He responded half-heartedly to the greeting, as if it were the shadow of the one I kept in my chest. He had lost his youthful confidence. He didn't even move his hips with the same passion. Our meeting seemed to belong to the realm of happy coincidences. I did not expect such a surprise from life, especially since the signs told me otherwise. I told you, first the black cat, then it was a Tuesday the 13th. And yet, the Universe doesn't care about such little things. He kisses you passionately when he feels like it.
(Translated by Andreea Laura Stanca / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / 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 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. 
