John Smith imagines his birth in the late 1960s, in a hospital on “this reservation or that reservation. Any reservation, a particular reservation” (3). The hospital is under-resourced, run down, and fully occupied. John’s mother is young, no more than 14, and she screams with the pain of his birth. Each time he imagines her, she is a member of a different Indian nation because he does not know her. Sometimes she is simply from “the same tribe as the last Indian woman he has seen on television” (4).   

When John is born, he is taken away from his mother, who protests that she wants to hold him. Instead, a helicopter descends through the clear, blue sky, and John is given to a white man in a jumpsuit, his face obscured by his helmet. The helicopter ascends into the sky, and its gunner opens fire on the reservation, causing Indians to dive for cover. The helicopter then flies to a faraway city, and John is given to a rich, white couple, Olivia and Daniel Smith.

Olivia and Daniel Smith are unable to conceive and decided to adopt a baby, only to be informed that waiting for a white child could take years.