When mom called me at 3 o'clock in the morning, I knew why. In his last days I avoided seeing him, speaking to him, I knew he could see the end on my face, I knew if I was going to see despair in his eyes, if he asked for my help, I would have shattered into thousand little pieces because of my helplessness. Nothing to be done, but wait. Time was up. I got home at dawn. I saw the body being taken out in a rug on the stairwell, put inside the coffin, then carried out. I slept in the living room those nights. Every morning, at 3 o'clock, his voice woke me up, shouting: Ioana.
(Translated by Iulia-Teodora Urea / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficţiuni Reale.