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Patrick’s own good that he went there, Mrs Pincent said. If he didn’t learn how to be a Surplus, he’d never find employment, and then what would he do?
    Yesterday, Peter was put in Solitary because he told Mr Sargent that it was old people who were Surpluses, not us. None of us could believe it when he said that and I’ve never seen Mr Sargent so angry. He didn’t even go red – he went white instead and the vein on his forehead started throbbing. I think he was going to beat him, but then he decided to call Mrs Pincent instead and Peter was taken away to Solitary. The worst thing of all was that he winked at me as they took him out. Like it was really cool to be put in Solitary.
    He came out this evening, but I’m not sure it taught him anything, because he still grinned at me stupidly across Central Feeding, like we were friends or something. Peter isn’t my friend. I wish Mrs Pincent would send him away so things can get back to normal around here. Or even better I wish Mrs Sharpe would decide that she wants me as her permanent housekeeper, to go around the world with her and keep her house spotless and clean. I wish she’d take me a long way from here.
    Anna carefully closed her journal and secreted it back on to the ledge behind the bath. Already it felt like a close friend, a confidante. When she’d been little, she and the other Surpluses in her dormitory used to talk to each other, sometimes late into the night, sharing secrets and thoughts. But then Mrs Pincent had appointed her Dormitory Monitor, which meant that she had to report any secrets or wrongdoings of anyone in the dorm. It hadn’t taken long for her former friends to stop taking her into their confidence and ever since then she’d become used to walking into a room and seeing groups of people breaking up, whispered conversations halting. She didn’t care, she told herself proudly; it was more important to be a good Surplus. Surpluses weren’t supposed to spend time whispering to each other, anyway. They were supposed to take orders, to listen to Legals. Anna was determined to be the best Surplus ever. She’d be so good, it would almost make up for her existing in the first place. But it was still quite lonely having no one to talk to, particularly now, with Surplus Peter making her feel agitated and confused. He’d been at Grange Hall for three weeks, and every time she glimpsed him in the corridor, Anna felt herself go red, found herself looking away, only to turn to look at him once he’d passed. He unsettled her, kept trying to talk to her when all she wanted him to do was leave her alone. Anna felt like he was watching her constantly with that slightly mocking smile on his face, making her self-conscious, and confused, and she was determined not to let him know that she’d noticed.
    After getting out of the bathtub and drying herself quickly, Anna shot one last look at the bath to make sure that her journal was completely hidden, and made her way back to her dormitory, running through the next day’s schedule in her head as she went. Managing Supplies Efficiently was at 8.30 a.m., followed by Decorum at 9.30 a.m., and then they were having a polishing demonstration with some real silver. Mrs Sharpe had had a great deal of silver in her house – cutlery, candlesticks, frames and more – so Anna was confident that she would impress everyone with her ability to create a real shine. ‘It’s a job you can’t rush,’ Mrs Sharpe had told her. ‘And nor should you want to. Polishing silver is therapeutic.’ Anna agreed. Silver was beautiful when it gleamed and she hoped that one day she would work in a house with as much silver as Mrs Sharpe had.
    Everyone was asleep by the time Anna got to her dormitory. Quietly, she slipped off her robe and got under the thin sheet and blankets, tucking the edges under herself to keep the warmth in and allowing herself to fall quickly into an exhausted sleep.
    She was so tired that when, twenty