She wore a straw hat and a black embroidered blouse. She must have been 60. I often saw her going into the Greek shop in the harbour, the one with hats from all over the world. One day she dropped a book on the floor, and I jumped in to help her. Thank you, young lady, she said in an elegant tone, then went on her way. I trailed behind her, sniffing the fine air. I then got myself an ice cream with the money I had saved from begging that day. As I sipped it I began to dream of another life, one in which I could have been my lady's grandson.
(Translated by Anca Cristina Georgiana Mihai / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / 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 January 2023, the group has 10,220 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. 
