I wait in line. I wait for my turn to come. I feel like crying, but there are too many people around. I feel like I am drowning. I am not having air to breath. The panic grows and I do not know how to stop it. Others' lives go further. Mine seems to have stopped. Being sunk. The one in front of me finished his speech. The papers heated in my hands. I am sweating. I put my hand on the receptor which still keeps the warmth of the previous hand. I am calling. Hello? It is heard the voice from the other side: Mom, I can't. I want back home. Come. And that is all. I am fine.
(Translated by Teodora Stoian / 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 November 2021, the group has 7.500 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 Ficțiuni Reale. 
