I struggle to tell the lady our fake names - the entire story of our lives that I made up to distract myself as we walked on the carretera. It's a dream story about girls like us, if only we'd been lucky enough to be born in the United States. Some things are the same. That Gabi is fascinated with cars and loves to swim. That I love to read and won a prize at school for a short story. And then there are the lies that are too good not to tell. That we go to an American school. That our parents are legal immigrants with good jobs who go to school meetings and coach softball teams. I'm not even sure what a softball team is - I know it's like baseball, but what's different about it? Is the ball really just softer?

These are the questions I used to pester Pablo about all the time. He'd been to America once, on a visit with Tía Rosa when he was seven. I asked him every question I could think of, to store up the answer, ready for when I would go to America, so I would be prepared for anything.

But now, in the warm, expensive car of a stranger driving us all the way to New Jersey, I can only repeat the word softball over and over in my head until the road becomes a dark fuzzy line, and I fall asleep.