The Apartment Store #6

Chapter 3, Part 2; in which Lydia has lunch in Paris

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.

They had interrupted Fairuza working. Lydia could tell because she had brushes stuck in her hair and was wearing her old Cornish smock that was covered in splashes and smears of paint.

“Lydia! We weren’t expecting you this early.”

“I’m sorry, I’m introducing Artie to everyone and you were next, he’s just moved in.”

“I hope we’re not intruding,” said Artie.

“Not at all,” said Fairuza, “Lydia’s always welcome, preferably bringing gifts, but guests will do. John, Lydia’s here, with a neighbour apparently.”

“Excellent,” said John, “You can help me decide.”

Where Fairuza was small and dark, with delicate fingers and serious, clever eyes, John was huge and jolly, with bright red curly hair and a bushy red beard. Even in her painting smock Fairuza was neat and contained and still while John, even when he tried to dress smartly, always seemed to be in the act of exploding out of his clothes, his shirt untucked, his jumper full of holes, his trousers shiny at the knees.

He had in his large hands two croissants resting on a tea towel. One was plain, the other was dusted with icing sugar.

“Almond or plain?” John held them out to Lydia and Artie, “Fairy likes Almond, but they’re a bit of experiment, I’m afraid. The plain I’m happy with, but I just don’t know. Try them.”

Lydia picked up the almond croissant and broke off one end. Inside was a seam of almond paste and the pastry steamed slightly. She popped it in her mouth.

“It’s delicious,” she mouthed through little puffs of steam.

“Lydia always thinks everything’s delicious,” said John, proferring the croissant to Artie, “What do you think - sorry, I didn’t catch your name - Fairy, you try some too.”

“I didn’t give it,” said Artie, tearing off a bit of croissant, “I’m Artie, I’ve moved in next door to Lydia and Door upstairs and, my word, this is an excellent croissant, this is excellent, don’t you think?”

“I like it,” said Fairuza, “Go and make some more immediately.”

“Your wish is my command, oh star of the morning,” said John.

“She’s not wrong,” said Artie, tearing off a piece “But you’re not wrong about the plain. You’ve got that cracked. French butter, am I right?”

“Normandy,” said John, pleased with himself, “You have to go to Krampus to get it, but what else are you going to use in croissants?”

“I was told elevenses here was going to be nice,” said Artie, “I’m beginning to think I was undersold.”

“Oh this isn’t for elevenses,” said John, “Although I have a couple more, I guess.”

“This is for lunch, I’m afraid,” said Fairuza.

“Oh, I didn’t mean I was expecting anything,” said Artie, “Of course, don’t let us intrude.”

“Are you going away for lunch?” said Lydia, “You are, aren’t you?”

“We are,” Fairuza shot a conspiratorial smile at John.

“You’ll be wanting to get ready,” said Artie, “Lydia, we should let them get on.”

“Where are you going?” said Lydia, “Tell me.”

“Paris,” said John, “That’s why the croissant.”

“You’re going to Paris for lunch?” said Artie, “This place is extraordinary.”

“I’m afraid we haven’t got enough for everyone for lunch,” said Fairuza, “Or you’d be welcome to stay, of course.”

“They could stay for coffee, at least,” said John, “I could make a couple extra croissant.”

“One moment. Now I’m really befuddled,” Artie held a hand, “You say you’re going to Paris for lunch, which is going to be a very late lunch, but now you’re staying in? Can someone tell me what is going on?”

“John and Fairuza have special lunches,” said Lydia, “It’s brilliant. They pick a place to have lunch in then John makes the right food for that place and Fairuza decorates the flat and then they have lunch anywhere in the world, wherever they want. They let me come too, sometimes.”

“All the time, more like,” said John.

“We’ve been to all kinds of places: Spain and Italy and India and what was the place that had the delicious little yellow tarts?”

“Portugal,” said John, “Pasteis de nata.”

“Lisbon,” said Fairuza, “Blue and white tiles climbing up steep hills.”

“And today they’re going to Paris,” said Lydia, “Is that right?”

“It’s splendid destination,” said Artie, “Croissants with coffee and then what’s for lunch? Filet Mignon? Coquilles Saint Jacques?”

“No,” said John, “We were thinking just a small cafe, somewhere in a back street, unpretentious, straightforward, as if we were just stopping for a quick bite.”

“Onion soup,” said Artie.

“Croque Monsieur,” said Fairuza.

“What’s that?” asked Lydia.

“Cheese on toast,” said Fairuza, “With ham. It’s delicious.”

“It’s a bit more than that,” said John, “You make a cheese sauce really, and you need the right bread.”

“And the right cheese,” said Artie, “Gruyere, probably.”

“It’s not really a meal, you see” said John, “It’s a snack, really.”

“But done right,” said Artie, “It’s a piece of heaven.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” said Fairuza, “Cheese and ham and bread. What more could you ask?”

“There is in Montmartre, in Paris, a set of steps that leads down from the hill alongside a park, and halfway down those steps is a little space, not even a square,” said Artie, “I found it quite by chance, I was just wandering. I was actually there, quite coincidentally, to find a baker to make croissants, but that’s another story.

“On one side of the space is a little cafe, nothing remarkable, just another little Parisian cafe, but what matters is what isn’t there. Because that park carries on down the hill and beyond it is Paris, all the rooftops of the 9th and 10th arondissements, and then beyond them Notre Dame and the Pont Neuf and the Place de la Bastille. So you can sit at that perfectly nondescript cafe and drink a perfectly ordinary coffee and eat and perfectly ordinary croque monsieur and look out at the most perfectly extraordinary city on earth and suddenly all those ordinary things become quite extraordinary too. That is the magic of Paris.”

“That’s exactly it,” said Fairuza, “This is a good neighbour you’ve found, Lydia, that’s exactly what we want.”

“Sounds like you’re staying for lunch,” said John.

“No,” said Artie, “This is your lunch, but we can help set the scene, can’t we?”

“You certainly can,” said Fairuza, “I need source material, come and help me find pictures.”

Which is what they did. While John retreated into the kitchen to make more croissants and begin preparing his Parisian lunch, Lydia, Fairuza and Artie all collected round the table in the living room and began poring over books and postcards and photographs, deciding how they were going to conjure Paris up in time for lunch.

Fairuza found a long roll of rough paper, stretched it out across the floor and sketched out on it a skyline of Paris. She then handed Artie one of John’s aprons from the kitchen and a set of brushes and he and Lydia got down on their hands and knees and started to fill it in, as they ate croissants that John brought out of the kitchen and Artie told her all about the buildings they were painting. He told her about the building of the Eiffel Tower for the 1889 World’s Fair and how all the artists had complained about it, saying it would ruin the skyline of Paris and how it had come instead to epitomise it. He told her about the Hunchback of Notre Dame, a book about a poor man called Quasimodo who lived in the ancient cathedral and his doomed love for a gypsy called Esmeralda. He told her about the Bastille which had been a grim and deadly prison but which had been stormed and torn down in the revolution and instead now there was a market where you can buy all kinds of food and clothes and curios.

Which led him onto Les Halles, the great food market, the belly of Paris he called it, where the whole country poured its produce into the ravening maw of the city, where you could find apples from the orchards of Brittany, Mediterranean fish straight up from the Cote d’Azur on the morning train, Charolais beef from Burgundy and Raclette from the Alps. He told her about walking the aisles, quizzing the wholesalers and the experts, picking out the perfect pears, finding the freshest fish, just soaking it all in, learning and understanding not just what makes things good, but what makes things the best, what to look for and what to avoid.

And that make Fairuza think, too. She was painting the trickier bits - advertisements and pictures for the walls of the cafe. She was painting a poster for a night club - a man in a hat wearing a red scarf - that she said was by a man called Toulouse-Lautrec and she talked about how you could tell that a true talent was at work, even in just an advertisement for a night out. She talked about composition, which was how a picture was laid out, pointing out how the picture was divided up unequally, a big block of yellow and a thinner block of blue, and how the man’s head was off centre, looking off the to left. She talked about colour and how the bright red stood out against the blue but how it was the richness of the the blue of the man’s coat that made the red work so well and how one needed the other. And she talked about wit and how the man’s eyebrow tilted up just so, so that he became amused and clever and interesting, how an artist could invoke character with just a flick of his brush.

And then she and Artie were talking about the night clubs of Montmartre, which was a hill in Paris, as far as Lydia could make out, and about all the artists and writers and strange individuals who lived there and worked there and had what sounded like an extraordinarily interesting time. And while Fairuza was talking a lot about stories she’d read or been told, Artie seemed to know all the places and the real, true stories behind the rumours. He knew the hosts of the bars and the landladies of the boarding houses, he’d been down into the smokey cellars and up into the rooftop garrets and seemed to know Paris just as well as he knew anywhere.

Then in the middle of this there was a knock at the door. Fairuza scrambled up and returned with Ivy, who appeared to have gotten dressed by just throwing herself into a wardrobe and thrashing about until she was mostly covered with clothes. But Lydia knew that this was Ivy dressing up for a special occasion.

“I was lying in bed and I could hear you all talking, not the words, you know, but the voices, and I wondered who it was and what you were talking about and I couldn’t stand it any more so I had to find out,” she thrust out a hand that jangled with bangles, “Hallo, I’m Ivy.”

“Artie,” said Artie, “We were just helping Fairuza prepare for lunch.”

“Which is almost ready,” said John emerging from the kitchen, “Hallo, Ivy - I’m not sure we’ve got enough food for everyone now.”

“But we do have enough service,” said Artie, “Ivy, Lydia tells me you’re a student.”

“I am,” said Ivy, “I mean, I’m studying but not always what I’m supposed to be, you know, because you get interested in something but it’s not what they want to teach you but you can’t leave it alone so then you have to do two things and it can get confusing. It’s fashion, by the way. What I’m studying.”

“Then you’ll know all about waiting on tables,” said Artie.

“Oh, I’m terrible at it,” said Ivy, cheerfully, “I forget things and spill things and then I think something else, something important and I forget that there are people there and I’m supposed to be serving them and I’m just staring off into space and they get awfully cross. I do it all the time. Waitressing.”

“You sound perfect,” said Artie, “This is Paris, the last thing we want is friendly, helpful service. Now, let’s get everything set up,” he turned to Fairuza and Lydia, “Madame, madamoiselle, a table outside, perhaps?”

They opened the balcony doors and took the Paris skyline outside, wrapping it across the balcony railings so it became their view, then they dragged the cast iron round table into the living room and covered it with a red and white chequered table cloth John brought out from the kitchen while Fairuza tacked up the posters and advertisements she had painted.

“Now, John, is everything ready?” asked Artie.

“The bread on the soup is just browning, the sauce is all ready for the Croque Monsieur,” said John.

“Then I can deal with it, this is your lunch too,” said Artie, “Sit down, sit down, you too Lydia, Ivy and I will serve you, Ivy - I want you petulant and recalcitrant, you don’t want to be serving anyone today.”

“I really don’t,” said Ivy, “I mean, I do, obviously, I mean this is great but it wasn’t my plan when I got out of bed, I was just curious, you know, and it’s so boring just lying in bed.”

“Well, so’s serving people lunch, so remember that,” said Artie, and pulled her into the kitchen after him.

And so Lydia, Fairuza and John all had lunch in Paris. Ivy slouched back and forth from the kitchen looking bored, fetching them French Onion Soup, which was almost like a pie made out of bread and cheese with a thick centre of soft, sweet onions and Croque Monsieur, which turned out to toasted bread with mustard and ham and a smooth, rich cheese sauce all browned and bubbling on top. And they spread out a map of the city on the table and imagined where they might go that afternoon and Artie came out of the kitchen, wiping his hands on his apron, to made recommendations about shops and restaurants and patisseries, and Fairuza said:

“Do you really know Paris this well, or are just making this all up?”

“Oh, I know it,” said Artie, “Just about as well as I know this town, which is pretty well. You can’t not know Paris if you do what I do.”

“And what is it that you do do?” asked John.

“He’s Krampus,” said Lydia, “Like the store, of the store. It’s his store - he’s Mr Krampus.”

“You’re what?” said John.

“It’s true: Otto Krampus literally at your service,” said Artie, “Although it’s no longer by, with, from or anything to do with the store, not any more. They slung me out, which is how I find myself here, in the company of you truly excellent and wonderful people.”

“You mean we were just served lunch by the founder of Krampus department store?” said Fairuza.

“It’s the genuine Paris experience,” said Artie, “That’s where I learned to do it, six months in a hotel restaurant.”

“Golly,” said John.

Ivy, for once, appeared to be lost for words.