Anarchy and Jasmine

Mirela A. Nica
What's going on here? Have the acacia trees gone mad? No, my lady, answered the rose while taking a bow. That was fake news. Acacia trees never go mad. Discretion is in their nature. But the linden trees have rebelled. Since they have bloomed, all of your servants grew pale. People don't stop to admire you like before either. They pass your shrub with indifference. They forgot how you flavoured their tea. Now they walk the paths inebriated. They don't even check their phones anymore. It's natural. It's their time, said Lady J almost asleep.

Carmen-Ecaterina Ciobâcă
The shouting of the fishermen, the muezzin call for prayer, the screaming of the seagulls cradle and engulf me. I close my eyes. I am there once more, with my people. A body with a thousand arms that yells its anger. The others threaten to crush us. We wave our flags, the mouths shout their own impotence. It's your turn doctor. Irhal. Suddenly, it starts to rain. A comrade falls. I bend down to lift him up, the loud bang breaks me. I wonder what is left of our dreams. Hatred, I answer and push the wheels of the chair towards the Galata bridge. I have a sign around my neck: Help Syrian refugees.

Alex Caragian
Confectionery is their calling, but the circumstances made Iasmina & Jasmin Amazons. They move a herd of horses in the attic only at night, and they water it when the stained glass leaks out its damp colours. The mares neigh until they shake off their petals from the vibration. The night is the day's dream, and during the day they whip cream until they collapse. Streams of crème pâtissière dribble hungrily on the raspberry nipples on top of the enticing chocolate fondant cake. They know recipes for which crusades were carried through deep gazes, but they keep them on the bottom of the lake.

(Translated by Ruxandra Adriana Dodoiu / 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 August 2023, the group has 11,680 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.