218 pages

Barry's life took a bad turn very early and set him on a path to a dark place. This is the story of a journey with terrible consequences for many people, except for Barry. The story proceeds from Barry's youth into the ups and downs of a serial killer whose nemisis is time, and maybe DNA.

Therefore to Barry's way of thinking the people who went into the wilderness and cut down millions of trees were serving a variety of useful interests. A healthy forest in this region in the northwest of B.C. contained spruce, balsam, alder, and pine trees. Tightly spaced. Dense undergrowth. There were small pockets containing cedar and these lived longer unless they were marked for harvest. Yes many of these forests had been harvested or burned and when they grew to about 40 years old they were supposed to be cut.

Barry aspired to machine operation loading trucks. He pined at wanting a machine under his ass because the job paid okay. But there was no future in it for him. He caught wind of rumour spread that he was too reckless to drive trucks or operate machines. He blamed Ruby for some reason. She hated his driving and especially his boat driving. Machine operators blow out their backs by middle age. The future for Barry lay in falling trees selectively or en masse with a chainsaw. In this area of the province this was a ground level job. None of these trees grew large enough for topping, a major skill in forestry involving trapeze and climbing trees. He never did any tree topping. His task was to follow a path cut by a chainsaw and cutting trees inside a block designated by green ribbons around trunks. The trees were not massive coastal rainforest elephants needing to be topped. Mostly they were 30 to 50 year old lodgepole pine, spruce, and smaller fir trees. He became obsessed with learning about the length of life in his midst.

"Drunk again?" Ruby stood, blocking entrance at the backdoor of the house. They rented a small house in Berns Landing, which he was thinking of buying when he was old enough. The baby was coming upon what they told him would be his third year of life. He backed down the porch and climbed into his pickup truck and went to the hotel tavern. He was underage but the tavern manager accepted his false I.D..