Myeah. You said your mother died? Just what we needed. What do you mean, her last will says to embalm her? I told you not to let her go alone on pilgrimages to kiss dead people. Where do you think she got this idea? I don't know how to embalm people. Do you? She left a recipe? Fine, we'll try and see what comes of it. She doesn't care anymore anyway. Right, so, boiling water, salt, sugar, pepper, vinegar, celery and preservatives. Anything else? I'll take one for the team and try it first. Mm, I think that was actually your mother's recipe for pickles.
(Translated by Bianca-Maria Ciucașu / 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. 
