My mom hugs me at the door, and I beg her to lead me to the school again. I'm afraid to walk alone on the road. You're a big girl, she told me, you'll be fine. And I left. I stept, as any other day, on the same sidewalk, I look to the left, I look to the right before crossing the street, my backpack is heavy, my stomach feels like I have stones in it. I start breathing as a sign of relief as soon as I see the school. I maaade it. Later I found out, that many days, my mother was always a few steps behind me.
Monica Ciurea
Lulă passed slowly down the alley. The women spit in their breasts and did a cross. Lulă seldom went out, but when he did, there was always a big fuss. Everyone knew him after he remained immovable in front of the church on the Day of Pentecost. In the morning, he knew the Slavonic liturgy better than the priest, so the icon would cry. This time he stopped at Lola's door and began to tell her in ranges and riddles: o sole mio, sono solo, tutto solo sulla terra, solo con te. Lola, a former gondolier's caretaker, was crying.
Carmen Moldovan
A gray autumn evening, the almost empty streetcar in that Sunday, was balancing on the tracks. The child was reading a book, absorbed. So absorbed that he didn't realize the passing of the time, he didn't even see how the route was traversed almost from one end of the line to the other. Just before he reached his destination, he also reached the ending of the book and he closed it, worried. When he came down the streetcar, his mother didn't even notice, in the light rain, the tear on his cheek. It was Alone in the world by Hector Malot.
(Translated by Mihaela Stănilescu / 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.