Anita: Was there a space at home where you went to read?Luisa: [Pause] No, I didn't have a specific place. Any place that was quiet at the moment. I didn't have a specific place.

Luisa: My favorite genre was fantasy, of course, because at that point, it was an alternate reality where magic and anything was possible. Harry Potter. I grew up with Harry Potter. Grew up with Tolkien, grew up with Eragon, grew up with the series for the Lady Knight, grew up with the Chronicler. Grew up with all these fantasy books. I grew up with them. I still read them over and over and over again because every time you read a book, you find something that you missed and I love that. So yes, reading was my thing [Chuckles]. I love reading.

Around this time is when I started getting my obsession with the Holocaust, with all this tragedy.

Anita: Let's talk about that. We're talking about fourth grade?Luisa: Yes, fourth grade.Anita: Tell me about that. You loved to read, right?Luisa: I loved to read. That was my escape from reality.Anita: Tell me about Scholastic storybooks, and also tell me about where you would go and read.Luisa: In eighth grade?Anita: Yes.Luisa: I'm not sure if you're familiar with this but in grade school, they give you this little magazine that's for Scholastic and they let you buy all these books. So my mom would give me a budget in order for me to buy all the books that I wanted, and when I was bad, her punishment was no more books, which murdered me [Chuckles]. That would kill me. That killed me. During the summer reading programs—I'm not sure if you know, but in the libraries, they give you prizes for reading a certain amount of books.Luisa: I was always the top winner because … they knew me. I knew the librarians by name. They were my friends. I was there. I couldn't find a book, I would order it and within a week, they would have it. “Oh, your book is here.” I think you had a limit of twenty books and that would kill me because it's like [Groans]. But it was okay, too, because I'd go back to the library pretty often. It was a pretty great place. The library was amazing. So yes, Scholastic. I had a huge collection of books. My mom got a huge bookcase for me because I had so many books—so many.

Then I picked up reading pretty fast. I think in fourth grade was the first largest book that I read. It was the Bram Stoker's Dracula, the big one. That was the first biggest book that I read, and then I had an obsession with Roald Dahl. Roald Dahl was my thing. I loved Roald Dahl. The BFG, the Twitches, the Witches, all of it, I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. Matilda, Matilda. Oh, my God. I loved Matilda. Roald Dahl was a huge thing -- as well childrens’ books -- but I was also reading adult books at the same time.

Anita: Miss S. school was a better quality school?Luisa: Yes. That says a lot about the education system [Chuckles]. One of my best friends is a teacher right now. It's awful.

When I moved schools, the new school that I got to was a lot higher. It was in a different area. We moved. My grandparents bought a house someplace else. It was a cheap house, but not in a good neighborhood, so the school that I had to go to was not a good school.

Anita: Were you bullied?Luisa: [Pause] Not until later. I switched schools and then I was bullied at my other school.

Anita: Did the kids tease you? Were they friendly to you? What was it like in Miss S. class?Luisa: In Miss S. class, I remember there were two boys who were nice to me, J___ and— what's his name? Sorry. I still know him. He's still a good friend of mine. O___. They both kind of spoke Spanish, so they kind of helped me out as well, but I wasn't allowed to speak to anyone. The teacher was not having it … She was extremely strict. I think she was the kind of teacher that should not have ever taken up teaching as a job because some people just don't have the vocation. Is that the word in English? They don't have that in them and I don't think she had it, but they helped out a lot. J___ and Osvaldo, thank you wherever you are now. I know O___ is getting married soon, so yes.

Anita: Let's talk about that in one second. If you were lying face down on the magic carpet all day, how did you learn English?Luisa: I was there for half the day, and this is something that I'm going to tell you that my teachers had told me in kindergarten. I could be sitting down underneath the table and playing around, and they would be teaching math and I could learn it. I'm an extremely fast learner—an extremely fast learner. I think I picked it up by just listening to it, and the few classes that I had, I picked it up. It was not that hard and I think at that age it's easier to absorb information, but I think it was mostly that I'm a quick learner.

Luisa: I told my mom about this and I remember vividly having a conversation with her and telling her, "Hey, you know what? This is happening at school," but I think my mom was going through so much stuff that she didn't know how to deal with it or she didn't … there wasn't enough of my mom to go around back then. I know now. I forgive her, but certain things … [Pause] I forgive her a lot for it now because I get it. It was extremely traumatizing. She had a lot of health issues and then this man who was her entire world just dumped her aside and she had to leave her whole life behind and everything she knew, all the comforts and work. She had never worked in her life [Chuckles]. I respect my mother a lot. She started going to design school for designing clothes and it’s pretty great.

So I picked up English extremely fast because I had to [Chuckles]. I had to pick up English very, very, very fast or that was going to keep happening. I didn't want that to keep happening, so I picked it up.

Anita: When did you start going to school, in Chicago or in LA?Luisa: I moved to Chicago and that's where I started going to school. I started going to school at the age of six. Unfortunately, the school that I went to did not have a bilingual program. I was stuck with Miss S. [Chuckles]. I'm never going to forget her … Miss S., lovely woman [Chuckles].Anita: Is that sarcastic?Luisa: Yes, [Chuckles] very sarcastic. Did not speak a lick of Spanish. Not one sentence. I don't think she knew how to pronounce anything, and she was as WASP [White Anglo-Saxon Protestant] as you can get. This woman would get extremely frustrated with me—extremely—and I didn't know what was going on. To me, it was a completely … [Disgusted sound] it was mind-boggling how I could go from—I knew how to read and write in Spanish. I was a pretty smart kid. I knew how to read and write in Spanish at six years old. So I go into first grade and I can't even understand what my teachers are saying, so it was extremely frustrating and this teacher found it extremely frustrating as well, so she would lay me down face down half the day on the magic carpet where she would read stories to everyone because she didn't want to deal with it anymore. I told my mom—Anita: Because she didn't want to deal with what?Luisa: Deal with me anymore. I guess she didn't know where to put me. She didn't know what to do with me, she didn't know how to teach me, so her solution was to put me aside and not have to deal with me, so I had to pretty much be invisible for half the class. Just put my head down and not say a word. So I picked up English extremely fast because I had to [Chuckles]. I had to pick up English very, very, very fast or that was going to keep happening. I didn't want that to keep happening, so I picked it up.

Anita: Was the tumor benign?Luisa: Yes, it was benign. Thank God for that. But she had an encounter with TB and then she was on medication for that. You know what I think it was? I think that all this negativity affected her [Chuckles], or I don't know if you believe this, but the law of attraction. I think that she really did not want to keep going and that affected her quite a bit.

Anita: How soon after getting to California did you move to Chicago?Luisa: Within three to six months. It didn't take that long … immediately kind of. I think one of my uncles took it upon himself to take care of us

Anita: Do you remember what your mood was like at that time?Luisa: Jarring. It was extremely jarring. From one day to another, the move was extremely … it was jarring. One day, you have a family and you're happy, and then the next, you can't even speak the language. You can't communicate, you don't know where you're at. I felt like my whole world was tilted to the side.

Anita: The apartment you moved into—Luisa: The apartment that we moved into in California was a one-bedroom apartment. It was a big complex and I remember it. There was a pool in the middle and there were a lot of families like us that shared a one-bedroom apartment. And there were eight to twelve people in this one space, and we were trying to find something bigger, but it was impossible.

Anita: How old were you?Luisa: When I left, I was six years old.

I had a great childhood. I went to private school.

Anita: Last time we spoke, you talked about how difficult it was to—Luisa: To leave my dad?Anita: ... to leave things behind.Luisa: Of course. I grew up fairly wealthy in Mexico. I had a big, big house. I had two German Shepherds that ran around everywhere. I had a playroom, my own room. I had a great childhood. I went to private school. It was amazing, so to go from that ... My dad and I were inseparable. I have extremely fond memories as a child, and I remember I didn't want to go to my own room. I would sleep on top of my father. That was my place. They had to buy a king-sized bed because I would not leave my father's side. I would lay and sleep on my dad's chest always. Always, always, always, always, always, so it was extremely difficult to leave my dad behind the most. My dad was my world back then. But my dad, my friends, school—school was great, I loved school [Chuckles]—I had to leave it all behind.

Anita: Let me ask you a few questions going backwards. Was there any domestic abuse in your family?Luisa: With my parents? My mother, yes. She doesn't like to talk about it. The older I get, the more she opens up, but it's not something that she likes to talk about. It was never in front of us, it was behind closed doors. I thank my father. He's a piece of shit, but I thank him for at least having the thought of not wanting to traumatize us. So yes, it was behind closed doors, but the more I get out of my mom, it was a lot of emotional abuse as well, a lot. I think there was some physical abuse. My mom's never touched upon it, but that's what happened. And then we got to Chicago.

I didn't know what was happening, of course. We arrived to ____ California. We arrived at an apartment that we were sharing with about eight other people—my grandparents, my sisters and I, my mother, my uncles, then eventually my uncle's wife. One of my uncles got the opportunity to move to Chicago—a job opportunity—so he moved. I think after my parents divorced, all of my uncles saw us as their kids, because two of the ones that really took care of us never really had kids, so they loved us and they brought us in.Luisa: We moved to Chicago with my grandparents because my grandparents were my second parents by this point. My mother is the eldest—she took care of seven of my grandparents’ children, so my grandmother really, really loves my mother. We moved to Chicago to an apartment on Green Bay on the East Side, and that's how it went.

My mother, she had to cross the bad way. She went through the desert, she went through the river. My sisters and I, we went through the bridge, like the regular crossing, but we used other people's papers. My middle sister, they cut her hair off completely, and I had to call her Jose.Luisa: She had short, short hair. My sister's hair was up to her waist, and my mom just shaved it off and her name was Jose now, and it was a game. I didn't know what was happening, of course.

My grandmother's Texan at heart and never learned English, but very, very Texan [Laughs].

Anita: Let’s begin by you telling me a little bit about migrating to the United States.Luisa: Migrating to the United States: okay. My parents had an extremely bad divorce - very, very, very bad divorce. My dad's family is on the wealthier side and a little bit on the powerful side, and my mom has no money nor connections, and she's poor. When they were divorcing, by the end of their marriage—I think it was the most awful marriage that I've seen—he was threatening her with taking us away and completely … you know she would never see us ever, so like a thief in the night, she grabbed my two sisters and I and she moved us to the States.

Luisa: I wanted to get into a good university. I was like, "Okay, high school's fine. Okay, whatever. We're going to make do. I'm going to be the best student wherever I am." So I started swimming, track, volleyball, softball, everything, extracurriculars like crazy, book club. Whatever it was, I needed it. The environmental club, everything. I started doing a bunch of community work—I always liked community work anyway. Shelters, dog shelters, everything. I did everything. My entire day schedule was full, full, full, full, full, full, full. Every single day was like let's go, go, go, go, go because I'm going to get to the best university I can.Luisa: I wanted Northwestern. I had my eye set on Northwestern. I don't know what it was about Northwestern that called to me, but I wanted Northwestern. That's what I wanted, and it wasn't unachievable. One of my friends got into Brown University and she had worse grades than I did, so I was like, "Northwestern's going to be easy. I got this." I wanted to be an oncologist—yes, an oncologist, cancer. I don't know why [Chuckles]. I don't know. Human tragedy, I wanted to save people. That's been my thing. I want to save people. I want to make people better. So [Pause] I killed myself in school. 4.6 GPA. I had all these extracurriculars.

Mike: I could cross the border right now if I wanted to, but I feel like, "What's the point if I'm going to be in the same status, or the same place, not having a future?" and like, "What am I going to get my kids if I just decided to go there and do it illegally and start all over if not try to do something here?"