He knew that there was someone else between the two of them. She hadn't confessed anything to him yet. She would have seemed completely crazy. And how could she tell him that he is still there? That she talks to him whenever she's alone? That she keeps a plastic bag hidden in the garage with the other man's shirt in it. That sometimes she takes it out and smells it to soothe her longing? It's ok, my dear. You loved him. It's normal. Pain may pass, memories may fade, but love not, never. I know the feeling. Will you come to leave some flowers at their graves?
(Translated by Andreea Teodorescu-Colciu / 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 June 2022, the group has 8,500 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. 
