Indian on Purpose

by Craig Kee Strete

Amos Brokeshoulder was an old man as Indians reckoned it.

He was proud of getting old because he knew winters and summers and fall. He most likely would have lived a long time but now he was mostly waiting to die. His old wife Betta died five years ago in the spring so he figured to join her.

She had cancer. One day she was fine and the next she fell down and couldn't get up.

Doctor said she had pancreas cancer. Maybe different than other kinds of cancer but Amos didn't care. She died anyway. Doctor said she didn't suffer but Amos didn't believe him.

It had been five lonely years without Betta but Amos figured he was about done with living. There was no fooling around now. He even bought himself a new shirt just to die in. He used to drink and maybe he thought about diving into a bottle again but he had promised Betta he wouldn't drink no more and he didn't.

He figured he'd die in the spring when the weather got better. Amos Brokeshoulder was partial to April.

He figured that was a good time to die.

And he would have died too but things got changed round and he had to give up the dying business altogether.

There was a knock on the door and the old man got up slow and went to see who it was. People so rarely knocked that he found it strange.

"I come back," said the girl named Solace and she looked plenty sick when she said it. She had a tiny baby cradled in her arm.

She was dressed in blue jeans and a shirt that must have belonged to some guy as it don't fit and it got the name Bobo stitched on the pocket. She had a running cold sore on her lip and she looked like she been run over.

"I see that," he said, looking shocked.

"I am home now," she said...

310 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 5, 2022

About the author

Craig Strete is a Native American science fiction writer. He is noted for his use of American Indian themes and has had multiple Nebula Award nominations.
Beginning in the early 1970s, while working in the Film and Television industry, Strete began writing emotional Native American themed, and science fiction short stories and novellas. He has had three Nebula Award nominations: two for the short stories Time Deer and A Sunday Visit with Great-grandfather and one for the novelette The Bleeding Man.
REANIMUS PRESS NEW RELEASES
The Game of Cat and Eagle novel
If All Else Fails
The World in Grandfather's Hands novel
When Grandfather Journeys Into Winter novel
A Knife In The Mind novel
Dreams That Burn in the Night
Death Chants
Burn Down the Night novel
The Angry Dead novel
The Bleeding Man and Other Science Fiction Stories
My Gun Is Not So Quick novel
The Star Killer novel
To Make Death Love Us novel
Dark Journey
The Bouncing Bride novel
The Mammoth Project novel
Nobody Rides Forever novel
Paint Your Face On A Drowning In The River novel
Strete Food. A book of plays.
The Dinosaur Project novel
Cloudboy Juvenile
Russell Raven Isn't Scared Anymore Juvenile
Death In The Spirit House Novel
New Books.
THE DIRE WOLF PROJECT Novel
THE BLOOD OF OTHERS SF Novel

BLOOD TELLS ME ABOUT THE NIGHT and
THE NIGHT BROTHER
BY R. WRIGHT CAMPBELL AND CRAIG STRETE Horror Novels

MOOSE AND RACCOON
ALL GROWN UP UNDER A BIG MOON SKY
Juveniles

all the books are available in kindle, epub format from Reanimus press.