Soap Bubbles

Monica Bologa
The old man was sitting by the ditch, in front of his house. Some children from his street were disturbing his peace. One boy was blowing colourful bubbles through a small circle, and the other children were running around trying to catch them. A bubble popped on the old man's beard, another one on his knee, and a few on his hat. Suddenly, he got up and left. He went into his house, wrapped a piece of wire around one of those plastic circles used to hang up curtains, put some water and dish soap in a glass and he went out. That evening, his wife found him in the stable, blowing bubbles at the cow and the two cats.

Răzvan Drăgoi
In Oymyakon, Ivan blew a soap bubble which instantly froze, of course. In Washington this gesture was interpreted as if the Russians want to dominate the whole planet. In Moscow it was suggested that perhaps Ivan was an undercover agent who suggested that Russia had to be incarcerated in an ice prison. In Beijing, they started to wonder if the Siberian might have wanted to buy some ice. In Brussels, it was determined that Ivan violated the bubble's rights and he was declared a terrorist. Ivan was three years old. And he still had some soap left.

George Dometi
Some have a hearing deficiency, others a speaking one, he has a life deficiency. Sitting on a meatless stern in the crypt, he was chewing on a late soldier's bones. They told him that this was the only way that they would accept him as a cadet. Come on, you bastard, finish your feast and beat it. Go back to your place, you bugger. Where did you come from? You are as thin as a stick and as small as a soap bubble. Be careful not to pop on the way out. Who do you think would even send you to war? I can't even place you in the first line, they are going to think that we are sending out our kids.

(Translated by Cristina-Paula Grosu / 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 November 2023, the group has 12,090 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.