I always remember the words of my art teacher from middle school. I had failed the admission test for medical high school and we met at the crosswalk by the National Theater. What did you do? I failed. Laura, you're not made to work with human filth. You are so sensitive. You should make art. I wasn't hurt. I could paint well. I was talented. He liked how I painted. He always praised me in front of the classroom. 9 years ago I called and told him, thank you, dear teacher. I work with human filth, but in some other way. The true art.
(Translated by Dragoş Frangulea / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)Real Fiction is a collective project started in 2013 by Florin Piersic Jr. The concept of Real Fiction continued to exist as a Facebook group, after a volume of stories was published at Humanitas Publishing House. (In May 2021, the group has 6.400 members.) The authors write ultra-short stories, with the texts limited to 500 characters (in Romanian, so the length of the English translation might be a little different) - a flash-fiction exercise on a topic that changes every few days. The group's coordinators are Florin Piersic Jr., Gabriel Molnar, Răzvan Penescu, and Luchian Abel. (Drawing by Adrian T. Roman)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficţiuni Reale. 
