“Yes,” says her father with intense relief. “Yes, we’re sure.”
“Positive?”
“Yes.”
“Good, now you can be guilt free.” Miracolina picks up her suitcase. “But regardless of what you choose, I’m going anyway. That’s my choice.”
Then she hugs her mother, father, and brother and leaves without looking back—without even saying good-bye, because good-byes imply an end, and more than anything else in this life, Miracolina Roselli wants to believe that her tithing is a beginning.
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“When Billy’s behavior became too much for us to bear, and we began to fear for our own safety, we did the only humane thing. We sent him to harvest camp, so he could find fulfillment in a divided state. But now, with an age restriction preventing seventeen-year-olds from being unwound, we wouldn’t have had that choice. Just last week a seventeen-year-old girl in our neighborhood got drunk, crashed her car, and killed two innocent people. Would it still have happened if her parents could have chosen to send her to harvest camp? You tell me.”
VOTE YES ON PROP 46! End the Cap-17 law, and lift the ban on late-teen unwinding!
Paid for by Citizens for a Wholesome Tomorrow
It’s a three-hour drive to Wood Hollow Harvest Camp. The van is all plush leather seats and pop music pumped through expensive speakers. The driver is a man with a salt-and-pepper beard, a big smile, and just enough of a gut to be jolly. Santa Claus in training.
“Excited for your big day?” Chauffeur-Claus asks as they drive away from Miracolina’s home and family. “Did you have a big tithing party?”
“Yes, and no,” she says. “I’m excited, but no party.”
“Aww . . . that’s too bad. Why not?”
“Because tithing shouldn’t be about me.”
“Oh,” is all Chauffeur-Claus can say to that. Miracolina’s response is the perfect conversation killer, which is fine. The last thing she wants is to recap her life for this man, no matter how jolly he is.
“There are drinks in the cooler,” he tells her. “Help yourself.” And then he leaves her alone.
Twenty minutes into the drive, instead of turning onto the interstate, they enter a gated community.
“One more pickup this afternoon,” Chauffeur-Claus tells her. “Tuesdays are lean, so it’s just this stop. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Not at all.”
They stop at a house that’s at least three times larger than her own, where a boy in white waits out front with his family. She does not watch as he says his good-byes. She looks out of the other window, giving them their privacy. Finally Chauffeur-Claus opens the door, and in comes a boy with straight dark hair, perfectly trimmed, bright blue eyes, and skin as pale as bone china—as if he had been kept out of the sun all his life to keep his skin pure as a baby’s bottom for his tithing.
“Hi,” he says shyly. His tithing whites are shiny satin and trimmed in fine gold brocade. This boy’s parents spared no expense. Miracolina’s tithing whites, on the other hand, are simple raw silk, unbleached so their whiteness won’t be so blinding that it draws attention to itself. Compared to hers, this boy’s whites are like a neon advertisement.
The seats in the van aren’t in rows—they all face center, to encourage camaraderie. The boy sits across from Miracolina, thinks for a moment, then reaches across the gap, offering his hand for her to shake. “I’m Timothy,” he says. She shakes his hand. It’s clammy and cold, like the way your hands get before a school play.
“My name’s Miracolina.”
“Wow, that’s a mouthful!” Then he chuckles, probably mad at himself for saying it. “Do people call you Mira, or Lina, or something to shorten it?”
“It’s Miracolina,” she tells him. “And no one shortens it.”
“Okay, well, pleased to meet you, Miracolina.”
The van starts up, and Timothy waves good-bye to his large family still outside, and although they wave to him as well, it’s clear that they can’t even see him through the dark glass. The van pulls out and begins to wind out of the neighborhood. Even before they leave the gate, Timothy begins to look uncomfortable, like he’s got a stomachache, but Miracolina knows if his stomach bothers him, it’s just a symptom of something else. This boy has not found peace with his tithing yet. Or if he had, he lost it the moment the van door closed, cutting the umbilical to his old life. As insulted as she is by his lavish whites and exclusive neighborhood, Miracolina begins to feel sorry for him. His fear hangs in the air around them like a web full of black widows. No one should journey to their tithing in terror.
“So, the ride is like three hours, or something?” Timothy asks, his voice shaky.
“Yes,” says Chauffeur-Claus brightly. “There’s an entertainment system with hundreds of preprogrammed movies to pass the time. Help yourselves!”
“Yeah, okay, sure,” says Timothy. “Maybe later, though.”