The Parcel for Apartment 4B
A package for a nonexistent apartment sends one resident door to door through an increasingly complicated building.
Photo: Unsplash.
The parcel was addressed to Apartment 4B. Our building had 4A, 4C, and a locked storage room where 4B should have been.
The courier handed it to me because I was standing nearest the entrance, a legal principle I had not previously encountered. The recipient was “M. Lin,” which narrowed the search to approximately half the building.
I began upstairs. Mrs. Lin in 7C had ordered vitamins, not a box that rattled. Mr. Lin in 3A denied ordering anything, then asked if it might contain tea. The student in 6B was not named Lin but offered to accept it anyway.
By evening, the parcel had acquired a committee. We compared handwriting, shook it gently, and discovered an old floor plan in the manager’s office. There had once been a 4B, before renovations joined it to 4C.
We knocked on 4C. A woman opened the door, saw the label, and laughed. Her grandfather had lived there when it was still 4B. The parcel contained a clock sent by his sister, who had copied the address from a twenty-year-old notebook.
The next morning a note appeared above the mailboxes:
Apartment 4B has moved. Please ask 4C. Do not ask 6B.
The student crossed out the last sentence.