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James Kensey's mom attempted suicide for the first time when he was 5 years old. He found her sitting in the bathtub, waste high in water and still wearing her bath robe. She was holding their telephone which had just started ringing.“Jimmy-boy,” she spoke calmly, “what are you doing in here?”“Mommy the phone is ringing.”They remained, frozen in silence; neither daring enough to answer the phone. Finally it stoppedringing. In her mind, James' mom replayed the scenario of just letting go. Just dropping the phone.After all, she's so close, she's already come this far. It won't matter what happens, expect just maybe, itmight not work. It might not do anything.“Mommy I'm hungry.”“James, baby, can you call Aunt Denise?” His mother asked as she handed him the phone. “Doyou remember how to do that? Tell her mommy needs help.”From then on, that was the code for when James' mom would need to go back to the hospital.That and when she would call him Jimmy-boy. “Jimmy-boy, I think you should give your Aunt Denisea call.” Here it goes again. Another month or so with the insufferable Aunt Denise.Both women were rather cold to James. The main difference being that his aunt chain smokedand didn't care for cooking and that his mother had an obligation to take care of him, at least a legalobligation. Those months, James subsided on Hungry Man and Hot Pockets. The microwave was theonly appliance that got much usage. Sometimes the stove would be used and James would be treated toa meal of Velvetta mac & cheese.Aunt Denise would smoke inside. She never believed in opening windows.“Cold air is bad for your lungs,” she would ramble on to the boy, “it hardens them, makes itharder to breath. I knew people that spent all night outside and they choked to death. Don't you forgetthat boy. And don't you go off opening any windows and killing off your Aunt Denise. Then there will be no one to take care of you.”

It's not that James' mom wanted Denise to watch her child, she had no other choice. Her familywas originally from just outside Pittsburgh. She met James' father while he was working there as a coalminer. They met one day when she was home on break from college. The dust and soot could not hidehis charms and they got married the day after she graduated from Pen State. A pre-med student, she hasalways wanted to get a graduate degree in nursing.Then one day, the Appalachian coal mines began to shut down. Citing the publics new foundinterest in more economically friendly sources of energy and the general decline in population in thearea, especially to do the steel bust, the mine where James' father worked had closed. He suggestedthey move back home, back to his home, of Wisconsin. There was more job security there and hewould need a steady job if they ever wanted to pay off the student loans.When James turned seven he started exploring the area outside his home more often. Therehome was nothing more then a simple trailer, plywood paneled and painted a peeling, sun-bleached pink. There's was the last property in the community and James had the woods as his backyard. He hadtaken a fancy to climbing trees, enjoyed the feeling of being taller and peering over his world.Around June of that year James had taken to a Green Ash tree that was rather close to the trailer.From it he could see in the windows, and on days that he felt especially daring, over the roof. On thesecond Saturday of the month James spent all of breakfast thinking about climbing his tree. His mother was especially kind this morning and had decided to make pancakes from scratch.“Jimmy,” she took her time talking, “how is school baby?”“S'okay.”“Just okay? Cherish your education boy, you don't realize that it will be the most importantthing to you one day. Only when it's too late.”“Can I go outside and play?”“Finish eating first, I want to sit with you longer.”When he was finally free of his mother's attention, James darted outside and into the pleasant