this night is bright as day. That's what you told me each night before sleeping, mom. To sleep along with the angels so I can grow. Big and strong. That there's so much power contained in me that I can overturn mountains. But you were reading to me about faeries and princesses while combing my long hair. I'm grown up now, mom. And I don't want to overturn mountains, mom. I only want to overturn the damn boulder from my heart, mom. I want to love, mom. I want someone to call me dad, mom. You should have read to me about villains, mom. The night is even longer. And I can't get on the Other Side, mom.
(Translated by Diana Pașcanu / 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 February 2023, the group has 10,500 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. 
