She came in, slamming the door behind her. Slow down, you're not on the streets, he told her, as he wiped off a medal with his silk handkerchief. Have you brought any more stamps, the young woman asked him as she chewed gum. I don't have any more stamps, I have these pearls. Show them to your father. They say they preserve what nature left behind. When a woman wears them, she remains as she was left. What do you mean, the young woman asked him intrigued. I mean fragile. Women are not fragile, the girl shouted in his face, as the pearls clung to her thoughts.
(Translated by Andreea Grințescu / 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. 
