Moving as quickly as possible, Jake narrowly avoids the waves and any potential of the waters stealing his shorts, even though he knows it sounds ridiculous. Free of the dangers, he will laugh at how silly he'd been.

Over all his years, Jake had heard horror stories from other beach members. "Oh, I slipped under the water and the riptide stole my shorts!" or "There was a homeless man who used to run around untying bikini strings when people fell asleep on their towels." These sorts of things had haunted his dreams, and as Jake started to walk out of the water these terrors returned to mind. He'd been so distracted, he hadn't noticed that the tide was shifting, and rolling waves were now coming towards him. They weren't anything for a grown man to be concerned about, but when one is panicked things do seem to appear larger. Especially waves.

Jake attempted to move quickly out of the water. Putting all his strength into his legs, he did his best to keep going without losing his footing. At first he felt like he was running through molasses, but then suddenly he was only knee deep. Ankle deep. The water sprayed playfully from his toes as he power walked out of the water. As soon as he was safe on the sands, Jake laughed to himself at the pointless panic he had just felt. His imagination had clearly gotten away from him. Still... He looked down, feeling silly, but wanting to check anyway.

[His shorts were firmly in place.]

[His shorts were missing!]