My father old man's coat faded, and so did the blood stain of my mother's. The memories are hidden in yellowed photos but I live on. So alive I feel the pain of the word home. And I'd turn back the clock at least for the holidays by giving it a molasses taste and smear it on slices of cake. But it's not, my parents' unique door no longer exists in order to open it and feel welcomed with Christmas wishes. Now there are two houses. My sweetheart grabs my hand and places it on her festering belly, and a sad thought crosses my mind. We'll be a house.
(Translated by Delia-Maria Cocoș / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / 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 March 2023, the group has 10,790 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, Luchian Abel, and Vlad Mușat. (Drawing by Adrian T. Roman)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale. 
