New folder

Andra Toropoc
After many smiles and a couple of slow dances, she had arrived home completely in love. Her mother had given her a reproachful look, not again? She didn't care, she couldn't wait telling the story about, hmm, what was his name? She frowned, she knew he was handsome and a good dancer, but she didn't know his name. It's alright, she consoled herself, that was no obstacle in the way of love. She took the secret notebook full of notes, opened it to the first blank page and meticulously described her emotions and her insomnia just as she always did, old folders for new loves. All of them anonymous.

Florina Hegedüs
I am in the waiting room. With a lot of years in my bags. It's hot, too hot. I take my skin off, my flesh. A kid colours my bones with a sharpie. There's nothing pathetic about that. An honest game with sense. I even laugh when a red sharpie slides between my ribs. They are announcing my train. I get on. Madame, please, show me your soul - the conductor asks. I lost it. Understanding he puts a stamp on my skull. I lied to him, although I know it's in the new, white house, no. 2024. It's waiting for me. As the train rushes, fields appear through the window. They are not green yet.

Andrei Tiganus
2012. My first computer. Big, white, with a turban. I press the oval shaped button, wait nervously for those five minutes that it takes until it opens, I admire the hills and blue sky. I click right on the mouse and my gaze falls on a small yellow icon. New folder. I don't really know what that means, but I open it and I see a bunch of pixels ready to be used, like a blank page. I guess there are endless possibilities, but as a beginner, I don't know how to create those yet. So for now, I place it in the top corner, floating beautifully in the sky.

(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 February 2024, the group has 12,700 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.