You go up to your room. Who's that? Dad. I can't wait to tell him that I won the competition. He's angry. I'll count to three and if this mess isn't cleaned up, you're gonna get it. It's not gone. Then? In the kitchen, eating. Mom will be happy. I'll count to three and if you don't finish your food, you're grounded. I didn't finish. Skip ahead 15 years. What do you hear? I love you, I'm coming. Those bitches again? I'll count to three and if you're not home by then, we're breaking up. I didn't go. You forgive everyone. I forgive them. Count to three and you'll wake up.
(Translated by Bianca-Maria Ciucaşu / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / 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 July 2021, the group has 6.800 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. 
