Of two things, Pătru couldn't get rid of: women and snaps, so his wife and the 13th Regiment got rid of Pătru. It was harder for him to forget about his rider's uniform than about his wife, but he kept his high boots, twirling his moustache in them, while he made belts and harnesses, because he didn't get any snaps or tommy for free. Long lived Pătru, until one winter, when some brats threw away the snow from a man who had fallen asleep in the ditch, and by the light of the lamp, the boots of a proud horseman were sprouted.
(Translated by Otilia Mocanu / 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 February 2022, the group has 7,950 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. 
