What do we do with our time?
Quintus Flaccus¹ was known, among the few who knew him, as the Selector. It wasn’t an ironic nickname but an exact description. When he wasn’t working or sleeping, he spent days and nights roaming streaming platforms, making lists: films to watch in winter, films for rainy days, for when he was alone, for when he had company. He grouped them by directors, countries, lead actors, screenwriters, cinematography, supporting characters.
No detail escaped him—except the essential one: watching. He lacked time.
One day he received a notification from one of the subscription services—he couldn’t say which, since he subscribed to all of them, including a few pirated ones. The message was fatal:
SUBJECT: Termination of Access.
Protocol: 70-QF-0144.
An internal proceeding has been opened against you and a peremptory cancellation of all your subscriptions has been decided. In consideration of your record and present condition, seven months of access are granted. Not one day more.
With no one to appeal to, he decided: during those terminal seven months he would watch the best films, the ones topping his endless lists. He created a new folder—the last one—titled In the Eyes of Eternity. But the selection didn’t stop. Inside the folder he created subfolders; inside those, others still, an endless refining: Top 12 for winter, 7 rainy-day essentials, 3 never to watch accompanied.
Sometimes he hovered the cursor over play. He thought: restored version or director’s cut? 1.44:1 or 2.20:1? the official subtitles or the festival ones? He tweaked brightness and contrast “neither too little nor too much,” as if an invisible ruler could save him.²
When sleep arrived, there was no time left to watch—there was always one worthier film, one last re-organization, one doubt to resolve.
The living-room wallpaper showed a white snow-covered mountain; from the monitor’s glass, a fine dust returned the shadow of his face. At night a constant hum seemed to fill the room, like the fan of an old projector—or was it his own pulse?³
With twelve days to go, he aligned everything one last time. On the shelf, a four-year-old wine rested “for the right occasion.” He smelled it; he did not open it. The moment had not yet come.⁴
The seven months went by like all the previous ones: in infinite choices.
On the last morning, Quintus Flaccus opened the ultimate folder. There was nothing. Only a blank screen, reflecting his tired face. For an instant, he thought he heard the start of a projection—it sounded like an intermittent, rhythmic knocking—suddenly the murmur grew louder, but then it began to fade, until it dissolved into silence.
Porto Velho, September 2025.
M. – Liber Sum
Notes
- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65 BC – 8 BC), known as Horace, was one of the greatest poets of ancient Rome, a leading figure of the Golden Age of Latin literature alongside Virgil and Ovid. He is famous above all for the line Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero (Odes I, 11): “Seize the day, put as little trust as possible in tomorrow.” The character’s name is an onomastic parody of the great poet, inverting the carpe diem. Liber Sum
- Aurea mediocritas (“the golden mean,” the balanced life). Auream quisquis mediocritatem diligit, tutus caret obsoleti sordibus tecti, caret invidenda sobrius aula (Odes II, 10): “Whoever loves the golden mean lives safely: free from the squalor of a crumbling hut, free from the envy drawn by a sumptuous palace.” Liber Sum
- The brevity of life. Pulvis et umbra sumus (Odes IV, 7): “We are dust and shadow.” Liber Sum
- To Soracte (Odes I, 9) — Wine, winter, and youth: “See how Soracte, the mountain, rises white with snow; how the forests can no longer bear the weight, and the rivers have stopped running under the ice. Dissolve the cold with logs that blaze kindly in the hearth, and bring from the jar the four-year wine.” Liber Sum
To read another short story by the author that reflects on the relativity of time, visit The Meeting at the River and the Relativity of Time:
Also read the author’s short stories:
On the poet Horace and time, see also:
Further reading: Horace — Roman poet. Encyclopaedia Britannica:
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