Suddenly, a Knock on the Door: Stories (12 page)
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Authors: Etgar Keret,Nathan Englander,Miriam Shlesinger,Sondra Silverston
BOOK: Suddenly, a Knock on the Door: Stories
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This is the story of a man who suffered from a hemorrhoid. Not a lot of hemorrhoids. A single, solitary one. This hemorrhoid started out small and annoying, but very soon it became medium-sized and irritating, and in less than two months it grew to be big and really painful. The man continued to live his life as usual: he worked long hours every day, took time off on weekends, and fucked on the side whenever he had the chance. But this hemorrhoid, which was clinging to a vein, kept reminding him at every long meeting or through every painful bowel movement that to live is to suffer, to live is to sweat, to live is an ache you can’t fucking forget. And so, before every important decision, the man would listen to his hemorrhoid the way others listen to their conscience. And the hemorrhoid, like any hemorrhoid, would give the man some asshole advice. Advice on whom to fire, advice on aiming higher, advice on whether to pick a fight and with whom he should conspire. And it worked. With every passing day, the man became more and more successful. The earnings of the company he ran kept growing, and so did the hemorrhoid. It reached a point where the hemorrhoid outgrew the man. And even then, it didn’t stop. Until eventually it was the hemorrhoid that was chairman of the board. And sometimes, when the hemorrhoid took its seat on the chair in the boardroom, it found the man underneath a little irritating.
This is the story of a hemorrhoid that suffered from a man. The hemorrhoid continued to live its life as usual: It worked long hours every day, took time off on weekends, and fucked on the side whenever it had the chance. But this man, who was clinging to a vein, kept reminding him at every long meeting or painful BM that to live is to yearn, to live is to burn, to live is to fucking screw up and wait for fate to turn. And the hemorrhoid would listen to the man the way people listen to their stomach when it rumbles and asks for food—passively but acceptingly. And thanks to this man, the hemorrhoid tried to believe it could live and let live, it could learn to forgive. It could conquer its urge to look down on others. And even when it swore, it didn’t mention people’s mothers. And so, thanks to the irritating little man under him, everyone came to value the hemorrhoid: hemorrhoids, people, and, of course, the company’s satisfied shareholders all around the world.
When the new great depression began, NW was hardest hit. Its merchandise was meant for the affluent class, but after the Chicago riots, even the wealthy stopped ordering, some of them because of the unstable economic situation, but most of them because they just couldn’t face their neighbors. The shares lay on the stock-market floors of the world and bled out, percentage after percentage. And NW turned into a symbol of the depression. The headline of
The Wall Street Journal
’s story about it was “Hailstorms in September,” a takeoff of its ad “September All Year Long,” which showed a family clad only in bathing suits on a sunny autumn day decorating a Christmas tree. The ad caught on like wildfire. A week after it was broadcast for the first time, they were already selling three thousand units a day. Wealthy Americans bought, and so did the less wealthy who were faking it. The NW weather-control systems became a status symbol. The official stamp of a millionaire. They now signified what executive jets used to signify in the ’90s and into 2000. Nice Weather, weather for the wealthy. If you live in Arctic Greenland, and the snow and grayness are driving you crazy, all you have to do is swipe your credit card and, with a satellite or two, they’ll set you up with a perfect autumn day in Cannes on your balcony every day of the year.
The Wall Street Journal
’s story about it was “Hailstorms in September,” a takeoff of its ad “September All Year Long,” which showed a family clad only in bathing suits on a sunny autumn day decorating a Christmas tree. The ad caught on like wildfire. A week after it was broadcast for the first time, they were already selling three thousand units a day. Wealthy Americans bought, and so did the less wealthy who were faking it. The NW weather-control systems became a status symbol. The official stamp of a millionaire. They now signified what executive jets used to signify in the ’90s and into 2000. Nice Weather, weather for the wealthy. If you live in Arctic Greenland, and the snow and grayness are driving you crazy, all you have to do is swipe your credit card and, with a satellite or two, they’ll set you up with a perfect autumn day in Cannes on your balcony every day of the year.
Yakov (Yaki) Brayk was one of the first to buy the system from them. He truly loved his money and had a hard time parting with it, but even more than he loved the millions he earned from selling weapons and drugs to Zimbabwe, he hated those humid New York summers and that icky feeling when your sweaty undershirt sticks to your back. He bought a system not only for himself but for the whole block. Some people mistakenly saw that as generosity, but the truth is he did it just to keep the great weather with him all the way to the corner convenience store. That convenience store wasn’t only the place to buy unfiltered Noblesse cigarettes they imported from Israel for him; more than anything, it marked for Yaki the boundary of his living space. And from the minute Yaki signed the check, the block turned into a weather paradise. No dismal rain or sweltering heat. Just September all year long. And not, God forbid, that annoying New York September, but the kind he grew up with in Haifa. And then suddenly, out of the blue, there were the riots in Chicago and the neighbors demanded that he turn off his perfect autumn weather. At first, he ignored them, but then those lawyers’ letters turned up in his mailbox and someone left a slaughtered peacock on his windshield. That’s when his wife asked him to turn it off. It was January. Yaki turned off the autumn and the day instantly became shorter and sadder. All because of one slaughtered peacock and an anxiety-ridden, anorexic wife who, as always, was able to control him through her weakness.
The recession just got worse. On Wall Street, NW stocks hit rock bottom, and so did shares in Yaki’s company. And after they hit rock bottom, they drilled a hole through the rocks and fell even lower. It’s funny, you’d think that weapons and drugs would be recessionproof, but actually the opposite turned out to be true. People had no money to buy medicine and they rediscovered what they’d long forgotten: that live weapons are a luxury, just like electric car windows, and that sometimes it takes only a stone you found in the yard to smash somebody’s skull in. They quickly learned to manage without Yaki’s rifles, much more quickly than Yaki could get used to the gloomy weather of mid-March. And Yaki Brayk, or Lucky Brayk, as the financial columnists liked to call him, went bankrupt.
He kept the apartment (the company’s accountant managed to retroactively put it in the anorexic’s wife’s name), but all the rest was gone. They even took the furniture. Four days later, an NW technician came to disconnect the system. When Yaki opened the door for him, he was standing there completely rain-soaked. Yaki made him hot coffee and they talked for a while. Yaki told him that not long after the Chicago riot, he’d stopped using the system. The technician said that a lot of customers had stopped. They talked about the riot, when a furious mob from the slums stormed the summery homes of the wealthy residents of the city. “All that sun they had drove us crazy,” one of the rioters said on a news commentary show a few days later. “Let’s see you freezing your butt off with no money for heat and those bastards, those bastards …” At that point, he burst into tears. The camera blurred his face to hide his identity, so you couldn’t actually see the tears, but you could hear him wailing like a wounded animal. The technician, who was black, said he was born in that neighborhood in Chicago, but today he was ashamed to admit it. “That money,” he said, “all that fucking money just fucked up the world.”
After coffee, when the technician was ready to disconnect the system, Yaki asked if he could turn it on just one last time. The technician shrugged and Yaki took that as a yes. He pressed a few buttons on the remote and the sun suddenly came out from behind a cloud. “That’s not the real sun, you know,” the technician said proudly. “What they do is image it, with lasers.” Yaki winked and said, “Don’t spoil it. For me, it’s the sun.” The technician nodded and said, “A great sun. Too bad you can’t keep it out till I get back to the car. I’m sick of this rain.” Yaki didn’t answer. He just closed his eyes and let the sun wash over his face.
There are conversations that can change a person’s life. I’m sure of it. I mean, I’d like to believe it. I’m sitting in a café with a producer. He’s not exactly a producer, he never produced anything, but he wants to. He has an idea for a film and he wants me to write the screenplay. I explain that I don’t write for films, and he accepts that and calls the waitress over. I’m sure he wants to ask for the check, but he orders himself another espresso instead. The waitress asks me if I want something else, and I ask for a glass of water. The wannabe producer’s name is Yossef, but he introduces himself as Joseph. “No one,” he says, “is really called Yossef. It’s always Sefi or Yossi or Yoss, so I went for Joseph.” He’s sharp, that Joseph. Reads me like a book. “You’re busy, right?” he says when he sees me glance at my watch, and immediately adds, “Very busy. Traveling, working, writing e-mails.” There’s nothing malicious or sarcastic in the way he says it. It’s a statement of fact or, at the most, an expression of sympathy. I nod. “Not being busy scares you?” he asks. I nod again. “Me too,” he says and gives me a yellow-toothed smile. “There must be something down there. Something frightening. If not, we wouldn’t be grinding our time so thin on all kinds of projects. And you know what scares me most?” he asks. I hesitate for a second, thinking about what to answer, but Joseph doesn’t wait. “Myself,” he continues, “what I am. You know that nothingness that fills you up a second after you come? Not with someone you love, just with some girl, or when you jerk off. You know it? That’s what scares me, looking into myself and finding nothing there. Not your average nothingness, but the kind that totally bums you out, I don’t know exactly what to call it …”
Now he’s quiet. I feel uncomfortable with his silence. If we were closer, maybe I could be silent with him. But not at our first meeting. Not after a comment like that. “Sometimes,” I say, trying to return his frankness, “life seems like a trap to me. Something you walk into unsuspectingly and then it snaps closed around you. And when you’re inside—inside life, I mean—there’s no escape, except maybe suicide, which isn’t really an escape, it’s more like surrender. You know what I mean?”
“It’s fuck-all,” Joseph says. “It’s just fuck-all that you won’t write the screenplay.” There’s something very weird about the way he talks. He doesn’t even curse like other people. I don’t know what to say after that, so I keep quiet. “Never mind,” he says after a minute. “Your saying no just gives me the chance to meet with other people, drink more coffee. And that’s the best part of this business. I don’t think the actual producing is for me.” I must have nodded, because he reacts to it. “You think I don’t have it, right? That I’m not really a producer, that I’m just some guy with a little money from his parents who talks a lot.” I must still be nodding, unintentionally, from the pressure, because now he’s laughing. “You’re right,” he says, “or maybe not, maybe I’ll surprise you yet. And myself.”
Joseph asks for the check and insists on paying. “What about our waitress?” he asks while we wait for his credit card to be swiped. “You figure she’s trying to escape too? From herself, I mean?” I shrug. “And that guy who just walked in, with the coat? Look how he’s sweating. He’s definitely running away from something. Maybe we’ll form a start-up. Instead of the film—a program that finds people who are trying to run away from themselves, who are afraid of what they might find out. It could be a hit.” I look at the sweaty guy in the coat. It’s the first time in my life I see a suicide bomber. Afterward, in the hospital, foreign journalists will ask me to describe him and I’ll say I don’t remember. Because I’ll think it’s something kind of personal, something I should keep between me and him. Joseph will survive the blast too. But not so the waitress. Not that there’s any culpability on her part. In terrorist attacks, character is not a factor. In the end, it’s all a matter of angle and distance. “That guy who just came in is definitely running away from something,” Joseph says, and laughs, rummaging around in his pockets for some change for the tip. “Maybe he’ll agree to write the screenplay for me or at least meet for coffee.” Our waitress, laminated menu in hand, dances her way over to the sweaty guy in the coat.
She decided to open the restaurant right away, the morning after the funeral. When Itamar heard about it, she thought he’d explode. “Just one hour ago you buried your husband, and already you’re in a hurry to sell
çorba
?!” “We don’t do
çorba
, Itamar,” Halina said in her most reassuring voice, “and it’s not about money at all. It’s about people. I do better being with clients at the restaurant than sitting at home on my own.” “But you’re the one who insisted we shouldn’t sit shiva,” Itamar said. “You said you didn’t want all the hassle.” “It wasn’t because of the hassle,” Halina protested. “When people leave their body to science, you don’t sit shiva. That’s just how it is. When Horshovsky’s father died, nobody …” “Give me a break, Mother,” Itamar snapped. “Leave Horshovsky out of this, and the Shiffermans and Mrs. Pinchevsky from Twenty-one Bialik Street. Just us, okay? Does it seem reasonable to you that the day after Dad dies you go and open the restaurant as if it were business as usual”? “Yes,” Halina insisted. “In my heart, it won’t be as usual, but for everyone who comes into the restaurant it will be. Your father may be dead, but the business is alive.” “The business is dead too,” Itamar said, gritting his teeth. “It’s been dead for years now. We haven’t had so much as a dog in here.”
çorba
?!” “We don’t do
çorba
, Itamar,” Halina said in her most reassuring voice, “and it’s not about money at all. It’s about people. I do better being with clients at the restaurant than sitting at home on my own.” “But you’re the one who insisted we shouldn’t sit shiva,” Itamar said. “You said you didn’t want all the hassle.” “It wasn’t because of the hassle,” Halina protested. “When people leave their body to science, you don’t sit shiva. That’s just how it is. When Horshovsky’s father died, nobody …” “Give me a break, Mother,” Itamar snapped. “Leave Horshovsky out of this, and the Shiffermans and Mrs. Pinchevsky from Twenty-one Bialik Street. Just us, okay? Does it seem reasonable to you that the day after Dad dies you go and open the restaurant as if it were business as usual”? “Yes,” Halina insisted. “In my heart, it won’t be as usual, but for everyone who comes into the restaurant it will be. Your father may be dead, but the business is alive.” “The business is dead too,” Itamar said, gritting his teeth. “It’s been dead for years now. We haven’t had so much as a dog in here.”
At the hospital, when they told her Gideon had died, she didn’t cry. But after what Itamar said, she did. Not in front of him, of course; as long as he was around, she kept a stiff upper lip. But as soon as he left, she cried like a baby. “It doesn’t mean I’m not a good wife,” she assured herself between sobs. “I’m a lot more upset that Gideon is dead than that Itamar said those things, but insults are much easier to cry over.” It was true. Ever since they’d moved to the arcade the clientele had dwindled. She’d been against the move from the word
go
, but Gideon said it was their big chance, “the chance of a lifetime.” Ever since then, every time they fought, she’d remind him of that “chance of a lifetime,” and now that he was dead, there was nobody for her to remind. She and the Chinaman had been sitting in the empty restaurant for three hours in complete silence. The Chinaman had been very fond of Gideon, who was very patient with him. Gideon used to spend hours teaching the Chinaman how to make cholent and gefilte fish, and whenever he ruined anything, and Halina would blurt out a swearword, Gideon would intervene: “Never mind, never mind.” If nobody shows up by three, she’ll close, she thought. Not just for today. For good. Two people running a business is different. When there’s a crowd there’s someone to help out, and when there isn’t, at least you have someone to talk to. “You okay?” the Chinaman asked, and Halina nodded and tried to smile. Maybe even before three. She’ll just lock up and leave.
go
, but Gideon said it was their big chance, “the chance of a lifetime.” Ever since then, every time they fought, she’d remind him of that “chance of a lifetime,” and now that he was dead, there was nobody for her to remind. She and the Chinaman had been sitting in the empty restaurant for three hours in complete silence. The Chinaman had been very fond of Gideon, who was very patient with him. Gideon used to spend hours teaching the Chinaman how to make cholent and gefilte fish, and whenever he ruined anything, and Halina would blurt out a swearword, Gideon would intervene: “Never mind, never mind.” If nobody shows up by three, she’ll close, she thought. Not just for today. For good. Two people running a business is different. When there’s a crowd there’s someone to help out, and when there isn’t, at least you have someone to talk to. “You okay?” the Chinaman asked, and Halina nodded and tried to smile. Maybe even before three. She’ll just lock up and leave.
There were almost twenty of them, and as soon as they stood by the door looking at the menu outside she knew there’d be a racket. The one who came in first was gigantic, a head taller than she was, with salt-and-pepper hair and eyebrows like a carpet. “You open?” he asked, and for a second she debated, but by the time she’d opened her mouth to answer, the restaurant was packed—with gold-and-purple nail polish, and the sharp smell of vodka, and shrieking children. She and the Chinaman lined up a few tables, and when she brought them the menus the tall guy said, “We don’t need menus now, lady. Just bring everyone plate and knife-and-fork.” And while she and the Chinaman were setting out the plates she spotted the picnic coolers. They started pulling out food and bottles of drink and filling plates, looking not in the least embarrassed. If Gideon were alive, he’d have kicked them out, but she didn’t even have it in her to say anything. “Now you come here with us,” the tall man said. She signaled the Chinaman to sit down at the table with them, and sat down herself, though she wasn’t really in the mood. “Drink up, lady,” he commanded. “Drink up.” He filled her glass with vodka. “Today is special day.” And as she stared at him, puzzled, he added with a wink: “Today is day we find this restaurant you manage with Japanese guy. Why you not eating?”
Their food was tasty. And after downing a glass or two, Halina didn’t mind their coarseness anymore. Even if they weren’t ordering anything and even if they were using up all the dishes, she was glad they had come, filling the whole place with their shrieking and their laughter. That way at least she didn’t have to stay there on her own. They drank
l’chaim
—to life. To her life, and to the life of the business, and even to the life of Gideon. For some reason that she couldn’t quite figure out, she told them he was abroad on business. Then they drank to the life of Gideon’s business abroad and to Joseph, which was what they called the Chinaman. And to the life of Joseph’s family and then to the life of the state. And Halina, who was a bit drunk by then, tried to remember how many years it had been since she’d last toasted the state. When they finished everything in their picnic coolers, the tall guy asked her what she thought of their food, and Halina said it was excellent. “Very good,” the tall guy smiled. “I’m happy. And now, we have your menu.” At first, Halina didn’t understand what he meant. Maybe because of the vodka. But the tall guy explained right away: “You sat with us and you ate our food. Now it is time for us to sit with you and eat your food.”
l’chaim
—to life. To her life, and to the life of the business, and even to the life of Gideon. For some reason that she couldn’t quite figure out, she told them he was abroad on business. Then they drank to the life of Gideon’s business abroad and to Joseph, which was what they called the Chinaman. And to the life of Joseph’s family and then to the life of the state. And Halina, who was a bit drunk by then, tried to remember how many years it had been since she’d last toasted the state. When they finished everything in their picnic coolers, the tall guy asked her what she thought of their food, and Halina said it was excellent. “Very good,” the tall guy smiled. “I’m happy. And now, we have your menu.” At first, Halina didn’t understand what he meant. Maybe because of the vodka. But the tall guy explained right away: “You sat with us and you ate our food. Now it is time for us to sit with you and eat your food.”
They ordered from the menu as if they hadn’t eaten a thing, and ate voraciously. Salads, soups, pot roasts, and, afterward, even dessert. “Your food is good, lady,” the tall guy said, taking out his wallet to pay. “Very good. Even better than what we bring.” And when he’d finished counting the bills and putting them on the table, he added: “Your husband, when he is coming back?” Halina hesitated before answering, and then said it wasn’t clear yet and that it all depended on his business over there. “He left wife behind, alone?” the tall guy said disapprovingly, his voice kind of sad. “That is not right.” And Halina, who wanted to say everything was fine and that she was managing, really, found herself nodding, and smiling, as if her eyes weren’t glistening with tears.
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