“Death on the Border” by Tonya Monteer

It was a Friday night when it all began. I was sitting in my living room enjoying a tall Bud Light and listening to music playing on my laptop. I’d only been in IB—Imperial Beach for the nonnatives—for three weeks, but Cali was a taste of freedom I never wanted to let go of. I had moved into a house only fifty feet from the beach and found a job in Coronado that people would envy me for. It felt too damn good to be true. Turns out it was . . .