Malu Belo

“Life itself” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #101

“I’ve been trying to look at the world more closely”, I said to the middle-aged, soft-toned, slightly-shorter-than-me woman that asked for the purpose of my visit. I leaned my torso over the counter as I said it, distributing the weight of my body along the white piece of furniture that stood before me. The place was all white, actually. Neat walls and clear glass. Accompanied by the type of instrumental background music of crickets and falling water that is supposed to relax you. A friend had told me about a technique she had been undergo...

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“The Wait ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #98

The waiter came to bring us the menu and our drinks, moving in slow motion once handing them to my brother, which acted oblivious to what was happening before him. I had only been to that restaurant once, on a failed date many years ago, but Johnny was living in the neighbourhood now and became a frequent client there apparently. “I still can’t believe you moved out before I did.”, I said taking a sip of my freezing tap water. He pulled the left side of his lip on a smirk but never took his face off his phone. “Sorry, I promise I’ll be...

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“Iris” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #68

She took a strand of hair stuck to my eyelash and tucked it behind my left ear, starring, unfazed, into my eyes. She narrated how the symphony of colors irradiated by the setting sun made them turn from caramel to green. I laughed incredulously at the quality of light through which she thought she saw me. We turned our backs on the scenic view as soon as the sun died on the horizon and took the long way home. I was a guest at her cabin for the weekend. All the while we walked, I felt her hand brushing against my arm, and it sent little unco...

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“Feel Free ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #61

It was pouring by the time we left the movies. The sky was that shade of dark and heavy, coarse green mixed with a whole lot of brown and black, how it gets after endless days of stifling heat. The type of rain one wants to welcome, since the previous afternoons have been spent running from air condition to air condition, trying to alleviate the race of sweat being performed from one's temples to one's cheek and awkwardly landing in places one is greatly embarrassed to think about. The type of rain that inconveniences people like us- relucta...

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“Aurora” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #55

I woke up to the sound of long sleeves of grass swishing in the grand field outside the bedroom window. Dawn was filled with a damp, dewy atmosphere of fresh beginnings, haloed rays poured directly into my eyelids as I pushed the calico sheets covering me and lifted my torso, giving up on slumber. As I walked, trying to minimize the cracking noises evoked by my steps, I opened the door to the living room and saw, from the little archway that divided the room, grandma swiftly juggling metal pans from the daffodil cupboards directly onto the ...

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“The Square ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #48

I am something of a mix between Anne Hathaway in the first half of The Devil Wears Prada and in all of Love and Other Drugs. Simply put, I’m a twenty-two year old millennial with only a smudged idea of what to do with life and no grand accomplishments to account for. On top of that, I carry around a medically diagnosed label of manic depression. As of three years, I see a psychiatrist twice a week and ingest copious amounts of drugs that prevent me from falling into any type of deep end, literal or metaphorical. This also means that, as re...

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“Pieces of you or the story of how you never let go” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #47

(Trigger Warning: gore)   You thought you never loved any other as much as you did him, face blocking the sun, beams surrounding him like a halo. Forcing your eyes open against the light, you could only remark how his eyes were the color of seawater, bulbs of greenish wonder. You pictured yourself diving, head first.   You don’t remember much of how it happened. Figments of the scene haunt you with their incompleteness. The one thing you know: he tore you open. You know for a fact that it happened literally as well as metaphoricall...

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“Marielle ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #45

“It’s been two years. And we still don’t have an answer”, I say clutching my fists and drowning my nails into the palm of my hands. Our weekly Wednesday meetings had to be postponed to today due to the latest police operations in the Complexo. Some of the members of the Justice for Marielle committee, including me, got stuck in their houses due to the exchange of gunfire. It has gotten worse over the years. There is no longer an explicit need for them to come. The panacea of the war on drugs seems to be this all-encompassing threat that k...

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“Zona Sul ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #43

I.          Aparecida twists her left wrist to try and catch a glimpse of her watch. The van was late, again. The woman sighs as she wipes off the golden drops of sweat from her face. Although the sun just came up, it blazes without mercy. Zona Sul, Zona Sul, the change collector screams announcing the van’s final destination. Relieved, she finds her way to the rare spot by the window. The two-hour commute from Madureira to Ipanema is becoming increasingly bearable since her mother sent her an mp3 play...

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“Notes on a word ” by Malu Belo

1. I’ve learned this past year to approach words carefully. To doubt their worn out meanings and usages and dissect what they hide behind their messy surfaces. Deceitful, for they are manufactured, unreal, but still make their way into the ordinariness of people’s lives, until one give’s them meaning, until one is so attached to them that they become one’s main form of expression. To be without them, is to be lost, unmoored, in a world where one is unable to understand its signs and significations.2. As words lead to other words, which lead ...

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“All that is solid melts into air ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #41

I was born by the sea. In a fisherman’s house off the northeastern coast of Brazil. Like most seafront villages in this region, we were ruled by seasonality. Summers were crowded, full of foreign bodies and excessive accumulation of trash. It is the time when I have to bathe on the river because water always runs out- our towns were just not made for that many people. Still, they come as surely as the rhythmic tides that mark the hours of our days. During these seasons, mornings are spent helping mother weave embroidery on tablecloths to sel...

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“The Lighthouse ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #39

1.There is a meadow I am drawn to. Every fortnight just before the sky loses its darkness to a clear blue paint. Even though these nights are cold and blinding, a glimmering light guides me through the woods until I reach the familiar clearing.As far as I knew, the twinkling came from a lighthouse. I was convinced somewhere past the undergrowth, the earth folded, seeking a passage to the heavens. At its peak, stood an ancient tower. It was most likely some muted color, torn from the time it had solely existed above the hill. Unlike its ...

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“Lion King ” by Malu Belo

Submitted to Contest #38

I swear, I tried to breathe out the hopeless exasperation that takes over me every time Nala entertains her high-pitch, endlessly repetitive barking-frenzy. I shrug in desolation for my mental sanity and professional ambitions when she decides to dispute territory with any foreign sound that presents itself outside of my apartment.*Neighbor 1 leaves home*I wake up with a speeding heart thinking I’d rather be awaken by the annoying standard Apple alarm noise then this unjustified hysteria. I cover my face with my hands, trying not to blame my...

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