They used to call her a gypsy since kindergarten. Don't listen to them, my father would say. She used to look in the mirror. She didn't look like her family from the island. She left so she could get lost in the blended world on the continent. At the bar she was working at and where men would tell their stories, a grizzled man was talking about his great one night stand, some blonde chick he had met sometime on the ferry going to the islands. Her name was Inga, she had a strand of hair as red as fire flames. I can't forget her. Hello, mom? Do you remember telling me that you'd never been loved? You were wrong.
Dan Banu
Nae saw her late in the evening. He walked past her while returning from the greengrocer's. She was tall and she smelled of a soft fragrance. He didn't sleep well, but he dreamt about her. At dawn he opened the window and took a look around to see her. He found her in the corner at B12. She was all colours and smiles. He put on his jacket and hastened downstairs. The closer he was getting, the faster his heart was beating. He knew he had found his paradise, but when he touched the door, it was locked, and the hothouse shouted at him: it was a hot date, dumbass, not a hothouse.
Daniela Toader
I had posters of Nena put on the walls and lots of dreams. I was dreaming of seeing Paris and stop eating butter bread every single morning. Before dreams came true, I had been listening to BASF cassette tapes on and on for days, nights, even months. Bonni m. I didn't really know their name, but I enjoyed them a lot. I wrote them one evening. I'm a fan. I love you. They sent me a postcard of them smiling after two years. They signed it too. I received it right after the Revolution. I was so happy I got the posters of Nena off the walls.
(Translated by Cristina-Andreea Dobre / 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.