I got up at 4 to catch the hot running water. I caught it, but it was playing hard to get. I gave myself a medal. Manele roar like Metallica. A pipe burst, the 534th. I've been invaded by cockroaches and I have so many ants I could lend them out. I'm getting paid by the spoonful, but at least I'm getting paid. The problems come pouring in? It's all right, I've got broad shoulders. If I don't trick life, it tricks me. Every night I have a little spritzer with Bubulina, season it with a Gică and happily doze off on my pillow. I won the bet, I'm a he-queen.
(Translated by Raluca Ioana Crucerescu / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by prof. dr. Nadina Vișan / Edited 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 November 2022, the group has 9,580 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. 
