The perfect match

I look myself in the mirror and I fix my tie knot. I take out my handkerchief and I wipe my face and neck. I'm sweaty like a pig although it's winter. I didn't expect I would get nervous again after two failed marriages and a heart attack. Some say I'm a hopeless romantic, others that I'm an idiot. The truth is always in the middle. I come down the stairs and look at her. She is beautiful and cold as ice. She tries to look at me affectionately, but fails. I know she's doing it for the fortune but I don't mind. I lost all the money.

(Translated by Ana-Maria Denisa Neagu / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)


Ficţiuni Reale este un proiect colectiv, iniţiat în 2013, de Florin Piersic jr. În urma apariţiei unui volum de povestiri la editura Humanitas, conceptul Ficţiuni Reale a continuat să existe, ca grup pe Facebook. (În aprilie 2021, grupul are 5.600 de membri.) Autorii scriu povestiri ultra-scurte, limitându-se la 500 de caractere - un exerciţiu de flash fiction a cărui temă se schimbă aproape în fiecare zi. Coordonatorii grupului sunt Florin Piersic jr., Gabriel Molnar, Răzvan Penescu şi Luchian Abel. (Desen de Adrian T. Roman.).