The Declaration

Sheila shook her head defiantly. ‘I’m Legal, not a Surplus. I should have things like this, Anna. And I like them. I don’t want to put them back.’
    Anna shook her head in disbelief. ‘Sheila,’ she said firmly. ‘Put them back right now.’
    ‘What, so you’re the only one allowed secrets now?’
    Anna stared at Sheila uncertainly. ‘What do you mean?’ she demanded. ‘What are you talking about?’
    Sheila smiled. ‘I woke up last night, Anna, and you weren’t there. Where were you?’
    Anna felt the blood drain from her face. ‘You must have imagined it,’ she said firmly. ‘You must have been dreaming.’
    Sheila shrugged. ‘Maybe you’re dreaming now, Anna. Maybe I don’t have anything in my pocket.’
    Anna stared at her, but before she could say anything Miss Humphries arrived at their counter and carefully looked through their work. Anna opened her mouth to tell her of Sheila’s transgression, but found herself unable to speak. Instead, she just stared at Sheila, beads of sweat beginning to appear on her forehead.
    ‘Good, good. Well done, you two. You can go now.’
    Anna looked at her uncertainly. ‘We . . . we can go?’ she asked hesitantly.
    Miss Humphries frowned. ‘Yes, Anna, you can go.’
    Sheila was tugging at her sleeve, but still Anna felt rooted to the spot, convinced that if she moved, Mother Nature herself would smite her down.
    ‘Come on, Anna,’ Sheila said, smiling thinly. ‘We’re going to be late for supper.’
    ‘Yes, I suppose we will,’ Anna said vaguely, shooting one last look at Miss Humphries to check that this wasn’t a bluff, that she wasn’t going to start laughing at them for thinking they’d got away with their crime, that she wasn’t going to grab a stick and start beating them on the hands for being dirty little thieves like Mrs Pincent had done years ago when Anna had helped herself to an apple she’d found in the kitchen when she was on cleaning duty.
    But it wasn’t a bluff. Miss Humphries was now checking the next pair’s work, and no one was even looking at them as they left the room.
    As they made their way to Central Feeding for supper, Sheila didn’t even appear nervous or concerned about her heinous crime, although Anna felt nervous enough for both of them. As she furtively stuffed a roll and hunk of cheese into her pocket for Peter, she wondered whether she was truly slipping deeper and deeper into hell itself. She wondered if Mrs Pincent had been right all along about Surpluses – that they were inherently bad, genetically programmed to leech off the world and do damage. And then, suddenly, a Middle Surplus appeared at her side.
    ‘House Matron wants to see you in her office at 8 p.m.,’ he said breathlessly.
    Anna looked at him sharply, her heart thudding heavily in her chest. ‘Did she say why?’
    The Surplus shrugged and shook his head. It wasn’t surprising; after all, Surpluses didn’t need reasons, just directions. Anyway, Anna already knew why. Mrs Pincent knew. Mrs Pincent knew everything.
    At 8 p.m. on the dot, Anna knocked on Mrs Pincent’s door and, when she’d heard the instruction, opened it. Breathing deeply to quieten the butterflies in her stomach and to try and hide the guilt that she had carried with her all day, she walked in and made her way to Mrs Pincent’s large desk, where she stood silently, waiting for Mrs Pincent to speak.
    The room represented many things to Anna – a confessional, a torture chamber, even a prison – but it was a room she knew, a room that felt familiar and even, in an odd way, reassuring. Mrs Pincent was always quick to punish, but afterwards she would always explain why. As Anna lay shaking on the floor or clutching a hand to her face, Mrs Pincent would smile and say that she hoped the punishment had brought Anna closer to being a good Surplus, had helped her to understand who she was. And Anna would nod, and would think very hard about whatever it was she’d done wrong to make sure it didn’t happen again.
    ‘Anna,’ Mrs Pincent said eventually, looking up at her with the piercing eyes that Anna had known and feared most of her life. ‘Tell me about Peter.’
    Anna looked up in alarm and immediately lowered her eyes again in deference. In her pocket, the bread and cheese she’d sneaked out of Central Feeding seemed to burn her leg.
    ‘About Peter?’ she asked hesitantly. She swallowed nervously, trying to prepare words in her head, to work out how to explain