Does anyone know how to hypnotize around here? I mean it. I want to be convinced I'm living in another year. Like 1985. I applaud the analphabet. I go to the parade. I drive a Dacia 1300 without a modern dashboard. I drink Cico. Water from the drinking fountain. I eat baloney off the newspaper. I put on a thicker coat inside. I put that horrible, brown sturdy wood furniture back into place. The porcelain ornaments, the Chinese fisherman, the cat, Venus de Milo. I learn Bulgarian again. I shower for 59 seconds, with Cheia or Palmier soap. I'll do anything. Just as long as it's not 2022 anymore.
(Translated by Diana Mîndruță-Tănăsescu / 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 April 2022, the group has 8,175 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. 
