Once upon a time there lived an old man and a beard. He could have had around a hundred year, but he chose to have less. Yes, less is better, he told himself. His beard was so long, that everyday tens of wise men journeyed to find its end. The one who would have found it, would have been offered the borders of a land, if not, his head would be cut from the roots of his soles. The only one who reached the end of the beard, swears on his own beard that the hairs were attached to another face. Hmm, he said, a beard that grows on two opposite heads.
(Translated by Jessica-Polixenia-Cristiana Copilaș / 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 June 2023, the group has 11,430 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. 
