The Fisherman's Daughter.

Chapter 3 - Five years earlier

Summer 1987; Westport, WA.

"Ana? Mom? Where are you two?" I hear Erik's voice from the front yard. It's a hot summer day and I have been picking the weeds out of my mother's little garden on the back side of our home. I wipe my hands on the front of my cut off cargo shorts and readjust my spaghetti strap tank top. I look down at my fingers that are covered in the black soil and wish I had remembered to wear gloves. I lift the visor of my wide brimmed hat and see Layne emerge from the passenger side door of Erik's old pick up truck.

"Layne!" I squeal excitedly and run towards him. A swift breeze catches my hat and blows it from my head. I keep running towards him, not minding that my hair is damp from sweat and plastered to my head.

I reach him quickly and throw myself into his arms. My body hits his with a loud thunk and I practically knock the air out of both of us. He catches me in his arms and swings me around with my legs hovering above the ground, making me laugh. He places me back down on the ground and smoothes my sweat dampened hair away from my forehead.

"Hey beautiful," he says to me and kisses me on my cheek. I smile up into his sparkling light eyes and say, "I've missed you so much."

Layne is about to speak when my brother says, "What the fuck, Layne, come on. Stop flirting with my baby sister. She is only sixteen."

"Hi Erik," I reply in response to his chiding of Layne and give him a big hug and kiss on his cheek.

"Hi Annie, are you staying out of trouble?" He says to me with his best fatherly impression. I laugh at his remark and ask what he is doing home.

"I got into U-Dub! And I saved enough money working at the docks to move into a place that's bigger than the closet sized shit hole I'm in now." Erik says.

"Erik, that is amazing news! Congratulations!" I throw my arms around him in a tight squeeze. Erik moved to Seattle after high school and has been working on the docks packaging fish and attending Seattle Central community college at night.

"Hey, don't knock the closet, I still live there." Layne announces behind us.

I giggle and move to stand next to him. Layne's hair is longer and just plain crazier  than when I saw him last Christmas. I rough his hair up with my hand and say, "You look like you stepped out of MTV."

He laughs and fixes the hair that I messed up. "That's the point, babe. The chicks dig the 'do." I giggle as he head bangs to the air guitar solo he pretends to play for me.

"I guess I better hide my hairspray and hair crimper while you're here." I tease him.

He leans towards me as Erik walks to the back of his pickup and whispers, "you have more important things to guard than your hair shit while I'm here." He says in a mockingly sexy tone.

"Ew, you have been around those Seattle groupies too long." I reply. He laughs and playfully pinches the back of my arm.

"Erik, is that you?" My mother calls as she exits the front door and walks down the porch steps towards my brother.

"Hey mama," Erik says and pulls her in for a tight hug. "Layne, what have you done to your hair?" My mother asks as she reaches out to hug Layne too.

"That's his chick magnet, mom," Erik replies.

Layne hugs my mother tightly and whispers something in her ear that I can't hear. She laughs and says, "you are such a little devil."

Exasperated Erik says, "Fuck Layne, first my sister and now my mom?"