One-night Stand

Cristina Daniela Dumitru-Pascal
He is in the bedroom. He's crying. It's the alcohol that's making him cry, actually. She's cleaning the blood of the wall. He knocked her head against it so she wouldn't leave him. One eye is red, green, black and the other is swollen. On her cheek, he inkied his handprint and all of his fingers. Her skin throbbed and burned from the belt he used to caress her. I love you, forgive me, she hears him. When? Perhaps only on the first night they met. She looks at him. He fell asleep in his own vomit. Through gritted teeth, she whispers, you're mine, I'll kill you, bitch. She opens the door and crosses the doorstep without turning her head. In a bathrobe and slippers.

Arthur Ianoși
When the Mureș river spits out its souls, it's a sign it's tired of death. Marin knows that and pulls his boat ashore. He lights a pipe and watches how it churns at first with spite, as if the water were waves of earth, then it calms down, and the magic begins. Don't blink. Thousands of Ephemeridae insects start to dance above the water, reminding everyone of those who loved each other and couldn't be together. The Mureș river blossoms, so says the legend. Two mayflies rest in its cracked palm and unite for a day. There is peace now.

Andreea Luise Stana
They've known each other for eight years, their relationship had always been platonic. Until that night. The road to the station was long, the trams stopped running, and the frost had no mercy. They still had 2 km to go when suddenly he grabbed her hand. Having arrived at the station, they went into the waiting room. They stayed there in complete silence, frozen and hugging as if they had always been waiting for the moment. I wanted to kiss you but I didn't have the courage, he messaged her after he got on the train. She read, but didn't answer. When she came out of the station, her hands were still shaking on her phone.

(Translated by Maria-Ilinca Darie / 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 December 2023, the group has 12,210 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.