The Most Dangerous Game
Chapter 5 The Voice of Reason
The video was published, and it received three million likes, thirty thousand shares, and eight hundred comments. Twenty million eyes saw the video. Ten million mouths discussed the video. Three monsters were unleashed the moment they watched it—and they were hungry for Greg’s blood.
Only one person sensed something was coming—something bad. That was Selena Moralez.
Selena shook her head after she closed her phone.
I don’t like this, she thought. He can barely cook a sunny side up egg. Now he’s gonna get lost in the woods? With strangers searching for him?
She stared at her phone, torn between warning him or deleting his number for good. What was she going to say, anyway? “Hey, don’t do this dumb thing?” If Greg wanted attention, why not let him have it? He put the spotlight on her once. Burned her with it. In real life, she was Selena. On Instagram, X, and YouTube, she was forever Greg’s ex-girlfriend. A bitch who couldn’t take a joke.
She gave in. Grabbed her phone. Texted him:
“Be careful filming your next video. I don’t know about this one.”
Five minutes later, he replied:
“Thanks…”
Rolling eye emoji.
He’s such an asshole.
Selena still wonders what she saw in the man. She loved his charm, his charisma. When he talked to her, it felt like she was the only one in the room. But the magic dried up fast. A month into the relationship, she started to notice he wasn’t talking to her anymore—just rehearsing lines for the audience he saw behind her.
Greg blew up after the Suicide Forest video. And after that, it was like dating a landslide. He scrambled to maintain the momentum. To reach escape velocity. Selena tried to stay with him as he rose, but it was hard to hold someone who kept floating away.
In the beginning, it was good. She loved how he made her laugh, how he was present—really present—when they were together. But after his big break, gone were the good days. She’d sit across from him at restaurant openings while he refreshed his feed, hunting for new comments to reply to, tracking every like like it was stock data.
Rejected, Selena would pick up her own phone just to have something to do. She’d scroll through Instagram, bored and bitter, pretending not to notice how far away he was, even though he was sitting right there.
Sometimes, she’d comment on his post while sitting across from him.
“We love to see it.”
Stone-faced. Waiting. Hoping he’d look up and laugh. Acknowledge her. Something.
Instead, he’d just like her comment and stay hunched over his phone.
Whatever was on the screen was more interesting than her.
Selena felt empty after scrolling at the table, but it felt better than staring at someone who had already left the room.
At first, scrolling was a shield—something to do with her hands while Greg disappeared into his analytics. But over time, it became a reflex. Wake up, scroll. Post, refresh. Wait for the hearts. Sometimes she wouldn’t even remember what she posted, just that it needed to go up. Her phone became an IV drip for attention, and she let it run straight into her bloodstream.
One time, Greg took her to this Brazilian-Italian fusion place called Casa Pollastro. As the waiter served their food, Greg pulled out a camera light and started recording. He had his phone on a gimbal, balancing the transitions like it was a B-roll for Netflix.
“I need to keep my socials active,” he told her. Then, with that same smug charm, he added, “Besides, the best thing on the table is across from me.”
Then he flipped the camera toward her.
That video got Selena ten thousand new followers overnight.
It felt good.
Her likes doubled. Her stories popped. She didn’t even need bikini pics anymore.
She had her own YouTube channel now, and it grew as Greg blew up.
Maybe those lonesome dinners weren’t so bad after all.
Then everything went to hell on Valentine’s Day.
Greg told her to post that he had a big surprise planned. Told her to come home soon.
She didn’t know what it was.
