I could find a job and quickly, I could get them all off my back.

But I was too stressed now to even think about filling out a job application, and I needed coffee.

Desperately.

I put my mobile in my pocket and left the apartment. The clock was ticking on how long I’d be able to use my phone as well. The monthly payment was due in seven days and there already wasn’t enough money in my checking account to cover it.

I would be left totally cut off from the world.

Which was appalling.

How was I meant to turn my life around if I could not go online?

The handful of dollars I still had in the bank was hopefully enough for a take-away coffee and a few more days’ food.

If it wasn’t, I did not know what I was going to do.

Starting to feel a panicky as well as sick, I stepped out onto the sidewalk.

It was busy with people in suits looking like they had somewhere important to be, couples holding hands and looking pleased with themselves, and people just strolling along acting cool.

No one paid any attention to me. One man who was engrossed in a conversation on his phone would have walked straight into me if I hadn’t moved out of the way.

Jerk! I thought. It was like I wasn’t even there.

I was used to being ignored. And alone. It had been a long time since I had been on a date, and my only sort of friends were people with strange usernames that I chatted to online now and then. I’d also fallen out with my family years ago. I was left-handed as well, which shouldn’t have bothered me, but sometimes, when I felt like the definition of a loser, it did.

This was one of those moments.

Thankfully the coffee shop was just across the road. I crossed – narrowly avoiding a cyclist – and went inside.

There was a queue at the counter of people who had no idea what they wanted and took an age deciding, so I was pretty wound up by the time it was my turn to order.

Everything looked expensive so I asked for the most basic coffee they had, then put my card on the contactless reader. The payment failed, so I put the card in and entered my pin.

Two of the most horrible words in the English language flashed up: Card Declined.

The person behind the counter asked me if I had another card.

I was too deflated and embarrassed to reply. I turned around and walked out.

The procession of passers-by continued. Everyone had somewhere to be but me. Everyone had interesting messages and calls and reminders but me.

My mobile pinged.

I hesitated to look at it.

It would just be the credit card company again. Or my landlord. Or maybe my bank telling me they needed to speak to me urgently.

But the need to check my phone got the better of me and I took it out.

There was a message on the screen. It said:

You have been selected to win a cash prize in an exclusive competition.

And below this:

Click the link to enter.

I actually laughed out loud.

I was a total loser but I wasn’t completely brain dead.

At least if you’re going to try and scam me, make an effort to be subtle, I thought and began to put my phone back in my pocket.

Then it pinged again.

I hesitated, but once again the urge to check was too much, so I glanced at the screen. There was a new message below the first:

The competition begins in one minute. Click the link to opt-out.

“No way,” I said.

This was the last thing I needed.

If I clicked on the first link to opt-in to the competition, likely my phone would be infected with a virus.

If I clicked on the second link to opt-out, it was equally likely my phone would be infected.

The only intelligent thing to do was to do nothing.

But there was a countdown timer on the screen on my phone now as well.

It showed I had thirty seconds left to click on the link to opt-out.

Twenty-nine.

Twenty-eight.

I swore under my breath and stared at the screen.

Sweat beaded on my forehead.

This was horrible.

Seventeen.

Eighteen.

Click the first link.

Click the second link.

Do nothing.

What option should I choose?

Five.

Four.

Three.

My hand twitched and I pressed the screen. Opting out.

I stood there as my heart pounded inside my chest.

But nothing was happening on the screen. Which was good, right?

Only then I started to feel cold, because I realized I had accidently clicked to enter the competition.

The cold feeling trickled through to my bones as my screen went completely blank for a moment, and then a new screen appeared.

There was one word in the centre in vivid red letters:

Welcome.

As I stared at the screen, Welcome disappeared to be replaced by:

You can win 100,000 dollars in cash today by following these simple instructions.

I shook my head. This was a complete scam, and I could only assume my phone was wrecked.

I tapped the screen to try and get to a menu where I could reset the phone. But the screen remained the same. I tried turning the phone off using the button at the side. But again, nothing happened.

Apart from new words appearing on the screen. They seemed to be a list of rules.

Do not tell anyone you are in the competition.

Do everything we say.

If you do, then the winner you will be.

Rules, clearly written by someone who spent as much time indoors on their own as I did.

And there was no way I was playing along. The only thing I wanted was my phone to be working properly again.

The words went and new text appeared.

It said:

Smile at a stranger.

Seriously! I thought.

I sighed and tried to think clearly.

Smiling at a stranger was a very random thing to do but there was no harm in it that I could see. And if it meant there was the slightest chance I could get control of my phone back…

What the hey, I thought and looked up from my phone.

Finding a stranger to smile at would not be a problem. Every single one of the people on the street were strangers to me.

There was a woman right in front of me. She was about my age. And pretty.

I hesitated.

I couldn’t smile at an attractive woman in the street.

It was too weird, and I was too shy anyway.

Besides… she’d walked right past me now.

There was a businessman to my left. He looked successful and confident. I hated successful confident people. There was no way I was going to smile at him.

Then I saw the perfect candidate. He was at my twelve o’ clock about ten feet away, walking slowly along the sidewalk carrying a grocery bag. He looked to be about seventy and was wearing a crumpled shirt with a bowtie.

I could smile at a pleasant old man. No problem.

He came nearer.

I got ready to smile.

Another couple of steps.

I smiled. Gave him a full beam, teeth showing grin.

He stopped, looked up at me, his face wrinkled in disgust, then he kept on walking.

I must admit, I felt pretty stupid, but that was fine. I had smiled at a stranger, now perhaps I could get on with my life.

I checked the screen. It said Complete and below this there was now a box with $1,000 displayed in it.

I felt a flush of excitement. Did that mean I had won 1,000 dollars?

That amount of money would solve my immediate problems and give me time to find a job.

Then I reminded myself that this was a scam.

There was no pot of gold at the end of the digital rainbow.

Still, it would have been nice. I was thinking this ruefully, when the words on the screen changed again.

They now said:

Tell someone you love them.

I swore out loud when I read this.

No way ever I was going to do that.

It had been bad enough just smiling at someone. Telling someone I loved them… I felt queasy just at the prospect.

Meanwhile, though, my phone was still in the grip of the blasted hackers or whoever they were.

Hang on, I thought. How had whoever was running t...

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