That village had once been cursed, as one of the locals had told him, and that was exactly what had attracted him to it. He was fed up with the miracle of the modern world. That's where he'd met the shepherd too, and from him he'd learned what the curse was about. Something about people trapped in time. He didn't understand much and suspected it was just gossip. It wasn't until he met the one they called dirt poor that he began to wonder. His face looked so familiar, even so, hidden under hair and dirt.
Marius Dichisan
It's an unwritten rule, you must not see, speak, hear and above all meddle in other people's business, otherwise you wake up with a ton of cement patting you on the head or wallowing at the bottom of a canal with an anchor tied to your feet. There's a reward for everything when you're in an elite group, as the boss likes to say. A man with a mustache in a grey hat and overcoat enters the room wielding a Thompson machine gun. He stares at me coldly. I hold my breath and close my eyes but don't hear the bullets whizzing by. It's not my turn yet.
Vlad Mușat
Few remember the tech boom. I'm the editor of the Scroll newspaper and I have to finish an article on a novel. Operator Maria got married five years ago to the lamplighter Antonio. The problem arose three days ago when the centralist's alleged lover, bowling player Caesar, was suspected of stabbing Antonio to death, right outside the town hall. The situation gets more complicated, because since yesterday we have a second suspect, Traian, the human alarm clock, who we have learned is Caesar's boyfriend.
(Translated by Alina Bâznă / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.