I've always had a self image problem. I don't think that I'm very pretty and I know that I'm not comfortable in most social situations. Ever since I was in kindergarten I've been shy and quiet at school. But when I finally started high school things rapidly changed for me.

It was about half way through my freshman year that I met Karen and her friends. I'd known who they were of course, because they were very out going and everyone saw them around school. It was in Freshman English that I found myself teamed up on a project with Karen. For some reason we hit it off right away and before I knew what I'd agreed to, I was going to the beach with "the gang" that weekend.

I live in San Diego and the beach is only a few miles away from my house, but you could count on one hand the amount of times I'd actually been. Well, I was really nervous about my upcoming trip with "the gang' not knowing how to act or even what to wear. Being a 14-year-old "very insecure" girl is no fun, let me tell you. I spent the rest of the week worrying about every little detail and imagining every little thing that could go wrong and was just about to throw in the towel by Friday.

But it turned out that I wanted to go more than I wanted to stay safe. For some reason I was excited about this trip with my classmates, and I think I was also a little tired of always missing out on what looked like fun to me.

Anyway, Saturday morning finally came and Karen and "the gang" showed up at my house honking horns and making lots of noise that had me racing out to meet them and trying to quiet them down before my parents came out to see what all the fuss was about.

Karen casually introduced then we all piled into the back of the pickup truck and headed for the beach. There were 5 of us that day, Brad, (who was driving) Marcy his girlfriend, Bobby and Karen and myself. I immediately started obsessing that I hadn't brought a boy of my own, not that I knew any boys well enough to have invited any.

But after reaching the beach and getting down to the oceans edge and having played around in the water and sunned in the sand for several hours I forgot that I was dateless. As a matter of fact I was enjoying myself more because I was single than if I'd had a boy like Marcy and Karen did.

It turned out that there were many more boys at the beach than girls and for whatever reason I was a hit with all the single guys. I'd never had that much attention from boys before and I even got friendly encouragement from Karen to "go for it" when guys would prowl around our site.

It was about 4:30 p.m. and at least 2 too many beers later when Karen started talking about leaving for home. For the first time I noticed that Bobby had left the group and that Karen looked a little miffed at my popularity. Apparently they'd had an argument earlier and he'd stalked off. I certainly didn't want to make an enemy of my new friend so I quickly agreed with her, which seemed to please her.

This is when things got really weird.

I'd been flirting all afternoon and I'll have to admit that all these boys making a fuss over me had really excited me. I guess I was even somewhat aroused by all their manly attention. I know that I had been fantasizing about several of them; wondering what they'd be like sexually, and what they would look like naked.

Apparently my arousal had an obvious effect that I wasn't aware of, because once we started out onto the freeway Karen and I in the back again, she said, "Looks like you've had some fun today, " and she nodded at me, looking meaningful at my crotch area.