Yes, sir, I admit I ran a red light. Well, it was yellow, actually, but I don't want to argue with you. I know it's a great offense, but the circumstances called for it. Let me explain, from man to man. Any true man is sensitive to the feminine beauty. Did you see how she overtook me? I only got to notice her ponytail and slim waist. I sped up to catch up to her at the next stoplight. I wanted to see what she looked like from the front, too. Goodness, you're taking my license away? That's abuse. Since when do traffic laws criminalize curiosity?
Alina Nedelcu
Great hubbub. The red and square-ish Tazz backpack rests on my lumbar vertebrae. Y'know, if you order pizza, I'm warm, but if you're on a diet I'm shivering. At the stoplight by Dristor, the window of the Toyota on the second lane rolls down, from the car, a sweet, cherry-flavoured smoke emerges. Hey handsome, maybe you'll get me two pizzas this evening. She threw me a banknote with little care, on which she had written a phone number in eyeliner. At home, I cleaned the eyeliner with rubbing alcohol because it dirtied my wallet.
Iulia Stavre
In my childhood, a Greek woman the same age as my grandma had told me the stories of the island. This holiday, I wished to look for them, in her memory. I rented a car. That is how I found the lighthouse on the seafront, the white church on the beach, and the tavern by the fish market. I got lost searching for the beach on the gulf. The car got a flat tire. You stopped. When you extended the helmet towards me and we hopped on the scooter, I knew that the wind would unravel my dreams, convoluted labyrinths until then, through which I was losing my way every night.
(Translated by Adriana-Maria Botea / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.