Craig Strete was born at Fort Wayne around 1950 and describes himself as “Cherokee, White.” He is one inch less than six feet tall, has brown eyes and black hair; has done some time; lost his right eye to a butcher knife. He has a BA in film from Wright State University. He has also done some nonwriting time as a migratory farm worker (“picking tomatoes, canning factories, tomato cook”) and further lists as employments that he has been a steel riveter in a steel factory, has done grocery carry-out, and been a library clerk.
He is a member of various Indian organizations and supports the American Indian Movement’s goals of self-determinism for Indian peoples. For a time he edited a magazine, Red Planet Earth, which he says was “… amateur in terms of production, but did have, I think, some worthwhile contents.”
He adds, “My first book, hardcover collection of my short stories, If All Else Fails, We Can Whip the Horse’s Eyes and Make Him Cry and Sleep, came out September 1976 in Holland.” There is no American collection as yet, but there are preliminary discussions going on.
Strete reported that he had sold forty-three short stories, one Western and five juveniles (counting pen names), but since he has a disconcerting habit of withdrawing his work from publication at something past the last minute, those totals are subject to later adjustments.
He regards talking about himself as being “like dancing for tourists and I’m against that.” So there is nothing more to be said.
The old man watched the boy. The boy watched the deer. The deer was watched by all, and the Great Being above.
The old man remembered when he was a young boy and his father showed him a motorcycle thing on , a parking lot.
The young boy remembered his second life with some regret, not looking forward to the coming of his first wife.
Tuesday morning the Monday morning traffic jam was three days old. The old man sat on the hood of a stalled car and watched the boy. The boy watched the deer. The deer was watched by all and the Great Being above.
The young boy resisted when his son, at the insistence of his bitch of a white wife, had tried to put him in a rest home for the elderly. Now he watched a deer beside the highway. And was watched in turn.
The old man was on the way to somewhere. He was going someplace, someplace important, he forgot just where. But he knew he was going.
The deer had relatives waiting for her, grass waiting for her, seasons being patient on her account. As much as she wanted to please the boy by letting him look at her, she had to go. She apologized with a shake of her head.
The old man watched the deer going. He knew she had someplace to go, someplace important. He did not know where she was going but he knew why.
The old man was going to be late. He could have walked. He was only going across the road. He was going across the road to get to the other side. He was going to be late for his own funeral. The old man was going someplace. He couldn’t remember where.
“Did you make him wear the watch? If he’s wearing the watch he should—”
“He’s an old man, honey! His mind wanders,” said Frank Strong Bull.
“Dr. Amber is waiting! Does he think we can afford to pay for every appointment he misses?” snarled Sheila, winning her fingers through the tangled ends of her hair. “Doesn’t he ever get anywhere on time?‘
“He lives by Indian time. Being late is just something you must expect from—” he began, trying to explain.
She cut him off. “Indian this and Indian that! I'm so sick of your god damn excuses I could vomit!'
“But—”
“Let’s just forget it We don’t have time to argue about it. We have to be at the doctor’s office in twenty minutes. If we leave now we can just beat the rush hour traffic. I just hope your father’s there when we arrive.”
“Don’t worry. He’ll be there,” said Frank, looking doubtful.
But the deer could not leave. She went a little distance and then turned and came back. And the old man was moved because he knew the deer had come back because the boy knew how to look at the deer.
And the boy was happy because the deer chose to favor him. And he saw the deer for what she was. Great and golden and quick in her beauty.
And the deer knew that the boy thought her beautiful. For it was the purpose of the deer in this world on that morning to be beautiful for a young boy to look at.
And the old man who was going someplace was grateful to the deer and almost envious of the boy. But he was one with the boy who was one with the deer and they were all one with the Great Being above. So there was no envy, just the great longing of age for youth.
“That son of a bitch!” growled Frank Strong Bull. “The bastard cut me off.” He yanked the gear shift out of fourth and slammed it into third. The tach needle shot into the red and the Mustang backed off, just missing the foreign car that had swerved in front of it.
“Oh, Christ—Well be late!” muttered Sheila, turning in the car seat to look out the back window. “Get into the express lane.”
“Are you kidding? With this traffic?”
His hands gripped the wheel like a weapon. He lifted his right hand and slammed the gear shift. Gears ground, caught hold, and the Mustang shot ahead. Yanking the wheel to the left he cut in front of a truck, which hit its brakes, missing the Mustang by inches. He buried the gas pedal and the car responded. He pulled’up level with the sports car that had cut him off. He honked and made an obscene gesture as he passed. Sheila squealed with delight. “Go! Go!” she exclaimed.
The old man had taken liberties in his life. He’d had things to remember and things he wanted to forget Twice he had married.
The first time. He hated the first time. He’d been blinded by her looks and his hands had got the better of him. He had not known his own heart and not knowing, he had let his body decide. It was something he would always regret.
That summer he was an eagle. Free. Mating in the air. Never touching down. Never looking back. That summer. His hands that touched her were wings.
And he flew and the feathers covered the scars that grew where their bodies had touched.
He was of the air and she was of the earth. She muddied his dreams. She had woman’s body but lacked woman’s spirit A star is a stone to the blind. She saw him through crippled eyes. She possessed. He shared. There was no life between them. He saw the stars and counted them one by one into her hand, that gift that all lovers share. She saw stones. And she turned away.
He was free because he needed. She was a prisoner because she wanted. One day she was gone. And he folded his wings and the earth came rushing at him and he was an old man with a small son. And he lived in a cage and was three years dead. And his son was a small hope that melted. He was his mother’s son. He could see that in his son’s eyes. It was something the old man would always regret.
But the deer, the young boy, these were things he would never regret.
Dr. Amber was hostile. “Damn it! Now look—I can’t sign the commitment papers if I've never seen him.”
Sheila tried to smile pleasantly. “He'll show up. His hotel room is just across the street Frank will find him. Don’t worry.”
“I have other patients! I can’t be held up by some doddering old man,” snapped Dr. Amber.
“Just a few more minutes,” Sheila pleaded.
“You’ll have to pay for two visits. I can’t run this place for free. Every minute I’m not working, I’m losing money.”
“Well pay,” said Sheila grimly. “Well pay.”
The world was big and the deer had to take her beauty through the world. She had been beautiful in one place for one boy on one morning of this world. It was time to be someplace else. The deer turned and fled into the woods, pushing her beauty before her into tie world.
The young boy jumped to his feet. His heart racing, his feet pounding, he ran after her with tie abandon of youth that is caring. He chased beauty through the world and disappeared from the old man’s sight in the depths of the forest.
And the old man began dreaming that—
Frank Strong Bull's hand closed on his shoulder and his son shook him, none too gently.
The old man looked into the face of his son and did not like what he saw. He allowed himself to be led to the doctor’s office.
“Finally,” said Sheik. “Where the hell was he?”
Dr. Amber came into the room with a phony smile. “Ah! The elusive one appears! And how are we today?”
“We are fine,” said the old man, bitterly. He pushed the outstretched stethoscope away from his chest.
“Feisty isn’t he,” observed Dr. Amber.
“Let’s just get this over with,” said Stella. “It’s been drawn out long enough as it is.”
“Not sick,” said the old man. “You leave me alone.” He made two fists and backed away from the doctor.
“How old is he?” asked Dr. Amber, looking at the old man’s wrinkled face and white hair.
“Past eighty, at least,” said his son. “The records aren’t available and he can’t remember himself.”
“Over eighty, you say. Well, that’s reason enough then,” said Dr. Amber. “Let me give him a cursory; examination, just a formality, and then I’ll sign the papers.”
The old man unclenched his fists. He looked at his son. His eyes burned. He felt neither betrayed nor wronged. He felt only sorrow. He allowed one tear,, only one tear, to fall. It was for his son who could not meet his eyes.
And for the first time since his son had married her, his eyes fell upon his son’s wife’s eyes. She seemed to shrivel under his gaze, but she met his gaze and he read the dark things in her eyes.
They were insignificant, not truly a part of his life. He had seen the things of importance. He had watched the boy. The boy had watched the deer. And the deer had been watched by all and the Great Being above.
The old man backed away from them until his back was against a wall. He put his hand to his chest and smiled. He was dead before his body hit the floor.
“A massive coronary,” said Dr. Amber to the ambulance attendant. “I just signed the death certificate.”
“They the relatives?” asked the attendant, jerking a thumb at the couple sitting silently in chairs by the wall.
Dr. Amber nodded.
The attendant approached them.
“It’s better this way,” said Sheila. “An old man like that, no reason to live, no—”
“Where you want I should take the body?” asked the attendant.
“Vale’s Funeral Home,” said Sheila.
Frank Strong Bull stared straight ahead. He heard nothing. His eyes were empty of things, light and dark.
“Where is it?” asked the attendant.
“Where is what?” asked Dr. Amber.
“The body? Where’s the body?”
It’s in the next room. On the table,“ said Dr. Amber coming around his desk. He took the attendant’s arm and led him away from the couple.
“I’ll help you put it on the stretcher.”
The old man who watched the deer. He had dreamed his second wife in his dreams. He had dreamed that But she had been real She had come when emptiness and bitterness had possessed him. When the feathers of his youth had been torn from his wings. She filled him again with bright pieces of dreams. And for him, in that second half of his life, far from his son and that first one, he began again. Flying. Noticing the world. His eyes saw the green things, his lips tasted the sweet things and his old age “was warm.
It was all bright and fast and moving, that second life of his and they were childless and godless and were themselves children and gods instead. And they grew old in their bodies but death seemed more like an old friend than an interruption. It was sleep. One night the fever took her. Peacefully. Took her while she slept and he neither wept nor followed. For she had made him young again and the young do not understand death.
I’ll help you put it on the stretcher.‘ They opened the door.
And the old man watched the boy and did not understand death. And the young boy watched the deer and understood beauty. And the deer was watched by all and the Great Being above. And the boy saw the deer for what she was. And like her, he became great and golden and quick. And the old man began dreaming that—
Frank Strong Bull's hand, his son’s hand, closed on his shoulder and shook him, none too gently.
They opened the door. The body was gone.
The last time it was seen, the body was chasing a deer that pushed its beauty through the world, disappearing from an old man’s sight into the depths of the forest.