The Distance Between Us

“What's the border, Papi?'

'Hills,' Her father whispered. 'Hills and bushes, that's all it is. But we must walk across it.'

'Papi, if it's just land, why can't we take the bus all the way there. Why must we walk across?'

'Because we don't have papers, Carmen. And even though it is just land, it represents a wall. We must go like thieves.'

Juana wished she could ask what the father meant by that. Hills and bushes, that's what the border was. How strange.”