We Who Stand on the Front Line

Dan Banu
When the sky began to darken and the wind grew fierce, when the sand rose higher than Tabor, and the mist engulfed the entire kibbutz, they knew the end had come. There was nothing left to do but wait. When the mist lifted, Osip found himself sitting on the sand. Then Simon appeared, and Joseph, and David, and the others - all with long beards and staffs at their sides. But where are the houses, and the streets, and the trees? asked Jonah. We'll build new ones, murmured the white-haired stranger, stepping towards the place where sky and sand became one.
 
 Adina Drag
When the bullet hit him, Illya barely noticed. The earth teetered like a tired old man beneath him. Some strange weakness reminded him of Oleg, known as the Wolf, who lit his cigarettes with hands that never trembled. When the first bombshell landed, the Wolf turned around to Illya,who, for the first time, saw in his eyes something that looked like fear. Death did not care that the Wolf never fired the first shot. Nor that Illya was always the last to retreat. The footsteps of their fellow soldiers still echo somewhere in the distance.
 
 Gabi Lupu
I was neck and neck with the guy in second place. I could feel his breath on the back of my neck. It took everything I had to push past him in the final stretch. We were all important, but only the first one truly mattered. After him, no one else mattered. Getting there, competing against the best of the best was the ultimate joy. I was elated. I closed my eyes and saw my grand prize. Oh, God, what happiness. How proud I was of myself, of the fight I had fought. There were still nine months to wait until I could see my prize, but at least now I was where I had to be.

 
(Translated by Mara Scoroșanu / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)