Our Daily Bread

Gheorghiță Mircea
On the 15th of September '85, I got off at Slatina railway station and started my internship at Cărbunoase, the steel electrodes factory. A town with a special charm, it had a very nice old part, although dusty, and in front, on a hill, a giant portrait of the great leader. I stayed in a filthy cămin de nefamiliști[1]. Hungry, I went out. At the bakery, there was a notice. We have ogs[2]. I looked for the toilet. They didn't have any, but they had eggs. I had eggs already, so I asked for bread. Do you have an invitation? I look at the salesgirl and laugh. Are you kidding? I don't have any. Then I can't give any to you.
Andra Toropoc
People were stunned at the unveiling of the statue of love. It was just a woman with a baked pita face, dumpling eyes, bagel ears and a muffin mouth. Hair of braided dough rippled over limbs of crisp loaves, revealing breasts of milky buns and bellies of leavened sourdough. The ribs were made of croissants, and on the left side a single one glowed with honey. The artist invited everyone to taste his work. By evening there were only a few flies left caught on a sweet spot. And lots of crumbs.

Florentina Ghițescu
I was invited to a wedding. I recently discovered the concept of thriftiness and decided to wear an older dress. One didn't go past my knees, one didn't go past my middle. What would be cheaper? Buy another dress or lose weight. I figured option two. Wrong. Gym membership, personal trainer, diet, psychotherapy, apparently I'm traumatized that's why I'm eating so much, time I would have made money. I don't want to add it all up. There was another option, giving up the bread.

(Translated by Corina-Alexandra Belu / 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 April 2024, the group has 12,860 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.