Rerouting

Monica Bologa
I get out of bed, get dressed without washing my eyes, go out, lock the door, throw the key into the bush in front of the building, bypass the park, pass through about three neighborhoods, reach the bridge, climb on the railing, then, when I'm about to take off, I wake up with a child next to me eating cheese puffs. Mister, I want to fly too, he says to me. I climb down from the railing, take the child's hand, and we cross the bridge together. He runs to his mother, I head home. I retrieve my key from the bush, enter the house, and wash my face. Now I'm going to buy myself some cheese puffs.

Gabriel Rusu
I used to be a wild party animal. The kind who climbs onto your house's roof, chest bared, howling at the moon. In the corners of my soul, I felt emptiness, sometimes amplified by countless beers, but the thought that you can't have everything you want somehow comforted me. One spring, I met her. I continued with my life, until the evening of the Europa League final. That's when I truly felt that the path of my life was gaining color. I packed a few clothes and set off decisively.

Sanda Burță
I heard the bell, but I thought I had time, I wouldn't run around in my underwear, for heaven's sake. She said: run he is going to kill you, I said: wait I need to pull up my pants, she said: run for heaven's sake, I said: where is my jacket, she pushed me, I pulled her, then, I said: hey, come let me give you a kiss, my little dove, she said: how much she missed her little rooster, I grumbled, the window slammed above me. I stood there stunned, and then I knocked on the window because I couldn't leave without it. That's when it happened. No use running in zigzag, like a rabbit, he shot me, the bastard, with my own gun in the ass, Mr. Judge. But I love her.

(Translated by Andreea Laura Stanca / 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.