THE LINES BETWEEN US An Unseen American Part II (ENG)

THE LINES BETWEEN US
An Unseen American - Part II
by Twilight Master
the Novel: https://kakuyomu.jp/works/11054822662724564858

America has always loved a good line.
Blue and red.
Us and them.
American and immigrant.
Rich and poor.
The university on the hill
and the town beyond the river.
Everyone knows which side they're supposed to be on.
Nobody asks who drew the line.
A shirt says DEMOCRACY.
The supply chain says something else.
A billboard promises the AMERICAN DREAM.
The night shift quietly sends the bill.
Social media turns anger into data.
Markets turn fear into prices.
Corporations turn time into cost.
And somewhere beneath all of it,
people keep trying to make it home.
Mateo sees the contradiction.
He is the son of immigrants.
A janitor at an elite university.
A young man who never got the chance to attend college-
yet somehow sees connections
between physics, politics, algorithms, supply chains and Wall Street.
Then there is Emily.
American-born.
Chinese-American.
Asked, again and again:
"Which side are you on?"
As if a human being could be reduced
to a flag.
As if identity were a checkbox.
As if people came with clean borders.
And when Mateo steps inside Wall Street,
he discovers something even stranger:
Everyone can be doing their job correctly-
and the machine can still produce
the wrong result.
So he writes:
FACT.
ASSUMPTION.
UNKNOWN.
Then adds one more word.
PERSON.
Because numbers don't carry the whole story.
Neither do borders.
Neither do flags.
Neither do markets.
Neither does a political label.
"The Man They Never See"
was about the person America failed to notice.
"THE LINES BETWEEN US"
is about the invisible borders
America keeps drawing between its people.
This isn't a song asking you
to pick a side.
It's a song asking you
to look across the line.
Because there is still someone standing there.
Someone working.
Someone waiting.
Someone trying to belong.
Someone you were never supposed to see.

THE LINES BETWEEN US
An Unseen American - Part II
The line is invisible.
The people aren't.