The Apartment Store #5

Chapter 3, Part 1; in which Lydia introduces her new friend to her old friends and discovers much about both

The Apartment Store is the story of Lydia, a little girl who lives in a ramshackle attic apartment, in a ramshackle apartment building, down the ramshackle end of town. All Lydia wants is a proper Christmas, but it doesn't seem likely until a new tenant arrives in their building and changes Christmas for everyone in it.

The Apartment Store is a book length Christmas story of twelve chapters, split into twenty four episodes for Advent.

Lydia and Door sat and stared at the little man standing in the middle of their apartment in silence, taking in the expensive suit and expensive haircut, thinking about the big steamer trunk and the huge model of the department store in his living room.

“You’re Mr Krampus?” said Lydia, finally.

“Call me Artie,” said the man.

“Of Krampus Department Store?”

“Not any more. They have decided that now they own my dream, they don’t need me. So here I am, washed up in your attic like an exotic piece of jetsam.”

“Wow,” said Lydia.

“Well,” said her father, “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“And I’m sorry I’ve made you sorry.”

“No, I mean, I’m sorry that you’ve lost such a huge thing, that you’ve worked for so hard. That’s tough.”

“Nuts to it,” said Artie, suddenly, “That’s right: nuts. It’s my own fault and I should consider it a fair price for a good lesson taught hard. You can’t eat your cake and have it, you know. If you want to keep your dream, don’t share it and if you want to share your dream, don’t surprised that people might want it for themselves. It’s like you say, Door, we find ourselves where we find ourselves and we have to make the best of it.”

“Do I say that?” said Door, “It doesn’t sound like me.”

Artie barked a sharp laugh.

“See, this is what I mean: I show up in your attic, all despondent and tearing my raiment and you two give me breakfast and listen to my sob story and help me put the whole thing in a proper perspective. This is good. This is what I have been missing. I’ve been stuck up in my seventh floor apartment with too much thick carpeting between me and my business. I forgot my own dream and I deserved to lose it. Deserved to. Maybe this, this building, my new neighbours, maybe this is exactly what I need right now.”

“Well,” said Lydia’s father, “What I need right now is to go to work, but I tell you what, Lydia here has nothing better to do and I can think of no one better placed to introduce you to your new home. Lydia knows everyone and everyone knows Lydia. What do you, say, Lydia - get some clothes on and show Artie the sights.”

“An excellent idea - will you, Lydia?” asked Artie. 

“Of course,” said Lydia, who was very pleased at the idea of shepherding around someone so famous and, more importantly, introducing him to all her friends, “I’d love to.”

“The first thing to know,” said Lydia, leading Artie down the first flight of stairs from their landing, “Well, the first thing is that the carpet is loose on this turn here, so you have to watch your step, but the second thing to know is that you are right above Ivy, who is in that apartment there. Ivy is a student and stays out late and stays in late, so she probably won’t be awake yet and you need to be quiet in the mornings as she says she needs her beauty sleep, although I’m sure she doesn’t. She’s very pretty,” Lydia added, conspiratorially, as she tapped gently at Ivy’s door.

“Ivy?” she called, softly.

“Waw?” came a muffled reply from somewhere deep in the apartment.

“It’s Lydia.”

“Lid?”

“We’ve got a new neighbour, I’ve got him here with me.”

“New nay. Nice.”

“He’s called Artie.”

“Tea.”

“You’ll have to meet him later, when you’re awake.”

“Layer. Nigh.”

“Night,” replied Lydia and beckoned Artie away from the door, “She’s still asleep really. You can talk to her all you like when she’s asleep and she won’t remember any of what she says, even though most of it is pretty sensible. More sensible than what she says when she’s awake, really.

“This, on the other hand, is George Joseph’s door, who will most definitely be awake because he gets up every morning at six to go for a run. Rain or shine, he says, and I believe him, although I’ve never checked because I’m not awake myself then.”

Lydia knocked at George Joseph’s door. There was a moment of silence.

“What’s the time?” she asked Artie.

“Nine forty seven, pretty early for a Saturday morning.”

“Not early for George Joseph - he’ll have finished his push ups by now.”

There was a sudden quick step on the other side of the door and it opened. From all Lydia’s talk of running and push-ups you might have been expecting a large, muscly man, but George Joseph was thin and wiry, with thin, wiry hair and a thin, wiry manner, like he was working off an electrocution.

“Ah, Lydia, good morning,” he blinked and nodded at her.

“George Joseph,” said Lydia, “Good morning, this is our new neighbour, Artie.”

“George Joseph Sweet,” said George Joseph, shooting out a bony hand, “Accountant.”

Artie took the hand and shook it.

“Otto Krampus,” he said, “But my friends call me Artie, so now Lydia’s given you that name, we better be friends.”

George Joseph didn’t seem quite to know what to do with this piece of information and blinked rapidly at Artie two or three times.

“Krampus?” he said, “Like the store?”

“Not any more,” said Artie cheerfully, “Say, is that coffee I can smell?”

“Well, um, yes,” said George Joseph, “I was just making myself a cup.”

Artie stood still for a moment, head cocked to one side, nostrils flared.

“Ethiopian,” he said at last, “A French roast.”

George Joseph goggled at him.

“It is, that’s precisely it,” he said, “It’s my only vice, you see, really, coffee, but I do feel you ought to do something right.”

“Boy, do you,” said Artie, appreciatively, “That smells almost perfectly done to me.”

“Yes, I ought to…” George Joseph began to back away down the hall.

“Can I try a taste?” asked Artie, eagerly, following him into the apartment, “Not a whole cup, just a taste?”

“Well, I suppose, um,” said George Joseph, edging into his clean and sparkling kitchen. In contrast to the empty kitchen beyond, the hallway they were standing in was full of sporting equipment. On the wall was a rack of all kinds of rackets and sticks and bats, all neatly pinned up, while beneath each one was an appropriate pair of shoes, spiked, studded, soft soled and stout.

George Joseph re-emerged from the kitchen carrying a small plain white espresso cup.

“You play a lot of sports,” said Artie, taking the cup.

“It’s good for you,” said George Joseph, “For the mind too, not just the body.”

“Your body is a temple and you…” Artie took a sip of coffee, “You honour it with what is surely a holy drink.”

He took another slurpy sip, swilling the coffee around his mouth.

“George Joseph,” he said, “I have had many wonderful cups of coffee. In a small piazza behind the Duomo in Florence, on a plantation in Columbia, in a souk in Tangiers, but this, this cup of coffee joins them. This is a superlative cup, George Joseph, and I daren’t drink any more of it. This is yours and you deserve to drink in contemplation and solitude.”

“Well, I…” George Joseph foundered for a moment. “Thank you.”

Artie stood, beaming at him.

“Thank you,” said George Joseph again, blinked, then nodded.

Artie nodded in return and backed gently out of the apartment, closing the door on George Joseph and his tiny cup of coffee.

“I was hoping,” he whispered to Lydia, “That he was going to offer me a cup of my own. Still, just a taste of that is more than enough.”

“Was it really nice?” asked Lydia, “All coffee tastes the same to me - all bitter and brown.”

“Coffee is an art you have to learn to love,” said Artie, “I can’t deny that, but coffee like that makes it easier to learn. It was better than nice. That was a loving word on a dull morning, a gentle promise to a worried heart, a warm reassurance to a tired mind. That was a great cup of coffee. Your friends, Lydia, show promise, and are a credit to you. I begin to suspect I picked entirely the right building to roost in. What’s next?”

“Well, next is the next floor down,” said Lydia, “And there are two more apartments there. The apartments are bigger on this floor and they even have balconies, although the Misses Pleasaunce have had their all glazed in like a greenhouse, you know, so they can use it in all weathers. We’ll meet them first. They’ll definitely be up but they might not be in, if you see what I mean - it’s what they say: ‘we’re not in to callers’ - when they don’t want to see people. And I don’t think they often want to see people. I don’t think they like strangers very much.”

“But I’m not a stranger anymore, am I?” said Artie, “I’m friends with a lot of people in the building. They know me. How can I be a stranger?”

“I wonder who’s stranger,” said Lydia, “You or the Misses Pleasaunce?”

She rang their bell and waited. There was the sound of light footsteps and the chirruping, chiming voices of the Misses Pleasaunce. There was a shuffling by the door as they took turns looking through the peep hole and then one of them said:

“We’re not at home to callers, Lydia, dear.”

“That’s alright,” called Lydia through the door, “I just wanted to introduce you to our new neighbour - and friend - Artie.”

“Oh, a neighbour,” said one sister and

“Is it rude to refuse an introduction?” said the other.

“I feel it is,” said the first and

“We ought to meet our neighbours,” said the second.

There was a rattling of bolts and chains and the door opened just enough to show the two sisters standing in the hall, peering out nervously, as if something large was about to leap out of the shadows and devour them.

They were dressed in long, narrow, matching coral pink dresses with a pattern of flowers embroidered up the skirts in silk thread that glistened as it caught the light. Both were wearing identical bright blue necklaces and earrings and had blue butterfly clips in their short curled hair. They stood side by side and although Lydia knew that Peony was exactly twenty one months older than Pansy and could easily tell the two of them apart, they looked so similar in their matching outfits and make up that you might have assumed they were twins until you looked more closely. They stood quite still, just staring at Lydia and Artie.

“You were going to introduce us, Lydia, my dear,” said Peony, who was usually the one to take charge.

“Yes, sorry, Peony Pleasaunce, Pansy Pleasaunce, allow me to introduce our new neighbour Artie, who has moved into the attic apartment next to dad and me.”

“Father and I,” said Peony, instinctively correcting Lydia’s grammar.

“Delighted to meet you, Mr…” Pansy stumbled over the name and correct form, “…Artie?”

“Krampus, Otto Krampus, although friends like Lydia do call me Artie, it’s true,” Artie took Pansy’s proferred hand and instead of shaking it, bent and kissed it delicately, “Enchante, madamoiselle,” and he did the same to Peony, even though it looked as if she was about to snatch her hand back, “At your service, please, should you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask, I do want to try and fit in here with all of Lydia’s friends.”

“We’re not completely useless old women, you know,” said Peony, sharply, “We don’t need people running around for us all over the place.”

“Did you say Krampus?” said Pansy, “Like the store?”

“So like the store as to be one and the same,” said Artie, “Until midnight last night that is, when I was unceremoniously thrown out.”

“We do all our shopping at Krampus, don’t we Peony?” said Pansy, “We always have.”

“You were fired, were you?” said Peony, “Were you up to shenanigans?”

“Of course you do, you are ladies of taste after all, as I can plainly see,” Krampus gestured at the hallway around them.

It was painted in the same pale green as their living room, with plaster details picked out in white. Halfway down the corridor was a delicate little half moon table, with a marble top and a vase of flowers on it, bright yellow against the green. All down the walls hung small pictures in ornate frames, apart from where, on one wall, a hat rack stood, festooned about with cloche hats and fox furs.

“Peony and I decorated it all ourselves,” said Pansy.

“There were no shenanigans, I assure you, Madam,” said Artie, “In fact, I think they would have been happier if there had been.”

“Lydia runs errands for us sometimes, though, doesn’t she,” said Pansy, “That’s running around for us.”

“We’re not talking about that any more, Pansy,” said Peony.

“And if your whole apartment is as beautiful as this hallway,” said Artie, “Even this reproduction Robert Adam table is a splendid… Hang on… this isn’t a reproduction, is it? This is a genuine Robert Adam table.”

“It ought to be,” said Peony.

“I chose the flowers,” said Pansy.

“And they compliment the colours splendidly,” said Artie, “As does this… Good grief, is this picture what I think it is?”

“That rather depends what you think, doesn’t it?” said Peony with a twinkle in her eye.

“Well, the colour alone, never minding the brush work,” Artie seemed genuinely at a loss. Lydia craned to see, it was a picture she had walked past and generally ignored for year, just some fruit, some apples and pears sitting on a table. It didn’t seem that remarkable to her. The colours were nice, she supposed.

“Is that… that’s a Cezanne, isn’t it?” said Artie, with awe in his voice.

“It’s just a sketch really,” said Peony.

“And that, oh my stars,” Artie was looking at a picture of countryside in beautiful bright reds and oranges and purples, not at all what it can have really looked like, Lydia thought, unless it was some country she’d never seen photographs of, but it was a lovely picture.

“That’s a Matisse!” Artie was standing stock still, holding his breath.

“He was a funny man,” said Pansy, suddenly laughing, “He wouldn’t even get out of bed.”

“Ladies, I… you met Matisse?” Artie, for once, seemed lost for words.

“We have been introduced to a great many people,” said Peony, “Some of them even more exciting than disgraced department store owners.”

“He was playing with bits of paper, like a little child,” said Pansy, still laughing, “But he let me cut some out, which was kind of him.”

“In my store… in the store,” Artie collected himself, “We had a department of fine art - like you ladies, we have some very refined and exclusive customers. Masterpieces from all over the world, from all of history - A Roman statuette, an African mask, a Japanese scroll painting, a Russian ikon, a modern Mexican mural. Beautiful, astonishing things. And to show them… I was in Venice, not looking that time for art at all, looking in fact, for a chef to make Venetian sandwiches in our tea rooms - they make beautiful little sandwiches in Venice, Lydia, tramezzini, they’re called, little hummocked things, we’ll have to take you to tea in Venice one day. I was in Venice, as I say, and I discovered this palazzo that was quite falling into the Grand Canal. Abandoned, decaying, and in it a room in almost exactly this green. Faded there, of course, patched with mould and damp, but almost exactly this. And do you know what I did? I bought the palazzo, the whole thing, had it all repaired - it became a hotel in the end - but that room I had stripped down and brought here, brought to my store, cleaned up, put back together and installed. And that is where we show our art. Some of the greatest, most startling, most expensive works of human art, brought together in a room from a genuine seventeenth century Venetian palazzo. And yet, this hallway, ladies, this hallway… just this hallway. Not only is this tasteful, and refined, it is full of wonder and joy and beauty. Ladies, I have never encountered anything like it in my life. Had I still my store, I’d be imploring you to come and sort it out yourselves. Had I still my store.”

Artie shook his head wearily.

“He can talk, can’t he?” said Pansy.

“He certainly can,” said Peony.

“He does it well, though,” said Pansy, “He says nice things.”

“He certainly does,” said Peony, “Of course women our age have had plenty of nice things said to us, not always with nice intentions; but we shouldn’t hold Lydia and her friend up.”

Lydia recognised her cue.

“Yes, we’ve got plenty of other people to introduce you to,” said Lydia.

“John and Fairuza will be having their elevenses,” said Peony.

“That’ll be nice,” said Pansy.

“Ladies,” said Artie, backing out after Lydia, “I’m not sure ‘nice’ will ever cut it again for me. I thank you for this wondrous, beautiful experience, with such wondrous, beautiful ladies.”

“Very nice things,” said Pansy.

“Yes, aren’t they?” said Peony, closing the door, “Goodbye. Thank you for calling.”

“Woo-wee!” Artie slumped back against the wall of the corridor and whistled a long low whistle at the ceiling.

“Was that really so amazing?” Lydia had wondered if he’d just been flattering the Misses Pleasaunce.

“Amazing? Stunning! Miraculous! Talk about a pearl in an oyster! To be in this run down old apartment house, three flights up a rickety stair in this run down old city and to find yourself in a beautiful little home decorated by great works of twentieth century art. And I don’t just mean those pictures. That little lady cut out collages with Matisse! Matisse!” Artie took Lydia by the shoulders, “Lydia, I want you to promise me that these John and Fairuza people are just nice because I’m not sure how much more I can take. First the greatest cup of coffee I’ve ever had, then the finest art in the world.”

“John and Fairuza,” said Lydia, “Are the best people in the whole world.”

“Uh oh,” said Artie, “This does not bode well.”