In the morning I had dressed in last evening's clothes, only the shoes with metallic heels I took in my hand when I stealthily went down the stairs in front of the porter. In the septic corridor they were waiting in silence. Should I go? I heard through the open window a first whimper. One life in exchange for another. I will stay. I entered in silence and didn't ask anything. A spatula was dropped on the floor. The anesthesia is not working so quickly, we are in a hurry. I didn't cry. My legs alone carry me back. There is blood dripping on the heels. In this life I will only grow by myself.
(Translated by Ioana Negrea / 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 September 2022, the group has 9,250 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. 
