The Museum of Extremely Recent History
A museum curator is asked to exhibit yesterday before anyone has agreed what happened. Her least photogenic visitor arrives with an object the sponsors need the public to forget.
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How it begins
The museum's first exhibit was yesterday's coffee.
Lena had argued for keeping the cup. The sponsor wanted the coffee too.
“It expresses immediacy,” he said.
“It expresses mold by Thursday.”
The Museum of Extremely Recent History had opened six weeks earlier in a converted bank. Its mission was to preserve the present before anyone else could monetize the past. Lena had accepted the curator's post because the salary arrived on time.
Today she was preparing an exhibition about yesterday's community celebration.
The approved title was A CITY COMES TOGETHER.
At nine, Frank arrived carrying a broken electric kettle.
“Acquisition?” Lena asked.
“Evidence.”
He placed it on the reception desk. A label from the museum's own staff kitchen hung from its handle.
“We already own that.”
“Then you'll save on paperwork.”
Behind him, the sponsor's assistant wheeled in a display case containing the mayor's ceremonial hard hat. It had not been worn near anything that could fall.
Frank pointed to the kettle's blackened plug.
“Power went at ten past two. All the volunteers were in the basement. Fire door wouldn't open.”
Lena looked at the approved timeline. At ten past two, according to the sponsor, the community had enjoyed a spontaneous period of quiet reflection.
“Did you report it?”
“To the man with the clipboard.”
“Which one?”
“The one who told us not to spoil the atmosphere.”
The assistant paused beside the display case.
“We're celebrating the event's positive impact.”
Frank nodded.
“Good. Put that next to the door that nearly kept us in.”
Lena turned the kettle over. On its base, beneath the inventory sticker, someone had written DO NOT USE.
The handwriting was hers.
She remembered a maintenance request, three weeks ago, marked low priority.
The exhibition's opening was in four hours.
For the first time, yesterday seemed considerably less finished than the sponsors had promised.
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Outline and characters
Develop this idea
Give the museum's sponsor a concrete reason to prefer one account of yesterday. Frank's object should be ordinary enough to resist an elegant publicity narrative, but its importance needs evidence. Use exhibit labels and acquisition forms sparingly as comic devices. Lena's professional compromise should precede the crisis so that telling the truth requires acknowledging her own earlier decisions, rather than simply confronting foolish outsiders.
- Lena receives yesterday as an exhibition brief.
- Sponsors provide a prewritten public narrative.
- Frank brings an unwanted broken kettle.
- Its history contradicts the centerpiece display.
- Visitors donate incompatible objects and memories.
- A publicity team edits the labels overnight.
- Lena uncovers the event's preventable disruption.
- Staff build an openly disputed exhibit.
- Sponsors threaten to withdraw their support.
- The museum displays how its story was made.
Characters
- Lena Price, 41. Museum curator
- Frank Bell, 67. Cleaner and inconvenient witness
Series possibilities
- Lena curates events whose participants have not finished arguing about what happened.
