Your Silence Has Been Reassigned

How it begins

Ruth's speech contained three words she hated.

Synergy. Stakeholders. Opportunity.

Clara read them in the transcript, then looked across the courtyard at Ruth hanging laundry with the expression of a woman who had never welcomed an opportunity involving stakeholders.

She called through the window.

"Did you speak at the council meeting?"

Ruth pinned a sock.

"No."

"Your name's on the record."

"Then somebody's spelling has improved."

Clara checked the audio.

A smooth voice thanked the council for representing the interests of older residents.

It was not Ruth's voice.

The attribution field said DELEGATED EXPRESSION.

Below that, in small print, was a transfer reference.

Clara had edited hundreds of these.

She had never opened the reference.

Now she did.

A consent form appeared.

Ruth's signature sat at the bottom of an application for a heating repair.

Between maintenance access and data processing, a paragraph assigned unused civic speaking time to an approved representative.

Clara printed the page.

Downstairs, Ruth read it at the kitchen table.

"I wanted a radiator."

"I know."

"I didn't want a representative."

"I know."

Ruth reached for a pen.

Clara expected her to cross out the paragraph.

Instead, she wrote down the names of four neighbors.

"They had the same repair."

Outside, the courtyard speaker announced an upcoming consultation.

Every resident, it said, would have a voice.

Clara looked at the transcript waiting on her tablet.

The next speech had been assigned to a man who had not left his flat in six months.

Its first sentence praised the city's efficient use of participation.

Ruth pushed the list toward her.

"Before you fix my words," she said, "find out who bought them."

Clara closed the transcript without approving it.

Across the table, Ruth uncapped her pen. The list of neighbors had room for several more names.

For the first time, the empty space in an official record looked like something someone might own.