Page 160 of Cherish

And the Curator sitting on a swivel chair in the middle of a circular desk in the center of the room. She has a thick journal open in front of her and a large cup of pens next to her right hand. As she leans over and starts to write in the journal, one of all of the thousands of TVs in the room turns from black and white to color.

“Holy shit,” Macy breathes again. And I don’t blame her, given I’m thinking the exact same thing.

I move closer to the colorized TV, try to figure out what it’s showing—and where the footage is from. But before I can, the picture changes to somewhere else and goes back to black and white.

That’s when I notice that all the pictures change pretty much all the time. They flicker onto something happening somewhere, play that footage for a couple of seconds, then move onto something else happening somewhere else. This happens on every single TV in the room over and over and over again.

Another TV turns to color for about three seconds, and I whirl toward it—just in time to watch it fade back to black and white. At the same time, the Curator spins in her chair—wait, no! her entiredeskswivels with her on some sort of circular platform—and starts watching a different wall. About two seconds later, she starts to scribble in her journal, and one of the TVs on this wall changes to color as she does.

It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen.

Obviously, the color flares are related to whatever she deems important enough to record in her book. If the Curator decides it matters, the moment bursts into color before fading back to black and white the moment she’s done.

But how does it work? And is three seconds really enough time to figure out what’s going on in any of these selected situations?

It must be, because another TV is changing to color right in front of me. Then another. And another. And another as the Curator continues to record in her book.

It’s impressive how much she sees and manages to write down. But at the same time, I can’t help wondering what else is getting missed. Because surely something important is happening at more than one spot in the world at the same time.

How does she watch both? Or does she have to choose what she thinks is most important? And what if it takes longer than three seconds to figure out what’s happening in any given situation? Does something else get missed?

The whole situation seems totally bizarre to me. Then again, a crystal ball or scrying mirror would be equally bizarre, and that didn’t freak me out. Why does this?

“So what’s your idea?” the Curator asks after a couple of minutes.

“My idea?” I repeat, caught up in watching a little boy fall off his bike some place next to the Pacific Ocean.

He cries, and then the feed changes, replaced by what looks like two men on a fancy date. One of them pulls a ring box out of his pocket, but before I can see if the other man says yes, the feed changes again. This time to a classroom full of kids learning what I think is Pre-Algebra.

“You’re blocking my view, Grace,” the Curator says all of a sudden, and I realize that with each moment I’ve watched, I’ve crept closer to the display of televisions, until I’m standing right in front of several of them.

“Sorry!” I tell her, walking closer to where she’s standing. “I just got…”

“Interested,” she fills in for me as she starts writing something else down in her giant book. “Believe me, I understand. Fascinating things happen all over the world, every day.”

“But how do you deal with not knowing how something ends?” I guess. “Especially if you think it’s an important historical moment?”

“By assuming it ends badly,” Macy interjects in a sly tone. “Obviously.”

“Most things do,” the Curator agrees. “But I can stay on situations longer if I want to. But right now, little moments are all that’s happening—”

She breaks off as a TV to the left of me flares into color—and stays that way for nearly a minute as the Curator watches it and records what’s happening at the same time. It’s a political rally of some sort in a country that speaks Spanish, judging by the content of the signs people are holding up.

“Can you do me a favor?” the Curator asks as she continues to scribble in her book.

“Of course. What do you need?”

“In there”—she nods toward the only wall space in the room that isn’t covered with TVs because it’s actually a narrow door—“is a shelf full of blank journals. It’s on the bookshelf just to the right of the door. Can you grab me one, please?”

“Sure.”

I cross to the doorway and pull it open. A light comes on inside the room as soon as I do, and I can’t help gasping at what I see. Because this is another huge room—maybe even bigger than the one with the TVs—and every available space is covered with these books.

Every. Available. Space.

Not just the bookshelves lining the walls—of which there are dozens—but every inch of floor space as well. There are piles and piles and piles of filled recording journals from floor to ceiling throughout the room, taking up so much space that the only spot to stand in the entire room is in front of the bookshelf to the right of the door, where the Curator directed me to find the empty journals.

I grab one, blinking when another magically appears to replace it, and hustle back out of the crowded, claustrophobia-inducing room as fast as I possibly can. “Is this what you’re looking for?” I ask, laying it on the desk next to where the Curator is still sitting and writing.

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