Crossing Into California

Guard towers rose from the interstate like broken teeth. The boy pressed his face to glass and counted the uniformed figures moving between idling cars.

Papers.

The fake vaccination cards lay in the manila envelope. Three thousand cash in Reno. His mother had wept leaving Las Vegas, their foreclosed house keys heavy in her palm. No choice.

Alliance Health Compact, the guard said. The scanner beeped green twice.

Welcome to the Pacific Health Zone.

They drove through. Nevada stretched behind them like another country. Which it was.

The landscape rolled past unchanged. Orange groves. Mountains blue with distance. But the billboards were different now. Wellness is citizenship in bold sans serif. Vaccination schedules. QR codes linking to Alliance portals.

Remember Disneyland, his mother said. We used to just drive to.

His father’s knuckles were white on the wheel. That was before the compact.

The boy closed his eyes. Tried to remember the Fourth of July when all states celebrated together. The memory felt thin as paper. Like something he’d only read about.