"And doesn't that make you angry that the only reason you're here was to help someone else?"

"Not at all," she says a little too quickly. She purses her lips and leans back in her chair, squirming a bit. The chair feels a little too hard beneath her. "All right, so maybe I do feel angry once in a while, but I understand why they did it. If I were them, I would have done the same thing."

"Agreed," he says. "But once your purpose was served, shouldn't your life be your own?"

"Miracles are the property of G.o.d," she answers.

"No," he says, "miracles are gifts from G.o.d. To call them his property insults the spirit in which they are given."

She opens her mouth to reply but finds she has no response, because he's right. d.a.m.n him for being right-nothing about him should be right!

"We'll talk again when you're over yourself," he says, and signals a waiting guard to take her away.

The next day a cla.s.s is added into her schedule, to keep her from having too idle a mind. It's called Creative Projection. It takes place in a cla.s.sroom that was once some kind of parlor, with faded, moth-eaten portraits on peeling walls. Miracolina wonders if the stodgy faces in the paintings look down on the lessons here with approval, disapproval, or absolute indifference.

"I want you to write a story," says the teacher, a man with annoying little round gla.s.ses. Gla.s.ses! Objects of antiquity no longer needed by anyone, what with laser procedures and affordable eye-replacement surgery. There is a certain arrogance to their quaintness. As if people who choose to wear gla.s.ses feel they are somehow superior.

"I want you to write the story of you-your biography. Not the life you've lived but the life you're going to live. This is the biography you might write forty, fifty years from now." The teacher wanders the room, gesticulating into the air, probably imagining himself to be Plato or someone equally lofty. "Project yourselves forward. Tell me who you think you'll be. I know that'll be hard for all of you. You've never dared think of the future-but now you can. I want you to enjoy this. Be as wild as you want. Have fun with it!"

Then he sits down and leans back in his chair with his hands behind his head, very satisfied with himself.

Miracolina taps her pen impatiently on the page while the other kids write. He wants her dream future? Fine. She'll give these people something honest, even if it isn't what they want to hear.

It is years from now, she writes, and my hands belong to a mother who lost her hands in a fire. She has four children. She comforts them, bathes them, brushes their hair, and changes their diapers with those hands. She treasures my hands because she knows how precious they are. She gets manicures weekly for me, even though she doesn't know who I was.

My legs belong to a girl who was in a plane crash. She had been a track star, but found that my legs simply weren't built for that. For a while she mourned the loss of her Olympic dream, but then realized that my legs could dance. She learned to tango, and one day she met a prince while dancing in Monaco, and she danced her way into his heart. They married, and now the royal couple have a grand ball every year. The highlight of the ball is her stunning tango with her prince.

With every word she writes, Miracolina is filled with deeper fury at all the possibilities stolen from her.

My heart went to a scientist on the verge of discovering a way to harness starlight and solve the world's energy needs. He was so close-but then suffered a major heart attack. Thanks to me, though, he survived and completed his life's work, making the world a better place for all of us. He even won the n.o.bel Prize.

Is it so strange to want to give of yourself totally and completely? If that is what's in Miracolina's heart, why should it be denied her?

And as for my mind-my memories, which are full of a loving childhood-they all went to troubled souls who had no such memories of their own. But now with that part of me in them, they are healed of the many hurts in their lives.

Miracolina turns in her paper, and the teacher, perhaps more curious about hers than anyone else's, reads it while the other kids are still writing. She watches his face, full of thoughtful expressions as he reads. She doesn't know why she should care, but she's always cared what her teachers think. Even the ones she didn't like. Then, when he's done, he comes over to her.

"Very interesting, Miracolina, but you've left out one thing."

"What?"

"Your soul," he says. "Who gets your soul?"

"My soul," she tells him with confidence, "goes to G.o.d."

"Hmm . . ." He strokes some graying whisker stubble. "So it goes to G.o.d, even if every part of your body is still alive?"

Miracolina stands firm against his questioning. "I have a right to believe that, if I want to."

"True, true. One problem with that, though. You're Catholic, isn't that right?"

"Yes."

"And you want to be unwound voluntarily."

"So?"

"Well . . . if your soul leaves this world, then voluntary unwinding is no different from a.s.sisted suicide-and in the Catholic religion, suicide is a mortal sin. Which means that by your own beliefs, you'd be going to h.e.l.l."

Then he leaves her to stew with an A-minus on her essay. Minus, she a.s.sumes, due to the eternal d.a.m.nation of her soul.

25 * Lev

Miracolina has no idea how deeply her obstinance affects him. Most kids here are either terrified of Lev, or worship him, or both-but Miracolina is neither intimidated nor reverent; she just hates him, plain and simple. It shouldn't bother him. He's gotten used to being hated-for just as his brother Marcus said, as much as the public mourned for poor, corrupted, little-boy-Lev, they also despise the "monster" that he has become. Well, he was innocent, and he was a monster, but here in the Cavenaugh mansion, none of that matters, because here he is one step short of being a G.o.d. There's a heady, awkward kind of fun to that, but Miracolina is the pin that pops the bubble.

His next encounter with her is the following week, at an Easter dance. t.i.thes are notoriously inept when it comes to male/female interaction. Knowing that dating and all that goes with it won't be a part of their limited future, t.i.thes and their families don't give boy/girl stuff much attention. In fact, it's downplayed, since it would create the kind of wistful longing that a t.i.the should not have.

"These kids are all smart as a whip," Cavenaugh exclaims at the weekly meeting of the t.i.the rescue staff, "but they have the social skills of six-year-olds." It's a fair description of how Lev was on his t.i.thing day as well, and he's not all that sure he's come much further. He's still never been on a date.

There are about twenty staff members, and Lev is the only one under thirty. Each of their faces are filled with concern that's so long-lived, it seems burned into their expressions. He wonders if their pa.s.sion comes from their own experiences with unwinding. Did they, like the Admiral, unwind their own child, and come to regret the decision? Was it personal for them, or did their dedication to the cause come from a general disgust with society's status quo?

"We shall have an Easter dance," Cavenaugh proclaims from the head of the meeting table, "and encourage our ex-t.i.thes to behave like normal teenagers. Within reason, of course." Then he singles Lev out. "Lev, can we count on you, as our goodwill amba.s.sador, to join in the festivities?"

Everyone waits for his answer. It bothers him that they're hanging on his response. "What if I say no?"

Cavenaugh looks at him incredulously. "Why on earth would you? Everyone loves a party!"

"Not really," Lev points out. "The last parties these kids had were their t.i.thing parties. Do you really want to remind them of that?"

The others around the table mumble to one another, weighing what Lev has said, until Cavenaugh dismisses it. "t.i.thing parties are farewells," he says. "Ours will be about new beginnings. I'm counting on you to attend."

Lev sighs. "Sure." There is no challenging of ideas in the Cavenaugh mansion when those ideas come from the man who shares the mansion's name.

It is decided that the ballroom is in too poor shape for an adolescent gala, so they use the dining hall, clearing away the tables and chairs and setting up a DJ station beneath the portrait. With attendance mandatory, the entire population of ex-t.i.thes is there.

As Lev expected, they gather by gender on either side of the room like it's a game of dodgeball, boys against girls. Everyone busies themselves drinking punch and eating c.o.c.ktail weenies while stealing secret glances at the opposing team, as if being caught looking will get them disqualified.

One of the adults does his best impersonation of a DJ, and when encouragement doesn't work, he demands that everyone form a circle on the dance floor to do the Hokey Pokey. However, ten seconds into the dance, he suddenly realizes how ill-advised it is for ex-t.i.thes to be putting various body parts in and out. The DJ becomes fl.u.s.tered and tries to skip right to the "you put your whole self in" part, but the kids are so amused by all this that they continue singing and dancing part by part even after the music has stopped. Ironically, it ends up being the perfect icebreaker, and when the dance music starts up again, there are actually kids dancing.

Lev is not one of them. He's more than satisfied to be an observer, in spite of the fact that he can have his pick of dance partners-although he suspects if he actually did ask one of these girls to dance, she might spontaneously combust on the spot.

But then from across the room he spots Miracolina leaning back against the wall with her arms resolutely crossed, and he decides that this is a challenge worth taking.

The moment she sees him approaching she looks away, a bit panicked, hoping he's headed toward someone else. Then she takes a visible breath when she realizes she is the subject of his attention.

"So," says Lev, as casually as he can, "you wanna dance?"

"Do you believe in the end of the world?" she responds.

Lev shrugs. "I don't know. Why?"

"Because the day after that is when I'll dance with you."

Lev smiles. "You're funny. I didn't think you had a sense of humor."

"I'll tell you what. If you run out of girls who worship the ground you walk on, you can ask me again. The answer will still be no, but I'll give you the courtesy of pretending to think about it."

"I read your essay," he tells her, which gets a nice head-snapping reaction out of her. "You have a dancing princess fantasy-don't deny it."

"My legs have a dancing princess fantasy."

"Well, to dance with your legs, I guess I'll have to put up with the rest of you."

"No, you won't," she says, "because not a single part of me will be here." Then she glances toward Lev's portrait, which is now weirdly lit by colorful strobe lights. "Why don't you dance with your portrait?" Miracolina suggests. "The two of you deserve each other." Then she storms out. The adults at the door try to stop her from going back to her room, but she gets past them anyway.

After she's gone, Lev hears the grumbling around him.

"She's such a loser," someone says.

Lev turns to the kid with a vengeance. It's Timothy, the boy who arrived with her. "I could say the same about you!" he snaps. "All of you!"

Then he shuts himself up before he goes too far. "No, that's not true. But you shouldn't be judging her."

"Yes, Lev," says Timothy obediently. "I won't, Lev. I'm sorry, Lev."

And then a shy girl, apparently less shy than all the other shy girls, steps forward. "I'll dance with you, Lev."

So he goes out onto the dance floor and obliges her and every other girl there with a dance, while his portrait looks down on them with its irritating gaze of holy superiority.

The next day the portrait is vandalized.

Something rude is tagged in spray paint right across the middle of it. Breakfast is delayed until the portrait can be removed. There is a spray paint can missing from the storeroom, but no smoking gun as to who could have done it. Everyone has a theory, though, and most of those theories point to the same person.

"We know it was her!" the other kids try to tell Lev. "Miracolina's the only one here who has something against you!"

"How do you know she's the only one?" Lev asks them. "She's just the only one with guts enough to say it out loud."

Out of respect for Lev's wishes, the other kids don't accuse her to her face, and the adults are diplomatic enough to keep their opinions to themselves.

"Perhaps we need more surveillance cameras," Cavenaugh suggests.

"What we need," Lev tells him, "is more freedom to express opinions. Then things like this wouldn't happen."

Cavenaugh is genuinely insulted. "You talk like this is a harvest camp. Everyone's free to express themselves here."

"Well, I guess not everyone feels that way."

26 * Miracolina

After a day of being cold-shouldered by every living thing in the mansion, there's a knock on her door. She doesn't say anything, because whoever it is will just come in anyway; the bedrooms here have no locks.

The door opens slowly, and Lev steps in. There's a quickening of her heart when she sees him. She tells herself it's anger.

"If you're here to accuse me of vandalizing your portrait, I confess. I can't hide the truth anymore. I did it. Now punish me by taking away all my inspirational movies. Please."

Lev just keeps his arms limply by his side. "Stop it. I know you didn't do it."

"Oh-so you finally caught the naughty t.i.the?"

"Not exactly. I just know it wasn't you."

It's a bit of a relief to be vindicated, although she did take some guilty pleasure in being a prime suspect. "So what do you want?"

"I've been meaning to apologize for the way you were brought here. Tranq'd and blindfolded and all. I mean, what they're doing here is important, but I don't always agree with how they do it."

Miracolina notes that this is the first time she's heard him say "they" instead of "we."

"I've been here for weeks," she says. "Why are you telling me this now?"

Lev reaches up and flips his hair out of his eyes. "I don't know. It was just bothering me."

"Soooo . . . you're going around apologizing to every kid here?"

"No," Lev admits. "Just you."

"Why?"

He begins pacing the small room, raising his voice. "Because you're the only one who's still angry! Why are you so angry?"