The minus used within words in Romanian language has a special name; but who paid attention in school when they told me? I think it was siren, or syphon. Or, perhaps, typhoon? Anyway, it doesn't matter. What does it do? I bet it's not there only to annoy me. When do you use it? My son's words - sometimes you do; sometimes you don't. When it's the case to use it and when not, he had no idea; so he shrugged and started writing, firmly: Mr. Director, please allow me to work from home, in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. Thank you, Agamemnon Coadă, janitor.
(Translated by Alexandra Lica / 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. 
