It was an unusually chilly evening in the high-class and very high-priced beach town of Summers, known mainly as a popular tourist location. Ann Loach, better known around town as the "Magic Cake Lady," was packing up her food cart for the day. Her honey-blonde hair fell lazily down her back as she reached up to close the umbrella. She blinked hard as the sinking sun surprised her tired eyes with golden light. If someone were to look at her full-on, they'd notice fine lines beginning to appear around her face, but she still looked very good for her age.

Life for Ann had taken a drastic turn for the worse ever since Hurricane Electra tore through the area last month and demolished many of the poorly-made buildings around town. Luckily, her small apartment survived with little damage, but insurance had skyrocketed. She knew people were saving every penny they possibly could, so no one could splurge on her cake anymore. Couple that with rising flour prices and Ann would probably be homeless in less than a year if she didn’t move to a more affordable town. She was grateful for the rare tourist who bought a few slices of cake to share with their family, but that was hardly enough to keep herself afloat.

Looking at the many slices of cake that would be deemed inedible if they weren't sold tonight, Ann sighed as she came to the realization that she'd have to rely on the bums of Toto again. Since no one wanted to pay top-dollar for stale cake, the bums were only too happy to hand over a few dollars in exchange for small slices of the strange baked good. Unfortunately, that would end up being Ann's only income for the week.

Ann leaned against her food cart and turned toward the ocean. She wished she had time for a swim, but it would be dark soon and it was dangerous to swim at night. Instead, she watched the waves slap lazily at the shore and let her mind wander. The sun was beginning to sink below the horizon and a soft breeze was now making the palm trees sing. Feeling elated, she walked down to the beach, sat down with her back against the sea wall, kicked off her shoes, and listened for a while. Ann dug her feet into the warm white sand as she listened to the symphony of seagulls and ocean waves. She breathed in the mist and felt every worry leave her mind as she exhaled. It was such a nice feeling. She sat long enough to watch the sky go from orange to pink and purple. The swirling clouds began to form a serpent-like shape. It reminded Ann of a day long past...

A ten-year-old Annie Loach was walking down the beach with her best friend, Teddy Whelk, also the same age. They've been friends ever since they were born thanks to their mothers always doing everything together. Teddy had naturally brown hair, but the sun was starting to bleach in little streaks of gold as it did every summer. Annie always teased him whenever this happened because she accused him of trying to look more like her. She was very proud of her honey-blonde hair, for no one in her family had that same color. Their usual summer tans had only just started, so their skin was an odd shade of olive, though Teddy was a bit darker.

Today was the first day of that wonderful three month vacation from school and the two friends couldn't wait to get into as much trouble as possible. The day was bright, barely any clouds in the sky, and very hot. If it weren't for the ocean breeze, it might have been too unbearable to stay outside for very long. A few clusters of tourists were scattered around the beach, but it wasn’t as busy as it gets in the wintertime. Most of tourists were in the water.

Annie and Teddy lived during a time where it was okay for kids their age to roam around unsupervised, so Annie was carrying the cooler containing the lunch her mother packed for them, and Teddy was carrying their supplies. They found a nice spot in the shade of someone else's beach umbrella and set down their stuff.

Their latest obsession was digging for buried treasure. Tales of a giant sea monster called the Kraken had been passed around school for years, and Teddy and Annie's interest was recently piqued when Teddy dug up a very large tooth near the shore. They were convinced that the sea monster was alive out there and were determined to find anything of value that might have been lost at sea when the Kraken attacked cruise ships and fishing boats.

As Teddy busied himself with the towels, Annie grabbed the two cheap plastic shovels and took out a map that the two of them had worked on. They had done their best to draw the defining features of the beach and marked the spot where Teddy found the tooth. She stared at the map as she tried to decide where they would start digging that day. They already tried both sides near the sea wall and all they found were a few coins that tourists probably dropped. Teddy figured their best bet would be somewhere in the middle since the waves always seemed to push them to the middle of the beach, no matter on which side they swam.

Teddy finished setting up and joined Annie with the map.

"How 'bout we dig somewhere around here," suggested Teddy, pointing to the middle.

"Okay, but it'’s pretty hot today, so I'm gonna go swimming first," replied Annie. That was her favorite part of coming to the beach. Ever since she was little, she always wanted to be a mermaid. She felt more at home in the ocean than she did in her actual home.

Already used to Annie's habit of taking a dip before doing anything important, Teddy took one of the shovels and set to work in the spot he indicated. He'd given up on that area and started on another one close by when Annie finally came out of the water. She reached for the other shovel.

"I guess I'll try the other side," she said with her eyes on Teddy's abandoned dig spot. They dug for an hour and a half, each moving slowly down their side of the beach until they were so far away from each other that they couldn’t communicate without using hand signals. Annie had taken two more swimming breaks since she started.

"I'm hungry, let's take a break," said Teddy moodily when they met back up in the center of the beach. They walked over to their towels and started munching on the peanut butter and banana sandwiches that Annie’s mom made for them. They compared their findings as they ate.

"I only found some coins," reported Teddy with a glum look on his face. He pulled the coins out of his pocket and dropped them onto his towel. Many of them were foreign.

"I got some of those, and also some really neat-looking shells!" exclaimed Annie holding up a particularly spirally one. She was also somewhat of a shell-collector. Teddy rolled his eyes.

"You're supposed to be looking for treasure, Annie," he reminded her.

"Yeah, yeah, but I can't help it if I find some other stuff along the way," she replied. Teddy would never understand her love of shells, so she refrained from arguing with him.

They spent the rest of their lunch discussing the many things they might uncover in the sand, and then sat around building a giant sand castle near the surf. When the castle was nearly finished, Annie laid on her stomach and let the waves wash over her as she attempted to catch as many tiny mole crabs as she could before they burrowed under the sand. She kept them in a bucket and then brought them over to the castle when she caught a nice handful.

"Here they are, the citizens of Sandy Castle!" announced Annie, and dropped the mole crabs into the castle's courtyard. They immediately burrowed under the sand. Teddy laughed and started on the moat.

"C'mon, Teddy, let's go swimming," pleaded Annie. She was bored of playing in the sand. Teddy stood up and dusted himself off.

"Yeah, sounds like a good idea."

They raced to the ocean and tried to hide their pain as the icy water bit their sun-warmed bodies. Annie immediately went under to get her hair out of her face. The cold water was shocking and she jumped back up quickly to take a breath. Teddy laughed at her and went under himself, coming back up as quickly as Annie did. She stuck out her tongue.

They had a few races and then some contests to see who could hold their breath the longest. Then Annie challenged Teddy to see who could find the coolest shells with their toes, and then dive under to dig them up. Teddy knew that this was Annie's not-so-discrete way of finding more shells, but he liked contests so he played along. He found two clam shells that were still attached to each other and Annie rushed up to their towels to put them safely away in a box, because that was certainly a rare find. She declared Teddy the winner. He was pleased.

After two hours of similar activities, Teddy got out of the water to continue searching for treasure and left Annie floating on her back. She promised she would get out soon, but she loved this time of day, when it was going from afternoon to evening. She closed her eyes and let the waves take her wherever they wanted. She was too content in her own world to notice the two boats that were racing back to Toto harbor. It wasn't until the ripples caused by the boats moved her body unnaturally that she looked up.

Annie saw Teddy waving at her to come to shore. The look on his face let her know that something was wrong. She raced back as fast as she could.

"What's wrong?!" demanded Annie when she finally reached Teddy.

"I saw those boats coming back and then watched the fishermen get out and they were pointing to this swarm of seagulls out there and I watched them for a while and then I saw a huge thing pop out of the water! It was big and green with some kid of red thing on its head and then it went right back under!" Teddy explained in a hurry without taking many breaths.

Annie immediately scanned the skies for the swarm of gulls. She found them quickly, though they were pretty far out, which was unusual. She squinted at them. They appeared to be in a feeding frenzy.

Suddenly, a huge head popped out of the water. Annie's eyes widened. It was just as Teddy had described it - green with some kid of red frills on it. It seemed to be agitated by the seagulls because it was biting at the air in every direction. Was it blind? It didn't appear to have eyes.

The two friends stood transfixed and watched the giant sea monster fight the seagulls with fear and wonder in their eyes. The other tourists had all gotten out of the water by then and everyone on the beach was watching the commotion out at sea. After about a minute more of fighting, the monster let out a huge blast of fire that took out a large chunk of the gulls and then dove underwater. Annie watched it as it went, noticing how long it took for its entire body to disappear, the frilled tail hanging in the air for a fraction of a second before sinking. A few seconds passed and the head came back up, but this time it was swimming away. The way it was moving resembled those old pictures of sea serpents that Annie saw in a library book about pirates. That had to have been the Kraken.

Teddy and Annie looked at each other with gaping mouths as soon as the Kraken disappeared into the setting sun.

"It's real," they both said in unison.

Teddy ran to the map, turned it over, grabbed a pencil, and started to sketch. He was the better artist of the pair and it wasn't long before he'd drawn out an impressive rendition of the monster they just saw.

Teddy and Annie spent the rest of the day and most of the entire summer break creating the very first Kraken fan club. Very few of their classmates believed that they actually saw the Kraken when they got back to school, but most of their friends joined the club. They went on treasure hunts every weekend and always kept an eye on the horizon just in case the Kraken decided to make another surprise appearance. Teddy and Annie never saw the Kraken again, but they would always remember that day. They became closer after that, because it always felt like they were sharing a secret.

Ann opened her eyes and saw that the sun was completely gone now. She sighed and stood up, her mind still on Teddy. It was when they were both fifteen that she had been working up the courage to ask him out on a date. Then, on his sixteenth birthday, she decided that she was ready. That was the day he told her that he and his family were moving away. Ann was absolutely crushed, but there was nothing she could do about it because Teddy's father found a better job in a far-off country. Since she probably wasn't going to see him for a long time, she kept her new-found feelings for him to herself.

Ann wondered for years if she would ever see him again, but had recently given up hope. She assumed he forgot about her and had moved on with his life. Maybe he had a wife and some kids by now. It hurt to think about that. Though she hadn't admitted it to herself in at least a decade, the slight chance that Teddy might come back to Summers was the only reason Ann remained there. Since her future in that town didn't seem very bright, she'd probably end up moving soon. She didn't want to, but there was no way she could afford to live there anymore.

Completely depressed now, Ann forced herself up, walked back to her food cart, and began the journey to the most-populated alley of Toto. "Those bums'll be trippin' tonight," she said softly to herself, wondering if they would miss her after she moved. They'd probably only miss her cake. Saddened even further by this thought, Ann crossed the street to continue her walk underneath the street lights.

A man in a sharp business suit with a fedora perched lopsidedly on his head was looking out of the window of his room in the Hotel du Summers. After a few minutes of star-gazing, he saw a woman with honey-blonde hair pushing a food cart down the sidewalk and considered her. He watched her until the darkness of the night swallowed her figure. The man appeared to be deep in thought, for his eyes never left the spot where she disappeared for the next half-hour. Was he hoping she would reappear or was he merely daydreaming?

A few more minutes passed before the man finally sat down on his bed. He placed his fedora on the nightstand, revealing dark brown hair, kicked off his shoes, and laid down. The many lines on his face seemed out-of-place, like he'd aged early. If one were to look closely, they might also see some stray white hairs on his head. He still appeared to be thinking. Unconciously, the man pulled a business card out of his pocket and began flipping it around in his hand, which appeared to be a nervous habit. The name on the card read Theodore Whelk.

He never forgot about Annie after all. He made it back just in time.