Bite My Tongue.

It was just after sunset, almost a week later when Josh stumbled across Annie again. The fact that he recognized her alone meant that she had left a mark, an indelible impact on him. Her hair was tied back in a sloppy bun, dreadlocks hanging helter skelter from it and she was wearing a thin t-shirt and a skirt that was the length of her ankles, making her look like some kind of bohemian. She was barefoot, sitting perched atop the roof of a beat up Jeep watching the surfers and listening to the music that filtered out of Venice beach.

"Annie, right?" Her head shot up and she peered around, a little startled. Spying Josh, she finally nodded, eyes scouring him quickly. She seemed to recognize him after a moment and she smiled.

"Josh! What brings you out here?" The question was posed gently, curiously. Josh just shrugged and gestured to the top of the car, his gesture seeming to inquire 'may I'. Annie scooted across the steel and made room, brandishing a cigarette from behind her ear as she did so.

"I can't get rid of her." He said, miserably. Annie lit her cigarette and let an eyebrow curve upward.

"So you came looking for me?" She sounded a little disbelieving. "I have a hard time believing that one, Runaway." It was now Josh's turn to raise an eyebrow. Annie laughed. "I have nicknames for everyone I meet under odd circumstances. My friend Davis is Jacks because when we met, he was playing Jacks. Get it? You looked like you were running from someone, so, you're Runaway."

There was silence stretched between the two, Annie smoking a cigarette, Josh searching for what to say. "I wasn't actually looking for you," he said. "I just needed air and stumbled across you." The air was void of their voices for another few tremulous moments before one of them broke the silence.

"You can't tell her to leave or she refuses to go away?" She flicked the cigarette into the pooling light of a streetlamp, her gaze soft, curious.

That was the start of their conversation. In the process of explaining Lyndsey, Annie had taken the tactic of tit-for-tat. For everything he said on the subject of Lyndsey, she responded with her own relationship horror story. It was like she sensed he didn't want to talk about it, really but she was trying to make him feel better by embarrassing herself. The tactic worked. The pair talked well into the night, and when it was finally time for them to part, Annie spoke one last time.

"You seem to have a knack for finding me, so if you ever need me, don't hesitate to look. And Runaway?" she said. "You really do need to let her go. She's not worth it."

---

As she had promised, Annie was waiting at the pier when they arrived. Unlike last time, they heard her before they spied her. More specifically, they heard her laughing and they were hesitant to disturb that. She sounded like she was having fun.

"She's proper fit though, yeah?" That was Max bringing Annie up yet again. He was quite interested in her and had been firing constant questions at Josh until he realized Josh hardly knew anything about her at all. There was general consent among them about Max's comment, however. Annie was small but she was absolutely the image of a proper California babe without the attitude.

"Hey! Runaway!" Annie called to Josh immediately upon seeing him and motioned all of them over to a thirty foot stretch of pier that consisted of a random bunch of what could only be considered nobodies. No one in the group made a remark about 'famous people intruding', no one in the group spoke out against it. Instead, they greeted the five of them with sodas and handshakes. The ones Annie was closest to were immediately apparent.

"Oh, so you're the boys Anabel's been talking about all afternoon." There was a tall young woman with raven colored hair and hazel eyes leaning against the rails, looking them all over one by one. Annie threw her elbow into the girl's ribs and turned an odd shade of pink.

"Heads up!" Someone yelled. Turning, the group spied a football flying toward them - not a pig skin, but a proper football. Annie, who had been sitting perched on the rail, swore violently when she realized it was heading right for her and instead of trying to catch it, promptly threw herself backward off the pier and into the water. The ball sailed through the space where Annie's head had previously been occupying and continued on until it ended up in the water as well.

"Are you mental?!" Chris yelled, but the raven haired young woman merely rolled her eyes.

"She does that when faced with objects coming at her head. She'll be fine." She said, seemingly certain enough. "I'm Cara, by the way."

"Cara! You wanna throw me my board so I can get to dry land?" Annie's voice floated up the pier from the water below and Cara stood and picked up the surf board that was leaning against the rails next to her.

"Nah, I think you'll make decent shark bait!" Cara yelled back before she dropped the fiberglass board over the side. "You might want to watch this. She's something else." The group managed to reach the railing in enough time to see Annie giving Cara the finger before she grabbed her board and attached the leash to her ankle beneath the turquoise water, looping her sandals through the leash cord first. "The surf is good so she should be alright."

"Are you sure? Those waves are huge." A nervous, bespectacled boy was biting his nails a few feet away.

"Davis, the double overheads don't bother her, you know that. I mean, she's more of the type to be on dawn patrol, but she can hack it, no doubt. She's no Stu that's for sure."

". . . what?" Dan sounded much more confused than the rest of them.

"Yeah, I think we might need a translator." Max's suggestion earned a chuckle out of Cara, who went on to explain that a double overhead was a wave that was twice as tall as the rider and dawn patrol was a person who would surf at dawn where there was minimal wind and chop. A Stu was an inexperienced surfer with minimal or no abilities.

"Hey! Don't hit any speed bumps now, Annie!" Cara yelled.

"Glad you're not out there then, Sand-for-Brains!" Annie's answering cry sounded much funnier than intended for an insult.

"Oh, she's gonna rip." Cara muttered. "And she's got company." She pointed out about two hundred yards from where Annie sat where they spied what appeared to be an incoming pod of dolphins.

"No way." Max murmured. Cara only grinned broadly, watching as Annie lifted a hand from the water to point to where the pod was incoming. She had seen them as well and by the way she was sitting on the board, she seemed nervous but ready to surf.

Annie caught the first wave she could and engaged in some spirited aerials with a few members of the pod. Her head was thrown back and she looked as if she was laughing as one jumped right over her head while she caught air. A few moments later, she disappeared inside a barrel only to reappear and switch directions back toward the pier, several pod members playing tag behind her. In an unspoken agreement, the group, including Cara and Davis began making their way toward the beach as Annie rode the wave out until it carried her to shore.

They met her a few minutes later as she walked, shaking and laughing up the dunes. "Oh man. Never in a million years." She said. "That's not happening again." She seemed breathless and almost high when her knees collapsed and she ended up sitting with her board across her knees and her head on her board. "Was I dreaming? C-Cara, was I dreaming? Did I really just-" Her sentence trailed in panting breaths.

It took her a few minutes to regain her feet but once she did, she walked with them back along the pier to Ruby's, talking the whole way, answering rapid-fire questions about her past and about surfing in general. They discovered that Annie no longer surfed as much as she used to due to something she called 'fin chop', and she showed off the six-inch scar around her arm to prove it. She had never encountered a shark before and this was her first time surfing with dolphins.

"You lot are rather mad, don't you think?"

Annie shrugged. "We might be crazy, but you'll come to find out as long as you stick with us, there is never a dull moment." She replied enthusiastically. "Cara's more of the entertainer. I'm the stupid-jokes kind of person that you only keep around in case of emergency. Also, I'm the general advice-giver although I'll be damned if I follow my own."

"So, are you gonna be at the show tonight?" Josh asked, while they sat outside of Ruby's after lunch. Cara leaped at a yes and Annie followed after, although by the pained expression on her face, Cara looked as if she had just stubbed her toe.

"How long are you in town for this time anyway?" Annie asked amicably as she kicked a hackey sack across the pier to Davis.

"A week." Matt replied. "Why?"

"Would you guys be opposed to joining us after the show? We'll probably just be hanging around Cara's flat. Music, alcohol, a possible crazy game or two. I'm not one for the bar crowd." Annie herself was impressed by their ability to give no fucks. Despite mentioning that their manager might go mental in Matt's words, they all agreed. After all, this was a side of California that none of them had experienced yet and Annie was more than willing to introduce them.