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.