We were sitting at a table with a drink each. It was past midnight and I l'd lost track of the emptied glasses. I stared at him with the same awe I'd had since I met him. Such a clever lad. And well-read. And full of potential. And gravedigger, the puzzlement roared in my brain. Something didn't quite add up in my head. As if overhearing my thoughts, he looked at me and said, serenely. Do you know why I became a gravedigger? I raised my eyebrows in sign I didn't. It makes you feel very alive, you know? But it reminds you it's only for a while.
Yuka Brevi
We all arrived at the pot market, one by one. Me, round, painted with daisies, others enamelled, with or without handles. We sat in the sun, laughed and waited for someone to buy us, to smoke us in the wood-burning oven, filled with cabbage, beans or sausages. It was all fun and games until a pitcher appeared with a small beak and a narrow neck. Slightly chipped and, above all, tense, he started swearing at us and rattling the counter, with the clear intention of knocking us over. But he fell down himself, merging with the ground. Dust to dust, said a deep, deep bowl.
Ana-Maria Butuza
He grabbed her wrists, forcing her against the wall, but she stumbled, fell across the table and pulled him with her. She struggled, dug her knees into his stomach, and his rage ignited. He grabbed her hair and slammed her head against the tabletop. The buttons of her shirt popped under his greedy fingers, but her hand grabbed the neck of an overturned bottle. She grabbed it and hit him. She didn't stop even after he collapsed. With the last of her strength, she dragged him through the mud, pulled up the latrine planks and shoved him where he belonged, in his own filth.
(Translated by Andreea Georgiana Bogdan / 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.