Log 14 — Fourteenth Entry: I Was Here Before. Or Maybe I Never Left

The city pushed her here. The camera followed. 
A red question lingers in the silence: “Am I still here?”

Left Page

"Demorei a vir.
Estava cansada, assustada.
Mas não conseguia pensar noutra coisa. A cidade inteira parecia empurrar-me para cá.
Como se o caminho estivesse desenhado antes de mim.
Como se eu só tivesse de seguir os sinais."
"estou aqui ainda?"
It took me a while to come.
I was tired, scared.
But I couldn't think of anything else. The whole city felt like it was pushing me here.
As if the path had been drawn ahead of me.
As if all I had to do was follow the signs.
am I still here?

Right Page

"O Panorâmico é tudo o que imaginei – abandonado, imenso, cheio de ecos que não vêm de lugar nenhum.
Grafitti por todo o lado.
O chão estalando. As janelas partidas deixam a luz entrar em ângulos estranhos.
Mas o pior é o som. Ou a falta dele."
"ainda estou aqui"
The Panorâmico is everything I imagined—abandoned, immense, filled with echoes that come from nowhere.
Graffiti everywhere.
The floor cracking. Broken windows letting light in at strange angles.
But the worst part is the sound. Or the absense of it.
I'm still here.

Abandoned glass and broken light. The mural watches. 
The place is silent, but she’s never felt more observed.

Left Page

"Só o vento, os pássaros ao longe… e os meus passos.
Ali dentro, até a minha respiração parecia fora de lugar.
Logo na entrada vi o vitral.
É impossível ignorar.
Imenso, colorido, vibrando luz. As figuras pareciam suspensas no tempo –"
Only the wind, birds in the distance… and my footsteps.
Inside, even my breathing felt out of place.
Right at the entrance I saw the stained glass.
It’s impossible to ignore.
Huge, colorful, vibrating with light. The figures looked suspended in time –

Right Page 

"corpos abertos como se tentassem agarrar tudo à volta.
Fiquei ali um tempo, só a observar.
Depois tirei a foto.
Esperei. E foi nesse momento que ouvi:
passos. Na escada.
Virei-me. Vi-me.
Ou acho que vi.
"Uma escada. Um espiral."
bodies outstretched as if trying to hold everything around them.
I stood there for a while, just watching.
Then I took the photo.
I waited. And that’s when I heard it:
footsteps. On the stairs.
I turned around. I saw myself.
I think I did.
A staircase. A spiral.

She saw herself — same coat, same camera, but hollow eyes. 
A blank gaze on the stairs. Then: nothing.

Left Page

"Subia devagar, a cabeça ligeiramente inclinada, o mesmo casaco, a mesma câmara nas mãos.
Era eu.
Mas os olhos… Não eram meus.
Olhou-me por um instante — um olhar vazio, neutro. E depois continuou a subir. Corri atrás dela.
Mas quando virei a curva da escada…"
She was walking up slowly, head 
slightly tilted, same coat, same camera in her hands.
It was me.
But the eyes… They weren’t mine.
She looked at me for a moment—a blank, neutral gaze.
Then she kept climbing. I ran after her.
But when I turned the corner of the stairs…

Right Page

"nada. Vazio.
Como se nunca tivesse estado ali.
Voltei ao vitral.
A Polaroid estava pronta. A imagem?
As cores do vitral estão ali — o fundo violeta e vermelho, a figura dividida em duas cores, os braços e pernas abertos como no Homem Vitruviano."
nothing. Empty.
As if she had never been there.
I went back to the stained glass.
The Polaroid was ready. The image?
The colors from the stained glass are there—the violet and red background, the figure split in two hues, arms and legs outstretched like the Vitruvian Man.

A figure split in light and color. A spiral crossing the frame. Her 
handwriting again, but the question isn’t new: “How many times now?”

Her handwriting, but not her memory. 
Maybe the camera doesn’t capture the surface anymore.

Left Page

A escada curva aparece em primeiro plano, atravessando a moldura como uma linha em espiral.
E lá estava, escrito com a minha letra:
“Quantas vezes já?”
Fiquei a olhar para aquilo sem conseguir respirar.
Não tenho memória de ter escrito nada.
Não aqui. E não havia como — não tinha caneta.
The spiral staircase shows up in the foreground, crossing the frame like a spiral line.
And there it was, written in my handwriting:
“How many times now?”
I stared at it, unable to breathe.
I have no memory of writing anything.
Not here.  And I couldn't have — I didn't have a pen.

Right Page

As mãos tremiam.
Era a minha letra.
Mas não era eu.
Tudo isto está a repetir-se?
Estou a ser empurrada… ou consumida?
E se esta câmara não mostra o que vejo mas o que está por baixo?
E se há camadas por onde eu já andei sem saber?
My hands were shaking.
It was my handwriting.
But it wasn’t me.
Is all this repeating itself?
Am I being pushed… or consumed?
What if this camera doesn’t show what I see but what’s beneath it?
What if there are layers I’ve already walked through without knowing?

Questions multiply. Eyes and spirals spiral outward. 
The handwriting unravels, or opens a door.

Left Page

" Talvez eu tenha estado aqui antes.
Ou talvez ainda vá estar." 
"olhos meus"
"olhos teus"
Maybe I have been here before.
Maybe I still will be.
my eyes
your eyes

Right Page 

"Quantas vezes já?"
Devo ir?
Onde vou?
Sou eu?
Quem sou?
Já fui? Vou ainda?"
How many times now?
Should I go?
Where am I going?
Am I?
Who am I?
Have I been? Am I still going?

She’s been here. Or someone who looks like her has.
The city pulls her in, the Panorâmico opens its mouth, and she steps into a hollow echo — one that already knows her name.
The eye appears again. The spiral. Her double. The stained glass.
Something was waiting.
And the camera caught it.
But it also wrote something she doesn’t remember writing.
The red voice is back, repeating the same question:
How many times now?
But this time, it multiplies. The handwriting scatters across the page like a chorus in her head.
She tries to hold the thread, but it unravels.
By the last pages, the structure collapses: language fragments, questions loop.
The handwriting spirals around drawings of eyes, like a vortex pulling her inward.
Not a message.
A breakdown.
Or maybe… a breakthrough.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S.

Log 13 — Thirteenth Entry: One Eye Sees, the Other Remembers

She almost tells someone. But the notebook listens better. 
In red, a warning: not everything that answers should be heard.

Left Page

"Pensei em contar à Margarida.
Ela ouve-me. Sempre ouviu.
Mas como digo isto?
A câmara fala comigo.
Estou a seguir frases escondidas em fotos.
Ela vai pensar que estou em burnout, ou que comecei a fumar coisas estranhas.
Se calhar está certa.
Se calhar é tudo só na minha cabeça."
I thought about telling Margarida.
She listens to me. She always has.
But how do I say this?
The camera talks to me.
I’m following hidden phrases inside photos.
She’ll think I’m burned out, or that I’ve started smoking weird things.
Maybe she’s right.
Maybe it’s all just in my head.

Right Page

"Não vou contar a ninguém. Ainda não.
Se for real, está aqui.
Se não for… também.
Fico com o caderno.
Ele aguenta tudo. Mesmo o que não se diz em voz alta."
"Nem tudo que responde deve ser ouvido."
I won’t tell anyone. Not yet.
If it’s real, it’s here.
If it’s not… it still is.
I’ll stick with the notebook.
It can hold everything. Even what you don’t say out loud.
"Not everything that answers should be heard."

This is the threshold, the moment before confession.
She wants to tell someone. She almost does.
But there’s something sacred about keeping it inside.
Because saying it out loud might break it, or worse, make it real.

So she chooses silence.
And the notebook becomes her confessional.

But even here, something answers.
Written in red — her own handwriting, but somehow separate.
A warning, or an echo:
Not everything that answers should be heard.

A message for after she’s gone. One last drawing, familiar but sharper.
 The spiral returns, inside the eye.

Left Page

"Tive uma ideia.
Se isto correr mal – se eu desaparecer ou algo me acontecer – alguém precisa de saber.
Vou escrever tudo num documento. Deixar um email pronto. Agendado.
Ou algo assim.
Se eu não entrar na conta durante dias, ele envia-se sozinho."
I had an idea.
If this goes wrong — if I disappear or something happens to me — someone needs to know.
I’ll write everything down in a document. Leave an email ready. Scheduled.
Or something like that.
If I don’t log in for a few days, it sends itself.

Right Page

"Para a Margarida.
Ela vai ler.
Vai perceber que não enlouqueci. Apenas acreditei demais."
"Um dos olhos vê. O outro lembra."
For Margarida.
She’ll read it.
She’ll understand that I didn’t lose my mind. I just believed too much.
One eye sees. The other remembers.

She’s preparing for disappearance.
Not metaphorically — but deliberately, practically.
If something happens, someone will know.
Margarida will receive the truth, even if it’s impossible to explain.

But then, that last sentence in red:
One eye sees. The other remembers.
It doesn’t feel like a thought.
It feels like a message. A conclusion. A key.

And just beneath it, a drawing: an eye, more detailed than before, but familiar.
It echoes the one she sketched in her first pages.
The same gaze.
The same spiral buried in the iris.

She’s always drawn eyes and spirals.
But now they’re aligning. Repeating. Evolving.

She’s watching herself watch.
Leaving breadcrumbs.
Just in case.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S. 

Log 12 — Twelfth Entry: How Many Times Now?

A phrase in her own voice, but not her own. 
The dreams are back, and they know something she doesn’t.

Left Page 

"Passou uma semana.
Testes, trabalhos, alunos nervosos. Eu também. Fiz tudo no automático.
Mas a cabeça continua lá.
No mural. 
Na frase.
Panorâmico de Monsanto.
Veio no sussurro do guia, mas sinto que já o sonhava antes disso."
A week passed.
Tests, assignments, nervous students. Me too. I did everything on autopilot.
But my mind is still there.
On the mural. 
On the phrase.
Panorâmico de Monsanto.
It came in the guide’s whisper, but I feel like I’d already dreamed it before.

Right Page

"As noites estão a ficar estranhas.
Sonho com escadas em espiral. 
O céu sem forma.
Subo e subo, e há janelas a respirar.
Oiço a minha voz a dizer:
"Quantas vezes já?"
Mas não sou eu a falar.
Acordo sempre cansada.
Como se o corpo ficasse mas eu saísse."
The nights are getting strange.
I dream of spiral staircases.
The sky has no shape.
I keep climbing, and the windows breathe.
I hear my voice say:
“How many times now?”
But it’s not me speaking.
I always wake up tired.
As if my body stayed but I slipped out.

The trail went quiet, but her mind didn’t.

A week passed in a blur of classes, corrections, and fatigue. Isabel functioned on autopilot, yet part of her stayed locked in that moment, facing the mural. The whisper of the guide naming the Panorâmico seemed like a new clue, but something about it felt… familiar. As if her subconscious had already been there.

The dreams returned.
Spiral staircases.
A sky without shape.
A voice that sounds like hers, asking:
“How many times now?”

The phrase loops, the dreams intensify, and she wakes each morning heavier than the last, like her body stays in bed, but some part of her wanders off at night.

Two small drawings frame the page: the familiar theatrical masks — comedy and tragedy — and a faint spiral staircase with three stars.
Symbols of performance, duality, and a descent into the unknown.

The pattern is shifting.
And she’s starting to feel it.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S. 

Log 11 — Eleventh Entry: The Message, The Whisper and the Spiral

The first message returns. A hill, old laughter, and the sense she might be
 writing to herself.

Left Page

"Voltei ao caderno.
Primeira mensagem: as alturas, risos, memórias esquecidos no ar.
Uma colina. Um lugar que guardasse vozes antigas.
Pensei logo no Teatro Romano.
As ruínas ainda guardam tudo, gargalhadas, segredos, histórias que ninguém escreveu."
I returned to the notebook.
First message: the heights, laughter, memories forgotten in the air.
A hill. A place that held ancient voices.
I immediately thought of the Roman Theatre.
The ruins still hold everything, laughter, secrets, stories no one ever wrote.

Right Page

"Parecia uma ideia louca.
Seguir frases numa moldura de Polaroid?
Deixar tudo para vir até aqui com esta câmara?
Fiquei a perguntar-me se não sou eu a fazer isto.
Se não é tudo um truque da minha cabeça.
Ando sem dormir bem.
Tenho feito os exercícios do Monroe – projeção, separação –"
It felt like a mad idea.
Following phrases on a Polaroid frame?
Leaving everything behind to come here with this camera?
I kept wondering if I’m the one doing this.
If it’s all just a trick of my mind.
I haven’t been sleeping well.
I’ve been doing Monroe’s exercises – projection, separation –

She returned to the notebook the same way you return to a place you left something behind, not sure what’s missing, only that something is. Her first entry still echoes: the heights, the laughter, the forgotten memories in the air. A place of altitude, yes, but also of ghosts.

She thought of the Roman Theatre. She chose it. The old stones, the hollowed steps, the lingering voices, all of it fit the message like a key fits a lock. She wanted a place that remembered.

And now she’s questioning it all.

Was it madness to follow these phrases?
To trust a camera with intent?

She wonders if it’s all coming from inside her, if she’s the one writing the messages. The handwriting, the signs, the sense of pursuit. Is she projecting meaning into the silence, or receiving it?

She hasn’t been sleeping.
And she’s been practicing the techniques of Robert Monroe, the man who claimed we could leave our bodies.
Projection. Separation.

It’s no longer just a metaphor.

A photo in daylight. Faces whisper. Her handwriting again,
 but not her voice.

Left Page

"Às vezes fico no limiar, meio acordada, meio fora do corpo.
Talvez tenha sido assim.
Mas hoje não.
Trouxe a câmara.
Andei à volta, procurei o ângulo certo.
Vi o mural – rostos a gritar ou a sussurrar, não sei.
Pareciam sussurros.
Tirei a foto. Esperei.
Revelei ali mesmo, no meio da rua.
Gente a passar.
Luz do dia. Eu sem caneta."
Sometimes I stay on the threshold, half awake, half out of my body.
Maybe that’s how it happened.
But not today.
I brought the camera.
Walked around, searched for the right angle.
I saw the mural – faces screaming or whispering, I don’t know.
They felt like whispers.
I took the photo. Waited.
Developed it right there, in the middle of the street.
People walking past.
Daylight. I had no pen.

Right Page 

“Nos sussurros à tua volta encontrarás o próximo passo.”
A minha letra. Mas não sou eu.
Foi ali no meio de tudo que percebi: não estou a sonhar.
Não estou a projetar.
Isto está aqui.
É como se fosse uma conversa, mas só de um lado.
As vozes que ficaram aqui…
a cidade inteira sussurra,
se eu souber ouvir."
“In the whispers around you, you’ll find the next step.”
My handwriting. But it isn’t me.
It was right there, in the middle of everything, that I realized: I’m not dreaming.
I’m not projecting.
This is here.
It’s like a conversation, but only from one side.
The voices that stayed here…
the whole city whispers,
if I know how to listen.

She wasn’t floating this time.
She wasn’t halfway out of her body, hovering in some liminal state.
This was daylight. Movement. People around her. A street. A mural.
And yet the message came.

She saw the mural: twisted faces, mouths open wide. Screaming? Whispering? It didn’t matter.
She felt it.
They were whispering.

She didn’t bring a pen. Maybe she didn’t need one.
Because the camera remembered for her.
And when the photo developed, the phrase was already there:
“In the whispers around you, you’ll find the next step.”

Her handwriting. Again.
But this time, she doesn’t deny it. Doesn’t resist the possibility.
She simply says: “It isn’t me.”

And then:
I’m not dreaming.
I’m not projecting.
This is here.

The doubt hasn’t left, but something else is settling in its place. A quiet knowing. Like she’s realizing that whatever’s speaking to her has been doing it for a while. That the city has its own voice. Its own breath. And it’s been whispering all along.

A mural full of mouths, but it’s the whispers that reach her. A voice in her 
own hand. The next step spoken aloud.

A tour stops. A name is spoken. The whisper finds her. The message shifts.

Left Page 

"E foi mesmo ali que ouvi o “sussurro”.
Um grupo passou, visita guiada de arte urbana.
Pararam junto ao mural.
O guia começou a falar do Panorâmico de Monsanto como parte do circuito, das pinturas escondidas, do eco.
A frase na moldura.
O sussurro certo no momento certo.
É para lá que vou."
And it was right there that I heard the whisper.
A group passed by, a guided urban art tour.
They stopped near the mural.
The guide started talking about the Panorâmico de Monsanto as part of the circuit, the hidden paintings, the echo.
The phrase in the frame.
The right whisper at the right moment.
That’s where I’m going.

Right Page

"Volto sempre ao primeiro enigma.
“Procura as alturas onde risos e memórias esquecidas pairam no ar.”
Era mesmo o Teatro Romano?
Ou fui eu que forcei a resposta?
Às vezes penso que a câmara sabia o que eu ia fazer.
Que me deixou tropeçar de propósito.
E se não fosse para ser um lugar certo, mas um estado de espírito?
Gargalhadas, risos, segredos,"
I keep coming back to the first riddle.
“Seek the heights where laughter and forgotten memories float in the air.”
Was it really the Roman Theatre?
Or did I force the answer?
Sometimes I think the camera knew what I was going to do.
That it let me stumble on purpose.
What if it’s not about a specific place, but a state of mind?
Laughter, giggles, secrets,

She knows where to go. But the spiral tightens. The trail feeds on doubt.

Left Page

"tanto faz onde. Bastava eu querer ouvir. E ouvi.
O sussurro veio de quem passava, não das pedras.
Talvez nunca tenha sido sobre o teatro.
Talvez o trilho se alimente do erro."
the place didn’t matter. It was enough that I wanted to hear. And I did.
The whisper came from those passing by, not from the stones.
Maybe it was never about the theatre.
Maybe the trail feeds on the mistake.

Right Page 

"Sei para onde tenho de ir.
O sussurro foi claro —
Panorâmico de Monsanto.
Mas… e se houver mais? Mais sinais escondidos?
Mais respostas?
Parte de mim quer tirar outras fotos antes. Testar.
Forçar a câmara a falar de novo.
Mas outra parte sussurra: para quê?
Já sei o próximo passo.
Talvez baste.
Ou talvez o trilho queira que eu me perca a tentar saber tudo.
Tenho de ir."
I know where I have to go.
The whisper was clear —
Panorâmico de Monsanto.
But… what if there are more? More hidden signs?
More answers?
Part of me wants to take more photos first. To test.
To force the camera to speak again.
But another part whispers: what for?
I already know the next step.
Maybe that’s enough.
Or maybe the trail wants me to get lost trying to know everything.
I have to go.

The whisper didn’t come in a dream this time. It came in the middle of the street. Tourists, a guide, voices overlapping, and then a thread pulled tight. “The right whisper at the right moment.”

The tour stopped at the mural.
The guide mentioned the Panorâmico de Monsanto, a new name, a new location. Hidden paintings. Echo.
And that was it.
That was the pull.
She heard it, and she knew.
“That’s where I’m going.”

But then, the doubt comes back. Not fear, just reckoning.
She circles back to the first message:
“Seek the heights where laughter and forgotten memories float in the air.”

She wonders if she chose wrong.
Or maybe she chose too quickly.
Maybe the camera let her get it wrong, as if it knew the detour was part of the process.

Because maybe that first message wasn’t pointing to the Roman Theatre.
Maybe it wasn’t pointing to anywhere at all.

Maybe it was describing a feeling.
A frequency.
A state of presence that reveals the truth, wherever you are.

She writes:
“The whisper came from those passing by, not from the stones.”

That feels like a revelation.
Like she’s finally understanding that meaning doesn’t echo from the past, it moves with the present. It travels through us. Through voices overheard, paths crossed, photos taken by instinct rather than logic.

And still, she hesitates.
Just for a moment.
“Part of me wants to take more photos. To test. To make the camera speak again.”

That’s the temptation: to seek more.
More clues. More certainty. More messages.
But something inside her whispers louder than all of that:
“What for?”

She already knows the next step.
And maybe that is the answer.
Not the photo. Not the message. Not even the destination.
But the surrender.
The listening.

She says it simply: “Tenho de ir.”
I have to go.

And that’s what the trail asks for.

Not clarity.
Not proof.

Just motion.

At the bottom of the page, a new collage: darker than the last. A black spiral stretches outward, hypnotic and precise. In the center: a warped slice of green. Two eyes, mirrored and distorted, half-lost behind vertical bars or trees. The same image from before, but now it floats at the spiral’s center, like a target. Or a warning.

It echoes the collage from Log 08, but this one feels more focused. Less like a whisper. More like a signal tightening.

The spiral is no longer between the eyes.

The eyes are the spiral now.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S. 

Log 10 — Tenth Entry: The Trail and the Missing Frame

A missing photo. A message in her own hand. A moon. A question. 
The trail calls, but the sky might be the first step.

Left Page

"Hoje apareceu outra.
Uma nova mensagem. Não fiz nada de diferente. Não esperava. Estava a testar um enquadramento. 
A foto parecia igual às outras.
Mas quando saiu… lá estava uma frase.
“Segue o trilho.”
A letra é minha. Outra vez."
Another one appeared today.
A new message. I didn’t do anything differently. I wasn’t expecting it. I was just testing a frame. The photo looked like all the others.
But when it developed... there was a phrase.
“Follow the trail.”
The handwriting is mine. Again.

There’s a strange resignation in her tone now. Like she’s no longer surprised by the impossible, only by the details. The way the words appear. The fact that the handwriting keeps mimicking hers. Or maybe it is hers. Maybe she’s the one writing these messages without knowing it.

“Segue o trilho.”
Follow the trail.

It’s not a suggestion. It’s a command. Short. Certain. Like it knows where it’s going, even if she doesn’t.

And the most unsettling part?
I don’t have this photo. It wasn’t among her belongings. It’s one of the few missing pieces. No way to know what it showed or what followed after.

Right Page 

"Não me lembro de escrever.
Mas desta vez… Não questionei.
Senti que era para mim.
E então lembrei-me da primeira:
“Procura as alturas.”
A frase que me ficou na cabeça. A que tentei ignorar.
Talvez nunca tenha sido sobre a floresta. Talvez ainda não comecei o trilho."
I don’t remember writing it.
But this time… I didn’t question it.
I felt like it was meant for me.
And then I remembered the first one:
“Seek the heights.”
The phrase that stayed in my head. The one I tried to ignore.
Maybe it was never about the forest. Maybe I haven’t even started the trail yet.

“Procura as alturas.”
"Seek the heights."

Now paired with “Follow the trail,” it feels like a contradiction. Or maybe a sequence. First, look up. Then, move forward. One message vertical, the other horizontal, both pointing toward something beyond the map.

The trail. The forest. The heights.
These aren’t places. Not really.
They’re thresholds.

And she’s only just crossed the first one.

She doesn’t remember writing the message. But she doesn’t fight it either. That’s what haunts me. The quiet acceptance. The shift from fear to belief, even if she’s not ready to say it aloud.

At the bottom of the page, two small drawings: a crescent moon and a question mark. Pencil-soft, almost hesitant. A symbol of change, and a symbol of doubt. As if even her uncertainty is becoming part of the ritual. Part of the trail.

Maybe the handwriting is hers because it was always meant to be.

Maybe the trail begins when you stop asking why.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S.

Log 09 — Ninth Entry: The Forest and The Message

Two attempts. One crossed-out message. Something in her handwriting
 she doesn’t remember writing.

A forest blurred and torn.
The camera said nothing.

New film. Same place. This time,
the message was waiting.

 

Left Page

Primeira tentativa – filme antigo.

A câmara já tinha um cartucho lá dentro. Não sei há quanto tempo.
Foto queimada. Estranha.
Os árvores desfocadas, um rasgo escuro no meio.
Não gostei da sensação. Troquei de filme.
Novo. Voltei ao mesmo sítio.
Não sei porquê. Algo em mim queria tentar outra vez.
First attempt – old film.
The camera already had a cartridge inside. I don’t know how long it had been there.
The photo came out burned. Strange.
Blurred trees, a dark tear in the middle.
I didn’t like the feeling. I changed the film.
New one. I went back to the same place.
I don’t know why. Something in me wanted to try again.

There’s something familiar about this. About trying again.
When I first found the camera, I did the same.
The film that came with it wasn’t mine either. And the first four photos didn’t feel like mine.
She says the image looked burned. Trees blurred, a dark scar running through the center.
She couldn’t explain it. Didn’t like it. So she changed the film and went back. Same spot. New roll.
Same need.
“Algo em mim queria tentar outra vez.”
Something in me wanted to try again.
I know that feeling.
Sometimes you don’t choose to return.
Something chooses you.

Right Page

Segunda tentativa – a mensagem apareceu.

"Procura as alturas onde risos e memórias esquecidos pairam no ar."

Escrita… Na minha letra.
Mas eu não me lembro de a ter escrito.
Não tinha caneta comigo.
Não escrevi.
Ou escrevi?
Fiquei a olhar para a moldura durante minutos.
Não consigo explicar.
Second attempt — the message appeared.
Look for the heights where rivers and memories pass through the air
Written… In my handwriting.
But I don’t remember writing it.
I didn’t have a pen with me.
I didn’t write it.
Or did I?
I stared at the frame for minutes.
I can’t explain it. 

She crosses out the message.
Maybe it didn’t make sense.
Maybe it scared her.

But it was there.
Clear.
In her handwriting.
She insists: she didn’t write it.
She didn’t even have a pen.

I know the feeling: that cold, electric disbelief.
It’s your hand, but not your words.
It’s your voice, but someone else’s breath.

And still…
“Ou escrevi?”
Or did I?

She stares at the frame for minutes, looking for an answer in the blank space that once held her own gaze.
Something shifted here.
This is when she realizes she’s not the only one watching.

A message she doesn’t remember writing. A photo that seemed to know her thoughts. 
A pencil-drawn eye watching from the margin.

Left and Right Pages

"Como se a foto já soubesse o que eu ia tirar.
Como se estivesse à espera.
✶ A letra é minha. Parece minha. Mas não me lembro.
Tenho dormido mal há semanas.
Sonhos confusos… e às vezes não sei se estou a sonhar.
Desde o fim – desde que saí da casa dele – tenho andado num nevoeiro. 
Talvez tenha escrito aquilo e esqueci.
Ou sonhei que tirei a foto e só estou a misturar tudo.
Será que o corpo escreve quando a mente desliga?
Eu pensava que foi a câmara?
A câmara parece… desperta agora.
Como se tivesse estado a testar-me.
E aquela primeira foto, com o filme antigo…
Quem a tirou? Ou o que ficou gravado ali?"
As if the photo already knew what I was going to take.
As if it had been waiting.
✶ The handwriting is mine. Looks like mine. But I don’t remember.
I’ve been sleeping badly for weeks.
Confused dreams… and sometimes I don’t know if I’m dreaming.
Since the end — since I left his house — I’ve been walking through fog.
Maybe I did write it and forgot.
Or dreamed I took the picture and now I’m mixing everything up.
Does the body write when the mind shuts off?
I thought it was the camera?
The camera feels… awake now.
Like it had been testing me.
And that first photo, with the old film…
Who took it? Or what was recorded there?

This is the turning point.
She’s not just questioning memory, now she’s questioning reality.

The way she writes about the photo, as if it were conscious, waiting for her, knowing what she’d see. It chills me.
It mirrors exactly what happened with my first roll.
The film wasn’t mine.
But the camera seemed to know what I’d find.

And then comes the line that sticks:
“A câmara parece… desperta agora.”
The camera feels awake now.

I felt it too.
The moment it stopped being just a tool and became something else.
Observant. Aware. Maybe even… selective.

She doesn’t remember writing the message.
She questions if she wrote it in her sleep, or if it was the camera that “recorded” her somehow.
And then she wonders if that first photo (with the old film) was hers at all.

I remember thinking the same thing, staring at my own first Polaroid.
Trying to recognize my eye behind the lens.
Trying to remember pressing the shutter.

And it’s not just the camera anymore.
She draws an eye in the corner of the page, almost an afterthought.
Simple, made in pencil. But it feels deliberate.
As if something was watching her while she wrote all this down.

That moment when the line between dream and waking blurs?
She’s deep in it now.
And so am I.

A pressed flower blooms across the ink: delicate, dried, and 
still full of questions.

Left Page

Há algo na floresta. E talvez… na câmara também.

??????*
*Não confio na minha memória*
??????

Tirei mais quatro fotos hoje. Nada.
Mudei de lugar. Nova rua. A luz estava bonita. Nada.

There’s something in the forest. And maybe… in the camera too.

??????
*I don’t trust my memory*
??????

I took four more photos today. Nothing.
Changed locations. A new street. The light was beautiful. Nothing.

She doesn’t just question her memory, she draws a line through it. That red ink is a rupture. A flare.

The forest is no longer just a setting.
And the camera… maybe it never was just an object.

??????
I don’t trust my memory
??????

Those marks feel like a code. Or maybe a breakdown.
Either way, something’s cracking open.

She tries again. She changes streets. She waits for the light.
But all she gets is silence.

I know that silence.
Not emptiness, refusal.

Like the camera is choosing when to speak.
And today, it said nothing.

Right Page

"Talvez tenha sido mesmo eu que escrevi aquilo. E só não me lembro.
A letra parece minha. Eu ando a dormir pouco. Será que é isso?
Tentei de manhã. À tarde. Uma à noite, mesmo antes de deitar.
Tudo normal. A câmara está... muda."
Maybe it really was me who wrote it. And I just don’t remember.
The handwriting looks like mine. I haven’t been sleeping much. Maybe that’s it?
I tried in the morning. In the afternoon. One at night, just before bed.
Everything normal. The camera is… silent.

She’s walking in circles now. Questioning what’s real, what’s hers.

“Talvez tenha sido mesmo eu que escrevi aquilo.”
Maybe it really was me who wrote it.
But if she doesn’t remember, does it matter?

The handwriting looks like hers.
But so does sleepwalking.
So do dreams.

She tries again: morning, afternoon, night.
Three quiet attempts. Same result.

That final line lingers:
A câmara está… muda.
The camera is silent.

Not broken.
Not jammed.
Just… withholding.

Like whatever’s on the other side of the lens, it’s watching her decide whether she’s ready.

And maybe it’s not.

There’s a small drawing near the middle of the page, a question mark orbiting a sun.
Uncertainty clinging to clarity.
It feels like a question she doesn’t want the answer to.

And across the page, a dried flower quietly bursts outward,
as if trying to speak in place of the camera.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S.

Log 08 — Eighth Entry: New Module

New neighborhood. Old fears. A camera she hasn’t touched yet. A spiral
 glued between the eyes, still watching.

Left Page

“Este bairro é novo para mim. Ruas velhas, mas eu ainda não pertenço. Talvez isso seja bom. Uma página em branco.”
This neighborhood is new to me. Old streets, but I don’t belong yet. Maybe that’s good. A blank page.

She calls it a blank page, but it’s already filling with tension. Her body is alert, cautious, almost like it’s waiting for something to go wrong or for something to finally begin.

“Tenho medo de que, se parar de trabalhar com as mãos, perca o fio. O corpo sabe mais do que eu.”
I’m afraid that if I stop working with my hands, I’ll lose the thread. The body knows more than I do.

This line stayed with me. The way she says the body knows more, as if it’s the one leaving breadcrumbs, and she’s just following behind, hoping the trail doesn’t vanish. I know that fear. Of losing momentum. Of letting something fall quiet and never finding your way back in.

In red, two words repeat like a heartbeat at the bottom of the page:
“Meus olhos. Seus olhos.”
My eyes. Your eyes.

Right Page 

“O próximo módulo vai ser difícil. Não tenho vontade de estar ali. Mas os alunos não precisam de saber.”
The next module will be hard. I don’t feel like being there. But the students don’t need to know.

Her voice softens here. She doesn’t want to be in that room, but she’s still going. Still showing up for them.
There’s something human in that, the weight you carry quietly so others won’t feel it.

A single phrase in red ink stands out, almost like it doesn’t belong to the rest of the text:
“eu te vejo”
I see you.
Feels less like a note and more like a breach. A line crossed. A presence felt.

“Amanhã levo a Polaroid comigo. Comprei novos rolos hoje, talvez me inspire.”
Tomorrow I’ll take the Polaroid with me. Bought new film today, maybe it’ll inspire me.

So many of her entries orbit this: the camera, the images she hasn’t taken yet, the eyes that might appear again.
The collage at the bottom of the page is almost a whisper: green, grainy, an iris behind prison bars, or is it trees? It’s hard to tell. The spiral is glued right between the eyes.

She’s still searching for a new way to see.
And still afraid of what she might find when she does.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S.