You can sign up for paper trading account to play with whatever you want with virtual money. You can reset and keep on trying weird strategies.

I haven't shorted because too risky but shorted using the paper trading account.

First, you need to check whether the stock can be shorted. Then, check how much they charge to short. If the stock is illiquid, sometimes you pay very high interest to borrow the stock. If it's liquid, you pay very little interest.

When you short, you get money since you are borrowing stock to sell and then receive cash. You can leave the cash or use the cash immediately.

Caution: If you short and stocks go up, you can get burnt. Many got burnt shorting Tesla. Also, if you short and company declares dividend, you must pay the shareholder the dividend from your own pocket.

There are other ways to short safely/limiting risk. E.g. buying puts or buying leveraged ETF that short.