Tel Aviv Noir Read online

  Table of Contents

  ___________________

  Introduction by Etgar Keret

  PART I: ENCOUNTERS

  Sleeping Mask

  GADI TAUB

  Beach Hotels Strip

  Women

  MATAN HERMONI

  Basel Street

  The Time-Slip Detective

  LAVIE TIDHAR

  Rabin Square

  Slow Cooking

  DEAKLA KEYDAR

  Levinsky Park

  PART II: ESTRANGEMENTS

  Clear Recent History

  GON BEN ARI

  Magen David Square

  Saïd the Good

  ANTONIO UNGAR

  Ajami, Jaffa

  Swirl

  SILJE BEKENG

  Rothschild Boulevard

  My Father’s Kingdom

  SHIMON ADAF

  Tel Kabir

  Who’s a Good Boy!

  JULIA FERMENTTO

  The Opera Tower

  PART III: CORPSES

  The Tour Guide

  YOAV KATZ

  Neve Sha’anan

  Death in Pajamas

  ALEX EPSTEIN

  Masarik Square

  The Expendables

  GAI AD

  Ben Zion Boulevard

  Allergies

  ETGAR KERET

  Florentin

  Center

  ASSAF GAVRON

  Dizengoff Center

  About the Contributors

  Sneak Peek: USA NOIR

  Also in Akashic Noir Series

  Akashic Noir Series Awards & Recognition

  About Akashic Books

  Copyrights & Credits

  INTRODUCTION

  THE DARK SIDE OF THE BUBBLE

  When I was a kid we didn’t have a car. My dad and I didn’t like taking the bus, and preferred to walk. I liked the peace and quiet of walking. Dad liked being able to smoke. Sometimes, when we walked down the neighborhood’s main street together, Y’s car drove by. Y was one of the most famous criminals in the country in those days. He’d pull up and greet my father. He’d ask how he was and how my mother was and offer us a ride. Usually we said no, but once or twice he gave my dad a ride to a meeting on the other side of town.

  One night, when I was already in high school, the evening news reported that Y had been arrested as a murder suspect. Dad, who was watching with me, lit a cigarette and shook his head. “This has to be a mistake,” he said. “You know Y. How could they accuse someone so warm and kind of murder?”

  Almost thirty years later I found myself sitting with Johnny Temple of Akashic Books at a coffee shop in SoHo. When he asked me to edit the anthology Tel Aviv Noir, I felt a little like my father in front of the television. I wanted to say, “Tel Aviv Noir? This has to be a mistake.” Tel Aviv is one of the happiest, friendliest, most liberal cities in the world. What could possibly be dark about our sunny city, a city nicknamed “The Bubble” due to its sense of complete separation from the violent, conflicted country in which it is situated? Compared to Jerusalem—torn apart, exploding with nationalism, xenophobia, and religious zeal—Tel Aviv has always been an island of sanity and serenity. If you don’t believe me, you can ask my eight-year-old son, who walks to school by himself every day, fearlessly. Stories of crime and sleaziness taking place in my beloved city sounded about as unbelievable to me as the accusations against Y had sounded to my father.

  By the way, Y is no longer with us. A bomb attached to the bottom of his car took care of that. But Tel Aviv is still around, and considering and reconsidering the question, I realize that in spite of its outwardly warm and polite exterior, Tel Aviv has quite a bit to hide. At any club, most of the people dancing around you to the sounds of a deep-house hit dedicated to peace and love have undergone extensive automatic-weapons training and a hand-grenade tutorial. This isn’t a conspiracy, my friends, just one of the fringe benefits of a country that institutes mandatory military service.

  The workers washing the dishes in the fluorescent-lit kitchen of that same club are Eritrean refugees who have crossed the Egyptian border illegally, along with a group of bedouins smuggling some high-quality hash, which the deejay will soon be smoking on his little podium, right by the busy dance floor filled with drunks, coked-up lawyers, and Ukrainian call girls whose pimp keeps their passports in a safe two streets away.

  Don’t get me wrong—Tel Aviv is a lovely, safe city. Most of the time, for most of its inhabitants. But the stories in this collection describe what happens the rest of the time, to the rest of its inhabitants. From one last cup of coffee at a café targeted by a suicide bomber, through repeat visits from a Yiddish-speaking ghost, to an organized tour of mythological crime scenes that goes terribly wrong, the stories of Tel Aviv Noir, edited by Assaf Gavron and myself, reveal the concealed, scarred face of this city that we love so much.

  Etgar Keret

  Tel Aviv, Israel

  July 2014

  PART I

  ENCOUNTERS

  SLEEPING MASK

  BY GADI TAUB

  Beach Hotels Strip

  It was I who came up with that name, Nicky. It seemed cool at the time. I don’t know another escort named Nicky. They always either have too-Israeli names—Chen, Mor, Nofar—or names that are like neon signs saying, Russia. Natasha, Nastia, Ilona, Katia. But I’ve never heard of a Nicky before. So I said Nicky. I told her, You’re not like the others. And you shouldn’t charge like the others. You won’t charge six hundred shekels per hour, you’ll charge 1,500 per hour.

  She didn’t understand why I thought she’d make more money than other girls. She had almost no boobs, she wasn’t blond, no hair extensions. Not a Barbie doll. She had short, brown tomboyish hair, big brown eyes. She was skinny. But she had a really pretty face. Really pretty. Those eyes. Clean. Like a model from an American magazine. Except she wasn’t tall. If you saw her on the street, even dressed for work, you’d never guess. And on her days off, she dressed like she knew whatever she happened to put on would look good. There’s no way she didn’t know. But that’s not the point. The point is, she was smart. And it’s the smarts that count. In the big league, it’s your mind, not your body. So I knew she’d make good money. I knew it from the get-go.

  I met her at the cell phone store where I buy my girls’ untraceable phones. The way it works is, you get a SIM card and a restricted number. Then you just buy minutes. I noticed her in the store. I liked her. We talked a little. She was pretty young. I thought she was an employee, but then she told me she owned the place. I wasn’t sure she was telling the truth—all our conversations were half-joking. But it turned out she was. The store was hers. She laughed at me for buying so many phones. I said I was a lawyer. Maybe she also thought I was just kidding. Said only criminals bought that many anonymous phones. I told her the difference between criminal lawyers and criminals is not that great. When you work with them, you sort of work for them, so you’re partially on the side of the law and partially on the side of crime.

  So you’re half a criminal, she said.

  I told her that wasn’t true either. I’d stopped working as a defense attorney. I was sick of the clients’ mind games. You always had to act tough or you’d get abused. It took a lot of energy, all this honor-and-toughness shit. You couldn’t call them back right away or else they sensed your weakness. You couldn’t get scared when they dropped veiled threats. You couldn’t accept when they offered you favors. You had to sit back, not bend forward, when they offered you a light. You had to look them in the eye when you said no. It was exhausting, being alert all the time, planning every move. So I still had the lawyer title, but I didn’t work at it anymore. I became a publisher. Or half a publisher, anyway. I published one paper.

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nbsp; I could tell she didn’t believe me, but I let it slide. Then one day I showed her my paper. It wasn’t exactly a paper. It was all ads for prostitutes and call girls and transvestites and dominatrices and other sex services. But it did look like a glossy magazine—chrome paper, quality printing. It was called Nightlife, and you could get it for free at any kiosk or hotel or in stacks on the sidewalk here and there. Almost anyone who worked independently advertised with me.

  It was a good business. I got between five hundred and two thousand shekels per ad, depending on the size. You could buy a quarter page, a half page, or a full page. I published about 120 ads in each issue, which meant 110,000 shekels a month, all with invoices and receipts, totally legal. Well, it used to be legal, anyway, until this new law was passed, forbidding the advertising of prostitution.

  I thought she’d look at me funny if I showed her the paper, which is why I did it. Flirting is nice, but I like a girl to know what’s what right up front, not discover it later. I wasn’t thinking of dating her or anything. She’s almost half my age. But even if this was just flirting, I like a girl to know. If it grossed her out, that was her problem. I wasn’t hiding anything.

  But she was interested. So I told her stuff. I didn’t think anything would come of those conversations. I don’t think she did either. She was just curious. I didn’t think she’d be getting a phone and a number from me one day. It was a phone she herself had sold me a month earlier.

  * * *

  Her real name was Shiri. One day she walked into my office. Denim cutoffs and a tank top, her short hair the way it always looked, as if she just got out of bed. But sexy. She was upbeat and appeared fine. Or maybe she was just acting, I don’t know. Her mood didn’t seem in tune with what she said. She said she wanted to start working with me. It took me by surprise. What did she know about prostitution?

  She said it was none of my business. She just smiled. Said she needed the money.

  Okay. I told her what I always tell new girls: This is a step. She should think hard before she takes it. Once you go there, you can’t take it back. And this time I actually meant it. Part of me didn’t want her to get into it. A girl like her—what, let any idiot have her for six hundred shekels? On the other hand, she turned me on too. Any girl who starts advertising with me, almost any girl, unless she’s especially ugly, I take her for an hour to get the ball rolling. I always pay the girl’s advertised price. I don’t ask for favors. If I have a good time I take her again once in a while.

  I told her to charge 1,500 an hour. It was a compromise between the part of me that didn’t want her to start working and the part that wanted to have her. I told her no one had advertised that kind of price with me before, but that she’d still be a hit. She thought it was funny. I told her I wasn’t kidding, she’d be a star. She looked me over. I tried to just act cool and gave her my regular spiel: You pay four hundred now, you get a phone and a number and graphic design for your ad. You can choose the wording yourself, or we can do it for you. Whatever you prefer. For that price we use a stock photo. If you want a real photo of you—no face, the face is blurred—that’s another three hundred. One-time payment. It helps sales, because I put in a caption guaranteeing the photo is real.

  She smiled.

  Once the ad is up, it’s a thousand a month for half a page, five hundred for a quarter page. I don’t recommend anything smaller than half a page, but if you want, you can share the half page with another girl. That’s it. That’s the deal. You can get back what you spend on a monthly ad in half a shift. No one splits the money with you. It’s all yours. No middleman, no agency, no pimps. You’re independent. Then I ended with my usual offer, except for ugly girls or transvestites: And I’m your first client. What are you doing tonight?

  She smiled at me again. What if I bring my own phone? she said.

  No way, I replied. The phones come through me. I smiled too.

  I asked if she was free at ten p.m. I told her I’d deduct the amount she owed for the entire package—ad, photo, design, phone—from tonight’s price. She didn’t need to pay anything in cash. I told her I’d take two hours. Three thousand minus 1,700 was 1,300 shekels. She’d more than break even by midnight. I told her that if a girl charges six hundred shekels an hour, I can take her for three hours without hardly paying anything. And it comes out of my gross income too. Can you believe it? I told her. I can claim at least some of the sex as a business expense.

  Pssshhh, she said. You have yourself a direct financing plan, huh? What about leasing? Can you lease a girl?

  I laughed. Yeah, I can. Try the Chief Rabbinate, the marriage department.

  She laughed too. I never took my eyes off her. She seemed to reassess me, as if she hadn’t really realized who I was until that moment.

  But I usually only like short-term rentals, I told her.

  Why is your office so freezing? she asked, hugging herself.

  I told her when she came over tonight I’d set the temperature to whatever she wanted.

  * * *

  I never paid as much as I did that night. The sex was great. We laughed a lot. She wanted to know how I got into this business, why I only liked prostitutes. She thought I was funny. She had this joy in her eyes, the kind of light that wouldn’t survive in this line of work for long. But in the meantime, that light was worth lots of money. Fifteen hundred an hour, easy. I knew I was right about that.

  After we finished fucking, we snorted some coke. We smoked my cigarettes. We drank beer. Then she pulled out a chunk of MDMA. That came as a surprise. It was huge. Twenty-five hundred shekels, probably more. Light brown, totally clean. Good stuff.

  That makes another hour of your time worth it for me, I told her. If we start feeling it before the hour is over, that is. I’ll time it from the moment we drink the stuff. I counted another 1,500 and put it on the dresser. I brought out a small bottle of mineral water. She cut some crumbs into it. We drank slowly. Then everything opened up. It’s harder to watch what you say when you’re on MD, and it’s her favorite drug. She used to be one of those nature rave girls, dropping ecstasy from age thirteen.

  I asked her again how come she needed so much money. And then she told me. That’s what happens on MD. It was like I was her best friend. She spoke with this passion, but I was only barely listening. Each time she ran her hand over my chest I felt ripples of heat below my skin, followed by cool blue waves, as if she had run her hand through water. Each time she touched my dick I couldn’t even hear her words. It felt like blinding light. But I sort of caught on, or I managed to remember enough to figure it out later. If I’d known how things would turn out, I might have paid more attention.

  Her father was a gambler. Gambling is the shittiest addiction. Her family lost their apartment when she was a kid. He lost her mother’s family’s savings before her mother even died. Her mother made him go to some rehab center run by a guy who learned it in India. Her father tried it, and for a few years it looked like things were going to be all right. He reopened his business, a rubber stamp shop that sold cell phones in the back room. No, it was the other way around. They had a cell phone store that she and her older brother opened at the front of his rubber stamp store. Two businesses, one name, one location. Her brother lived abroad and everything was under her name so that her father didn’t get tempted to touch the money. Just in case. Then her mother died and it was her, her brother, and her little sister alone with him, and things got bad again.

  Her head was on my stomach, her hand gripping the base of my dick. I couldn’t see what she was looking at. Probably my dick. I imagined her dreamy gaze, but I could only hear her. I took her hand in mine and moved it up and down, slowly. After she got the pace I let her do it herself.

  When she figured out what was happening with her father, she canceled his paycheck and only gave him enough pocket money for a day at a time. Her sister had just been enlisted into the military. The store, or the two stores, the stamp and phone stores, were the only source of inc
ome for the three of them—her dad, her sister, and herself. Her brother gave up his share of the business and didn’t want any financial connections with them. He went back abroad. The business was doing all right, but they had lots of expenses. They paid mortgage for the part they expanded for the cell phones, they had to pay for goods, taxes, accounting. Not a lot of wiggle room.

  Then one day her father didn’t come home. It was a Friday. She cooked dinner. Her sister was home from the army. They sat down to dinner, and he still didn’t show up. He didn’t answer his phone, nothing. Gone. She tried not to let her sister see how worried she was. She said the kiddush prayer instead of him, doing an accurate impression. That cracked her sister up. She tried to keep things light, as if everything was fine. But it wasn’t.

  On Sunday morning her sister went back to the army, but there was still no word. At nine a.m. she got a call from the bank—one of her checks bounced, they said. A check for 100,000 shekels. She never wrote checks like that. She asked if other checks had been withdrawn. All the cash in the store’s business account was gone. She asked who it was paid to and they gave her the name of a furniture store in Bnei Brak. You didn’t have to be a genius to figure it out. An entire checkbook was missing. Before she could even make a plan, two gorillas showed up at the store at noon. Her father owed 750,000 shekels to loan sharks. The checks bounced and he wasn’t picking up his phone. He’d gone underground. The checks belonged to the store, so it was up to her now to pay back his debt. It was her problem now, and interest was piling up. She told them she’d meet their boss, she’d fix it, it’ll be okay.

  That night her father came home. One of his hands was in a cast. Two broken fingers. He had tried to reason with the guy, but there was no one to reason with. So the guy broke his fingers. Her father was crying. Sitting there like some kid being punished by a teacher. She went mad. She screamed. She cried too. Then she hugged him.

  I felt myself about to come and I stopped her hand. I didn’t want it to be over. Even her voice felt good inside this high. I asked, Well, and then what?