"Dirt" by Etgar Keret and other fiction

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One April afternoon, right after lunch, my husband announced that he wanted to leave me.  He did it while we were clearing the table; the children were quarreling as usual in the next room, the dog was dreaming, growling beside the radiator.  He told me that he was confused, that he was having terrible moments of weariness, of dissatisfaction, perhaps of cowardice.  He talked for a long time about our fifteen years of marriage, about the children, and admitted that he had nothing to reproach us with, neither them nor me.  He was composed, as always, apart from an extravagant gesture of his right hand when he explained to me, with a childish frown, that soft voices, a sort of whispering, were urging him elsewhere.  Then he assumed the blame for everything that was happening and closed the front door carefully behind him, leaving me turned to stone beside the sink.  
--From The Days of Abandonment, a novel by Elena Ferrante, translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein (Europa Editions, 2005).  First published, as I giorni dell'abbandono, by Edizioni e/o in 2002.

Darrell had a face like a crumpled pack of cigarettes.  It was hard to believe he was only fourteen.  Every morning we had to stand in the hallway watching the kids walk into our classes because it was supposed to show them we were welcoming.  Darrell walked too fast and leaned too far forward when he walked, as if he was about to give someone a piece of his mind.  
--From "Fire," a short story by Krys Belc, Reservoir, Issue II (August 2016).

My father never even asks for a name.  He pulls up, I walk to the car, afraid the whole time it isn't really him, isn't really his car, and I open the door and I close it and I sit down and cross my legs and uncross them and cross my arms instead and say Hello and that's all he says back, Hello.  
--From "My Father Never," a short story by Krys Belc, Reservoir, Issue II (August 2016).

Benny Brokerage had been waiting for them in the doorway for almost half an hour, and when they arrived he tried to act as if it didn't make him mad.  "It's all her fault," the older man said, sniggering, and held out his hand for a firm, no-nonsense shake.  "Don't believe Butchie," the peroxide urged him.  She looked at least fifteen years younger than her man.  "We got here earlier, except we couldn't find any parking.  And Benny Brokerage gave her his foxy smile, like he really gave a shit why she and Butchie were late.  
--From "Eight Percent of Nothing," a short story by Etgar Keret, translated from the Hebrew by Miriam Shlesinger, published in The Nimrod Flipout (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006), pp. 43-47.  The story was featured in episode 285 of This American Life (Know Your Enemy, March 25, 2005).

Listen, a true story.  About three months ago a woman about thirty-two years old met her death in a suicide bomb attack near a bus stop.  She wasn't the only one who met her death, lots of others did too.  But this story is about her. 
--From "Surprise Egg," a short story by Etgar Keret, translated from the Hebrew by Miriam Shlesinger, published in The Nimrod Flipout (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006), pp. 55-58.

So let's say I'm dead now, or I open a self-service laundromat, the first one in Israel.  
--From "Dirt," a short story by Etgar Keret, translated from the Hebrew by Sondra Silverston, published in The Nimrod Flipout (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006), pp. 59-60.

Suddenly, A Knock on the Door

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These are from Suddenly, A Knock on the Door: Stories by Etgar Keret, translated into English by Miriam Shlesinger, Sondra Silverston, and Nathan Englander and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2012.  The collection was originally published in Hebrew as Pit'om Defikah Ba-Delet by Zmora-Bitan in 2010.

Two people were standing at the door.  A second lieutenant wearing a knitted yarmulke, and behind him, a thin officer with sparse, light-colored hair and captain's bars on her shoulders.  Orit waited a minute, and when she saw that they still weren't saying anything, she asked if she could help them.  "Druckman," the captain tossed the word, part command, part reprimand, at the soldier.  "It's about your husband," the religious soldier mumbled at Orit.  "Can we come in?"  Orit smiled and said that this must be some kind of mistake because she wasn't married.
--From "Simyon" by Etgar Keret, pp. 25-30, translated by Sondra Silverston.

I know a guy who fantasizes all the time.  I mean, this guy even walks down the street with his eyes shut.  One day, I'm sitting in the passenger seat of his car and I look over to the left and see him with both his hands on the wheel and his eyes shut.  No kidding, he was driving like that on a main street. 
--From "Shut" by Etgar Keret,  pp. 31-33, translated by Sondra Silverston.

Then one Thursday a fat, sweaty guy walked into the cafe and smiled at him.  Miron was caught off guard.  The last person to give him a smile was Maayan, just before she left him, five months earlier, and her smile had been unmistakably sarcastic, whereas this one was soft, almost apologetic.  The fat guy gestured something, apparently a signal that he'd like to sit down, and Miron nodded almost without thinking. 
--From "Healthy Start" by Etgar Keret, pp. 34-39, translated by Miriam Shlesinger.  "Healthy Start" is available online in Tin House. 

The man who knew what I was about to say sat next to me on the plane, a stupid smile plastered across his face.  That's what was so nerve-racking about him, the fact that he wasn't smart or even sensitive, and yet he knew the lines and managed to say them--all the lines I meant to say--three seconds before me.  "D'you sell Guerlain Mystique?" he asked the flight attendant a minute before I could, and she gave him an orthodontic smile and said there was just one last bottle left.
--From "Mystique"by Etgar Keret, pp. 58-59, translated by Miriam Shlesinger.

The first story Maya wrote was about a world in which people split themselves in two instead of reproducing.  
--From "Creative Writing" by Etgar Keret, pp. 60-65, translated by Sondra Silverston.

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.
--From "September All Year Long" by Etgar Keret, pp. 142-145, translated by Sondra Silverston.

There are conversations that can change a person's life. 
--From "Joseph" by Etgar Keret, pp. 146-148, translated by Sondra Silverston.

There's a theory that says there are billions of other universes, parallel to the one we live in, and that each of them is slightly different.  There are the ones where you were never born, and the ones where you wouldn't want to be born.  
--"Parallel Universes" by Etgar Keret, pp. 153-154, translated by Miriam Shlesinger.