Candy Hearts

by Nadia Djamila

Noor blinked, then blinked again. The woman in her doorframe was dazzling: slim, sloe-eyed, breasts the size of New York. The sight of her filled Noor with daylight, made her believe that she, too, could cut bangs and wake up with that face and that hair and that frame. Why Isla stood at Noor’s doorstep was one curiosity, why she held a bag of candy hearts in her hands, another. For a moment, Noor feared she was being approached with a multi-level marketing opportunity.

“Since we’re going to be neighbors,” Isla said, “I wanted to introduce myself.” 

Noor smiled.

“Please, come in.”

Whisking envelopes off the kitchen counter, Noor beckoned for Isla to make herself at home. Guests reminded Noor of the smallness of her condo—that the living room was the dining room was the kitchen. Hyperaware of the fingerprints smudged across the fridge, Noor swept its corners to retrieve anything passable for company. If Isla noticed the crumbs on the counter, or the scrubs strewn about the floor, she was too polite to let her eyes linger. As far as new acquaintances go, she was a merciful god, sparing Noor the ick of asking that D.C. question. 

“I work for the Agency,” Isla said, plopping the bag of candy hearts on the countertop as if arranging a department store display. “You’ve probably seen our showroom a few blocks from here. 14th and Irving?”

As Isla spoke, an image flickered into Noor’s mind. The Agency, yes, she knew it. The Agency had appeared seemingly overnight. The crinkly-eyed ladies smoking menthols at the bus stop said that there was never a storefront between the corner thrift and DeBakey’s, that it materialized in a liminal space. Just that morning, Noor had prodded her geriatric black Lab past the Agency’s sleek glass-and-brass facade, marveled at the fact of its abrupt conception, its concreteness despite its impossibility. But it would be indelicate, surely, to speak that aloud.

“I don’t know much about the Agency,” Noor said. “It’s very new.”

Columbia Heights was accustomed to barber shops and halal carts and LOTTO LIQUOR GROCER, EBT ACCEPTED, dispensaries and paint-peeling coin laundries and disconsolate men hawking yesterday’s roses and loose cigs and bottled water for a modest commission. Noor and her neighbors had never seen anything like the Agency. Kids with eyes like jawbreakers triple-dog-dared each other to touch the door. 

“The Agency’s had a big month. We’ve purchased the condo next door, and the one across the hall, and actually almost all of the units on this floor.” 

Noor, slicing cheese and fruit, paused.

“I didn’t know the O’Malley’s were selling.”

“They weren’t,” Isla said, flashing her one-hundred-percent veneer smile. “But our offer was absurd. They couldn’t say no.”

Noor considered making a Godfather joke, but was unsure if it would register with Isla’s brand of $200 yoga-panted millennial. Noor glanced at Isla, who perched on the arm of the sofa as if dog hair transmitted venereal diseases. Isla was a hood ornament with high-gloss finish, summers at a six-room cottage in Montauk. No, Noor decided. 

“Your space is gorgeous,” Isla said. “Are these custom bookshelves?”

Noor smiled at the hand-carved oak. 

“My husband and I built them together.”

She didn’t mention that her husband, Hamza, was four months in the ground, straight catgut sutures where scalpel cleaved flesh to reveal cancer the color of bananas flambé. 

Insidious, the surgeon had said. And unresectable.

Instead, Noor told Isla about the wedding in Rochester, the long drive upstate, the road stand cider donuts. The wrong turn that led to a yard sale where they salvaged the lumber in Chenango County. The bookshelves were another reminder of Hamza in their home, along with the loveseat they reupholstered together, the walls they painted Vernazza Blue. 

Noor added a plate of olives and almonds to the crackers in front of Isla. Isla took a turn around the room, audibly admiring the dozy dog, the thrifted turntable, the Moroccan poufs. She spoke like a girl pinning daydreams to a wall.

“I love what you’ve done with this breakfast nook.”

Isla stroked the crown moulding. How large her hands, Noor noticed. How long the fingers. The dog spooked at the glint of Isla’s nails. With Noor’s encouragement, Ginny settled long enough to “sit,” “shake,” and “roll over” for Isla. 

“Next time, we can teach her something more advanced,” Isla said. “Like ‘overthrow the patriarchy.’”  

Noor laughed in a way she hoped didn’t sound contrived. She fixed coffee. They conversed about mindless things: Noor’s job as an emergency room nurse, the sphincter-tightening price of raspberries. Noor learned Isla was a Boston transplant, a kombucha enthusiast, and a corporate exec turned real estate maven.

When Noor looked up from the espresso, Isla was energetically applying a measuring tape to the foyer and bookshelves. 

“What are you doing?” 

The words escaped before Noor’s politesse could enter the chat. Isla slipped the measuring tape back into her bag, conjuring a pamphlet in its place. 

“Look,” Isla said. “I really am your new neighbor. But I’m also here on behalf of the Agency to make an offer on your condo. This area has potential. We have a three-year plan to bring modern elegance to Columbia Heights.”

Behind her back, Noor’s nails left little half-moons in her palm. She glanced at the glossy pamphlet instead of shoving it up one of Isla’s flawless New England nostrils. 

The brochure said “Welcome Home” in a mawkish font. Where Noor’s current building stood, the pamphlet imagined a sterile, hypnotically beige neighborhood with faceless homes that looked, individually, like a cross between an oven and a coffin. 

“We’ll even relocate you,” Isla said, her doll eyes unblinking. “Elsewhere.”

“My home is not on the market,” Noor said, handing the brochure back to Isla. 

Isla grinned. Her teeth were perfectly straight and perfectly white, even if the canines were a bit longer than necessary.

“I hope you’ll visit our 14th Street location to see the mock-ups. Each luxury home will have its own organic juice bar—”

“This is not up for discussion.”

Noor crossed the room and opened the front door, encouraging Isla to see herself out. She tossed the candy hearts in the trash. But still, a perfume lingered, raw and cloying.  

#

Sleep came fitfully as Noor replayed the staccato of Isla’s steps, her olive peacoat, her bold lip. Noor pictured Isla at home, on the other side of the wall, plotting to turn her bedroom into a carbon-neutral parking lot, the kitchen into a BPA-free, gluten-free dog spa. 

The next morning was overcast, streetlamps shivering between fog-choked row homes, trees yellowing, leaves rippling, and rain-slicked cobblestones like a mirrorball, gleaming. After walking Ginny, Noor traversed Columbia Heights for a cappuccino with a nurse friend at Café Rajab. The tiny bookstore café was furnished exclusively with garage-sale saves and mushroom lamps. Noor had spent many a Saturday morning there with Divya, sunk into threadbare armchairs against a backdrop of bucktoothed bookshelves.

“She asked me where I was from, and I said D.C., and then she said no, like, where are you from from,” Noor told Divya, miming the way Isla had arched her arms into an air hijab. 

“Cringe. Maybe she meant before you moved to Columbia Heights?” 

“Maybe she’s a fucking troglodyte.” 

Noor dunked her biscotti more forcefully than necessary. Divya smiled like her teacup held perpetual sun. Hamza had always been more like Divya. His graciousness never flickered, no matter how many times he had to explain to strangers that his name was from a country in North Africa and no, none of his cousins were involved in 9/11 and yes, they make good kebabs and no, he isn’t Black and it isn’t weird that he isn’t Black. 

After a moment, Divya asked the question Noor feared the most.

“How have you been?” 

Noor twisted her mouth into an expression Divya would immediately recognize as false. 

“Oh, you know. Just working a lot. Night shift, clean, laundry, repeat.”

What could she say? That she still saw Hamza in every dark-haired silhouette, still remembered the sound of his ribs splintering during CPR? That she could never forgive herself for the role she had played in prolonging his suffering, the irretrievable selfishness in her refusal to let him go?

Divya reached for Noor’s shoulder as the tears began to scald. Even now, sipping coffee in dappled light, she bargained with a silent God. This life was so different from the one they’d envisioned. Noor had no taste for it. She lifted her face, sensing a tall shadow in the periphery. 

At the shop window, wasn’t it Isla peeking in, all glazed-eye and Cheshire grin?

“Geez!”

A black cloud seeped from Noor’s upended coffee cup before she could right it. 

“Sorry,” Noor said, reaching for napkins. “I just thought I saw—”

Noor glanced at the window behind Divya again, but identified no familiar faces. Although a moment before, in the frame, she could’ve sworn it was Isla’s silhouette swathed in a pelt of the season’s most on-trend beast, Isla’s tresses young and shiny and new. 

Noor excused herself to order another coffee. Was she losing it?

#

Within the hour, Noor retraced her steps home. The lobby was strangely vacant, the concierge absent, the elevator open and waiting. At her front door, she flashed her key fob over the lock. Its bleat lingered in her mind just a beat too long. 

“Hello?” 

Noor stepped carefully down the hall. The air itched. Every room held the feeling of someone having just left. The silence was incomplete, like the echo of a scream. And there was that smell again, stronger now, like moldering fruit. 

“Can I help you?” 

Isla floated out of the kitchen holding a baking sheet brimming with candy hearts. She wore Noor’s apron, Noor’s sweater, Noor’s shoes. Noor dropped her keys in astonishment, stooping to recover them. 

“Isla—um, what are you doing? You’re in the wrong condo.”

“Oh, gosh,” Isla said, smoothing her hair like something wearing a flesh suit. “You must be confused. We made you a generous offer. This is the Agency’s home now.”

“What? What gives you the idea—”

“The Agency rarely gives notice. You should be grateful.”

“No, Isla—” 

Noor retreated to the door, checking the unit number. 

“609. My family and I have lived in 609 for decades. This is my furniture, Isla. These are my memories—” Noor said, shaking a picture frame at Isla. 

“Look again.” 

Noor stared at the portrait, mouth suddenly full of briars. Isla’s image had replaced Noor’s in every picture on the mantle: Noor’s nursing school graduation, her nikah, Hamza’s birthday. The woman was clearly unhinged. Dangerous, maybe. Noor took a step back.

“I don’t know what you’re playing at—”

Noiselessly, two Isla look-alikes blocked the doorway behind Noor. One was bottle blonde, the other a kind of auburn, tradwife model of Isla. Neither of them appeared to see Noor.

“Welcome home!” said blondie. 

“Welcome home!” said red.

Isla beamed.  

“Noor, these are my new neighbors.” 

“Hello,” they said in unison, gliding closer. 

“Isla—get out of my house.” 

Isla bared her teeth like a wolf in sheep’s blood.

“That’s not very neighborly.” 

Isla and her vanilla clones slinked towards Noor, their long arms undulating, outstretched. One by one, their fingers bloated like balloon animals. Their incisors multiplied, pink taffy maws melting to expose mucous and sinew and bone, gelatinous peepers inflating like Luftballoons. On the stovetop, the kettle began to whistle. 

Noor ran. Up the hall, down the stairs, across the street. Blocks and blocks, not daring to look back until her legs turned to ballast. Finally, lightheaded, she stumbled into Meridian Hill Park. She was a woman of science. Was it a stress-induced hallucination? A trick of the light? She searched for the word for a monster who made your home their own. 

The Agency must have mixed up unit numbers on their sales, Noor decided. A probable but inconvenient mistake. Legs trembling, Noor forced herself back towards 14th Street. Surely the Agency would have answers, and apologies. A rational explanation. Still, Noor hesitated when she saw the burnished doors of the Agency ahead. There were plenty of people around, she told herself. Witnesses. Surely no harm could come to her with all those eyes watching.

When Noor stepped over the Agency’s threshold, she found it deserted. No one answered the service bell. The room had a hollowed-out, antiseptic feel, bare save the flotsam of corporate office life. Everything was unnervingly shiny. On the front counter, a porcelain bowl of candy hearts. Noor resisted the urge to throw it through the glass facade, lest the nice folks outside alert the Department of Homeland Security to an angry woman in a headscarf that was definitely not Hermès. 

With instinctual dread, Noor opened the slick model home lookbook on the front desk. Under “Available Properties,” the Agency’s catalogue featured still shots of every room in her condo. Noor turned the pages, tasting gasoline. She felt a sudden need to return home. She ached for it. 

As she turned to leave, she crushed something chalky underfoot. BABY. Those goddamn candy hearts. They were everywhere. Noor disposed of two more—LOVER and XOXO—when her fear-belly dropped. An envelope had appeared on the bare counter. An envelope with her name on it.

Fingers quivering, Noor ripped the seal. Inside the envelope was a key. 

We’ll relocate you. Isla’s voice slithered through her mind. Elsewhere. 

Stuffing the key in her jacket, Noor turned back towards her condo, dialing 911. Sweat beaded her neck by the time she reached the glass-paneled doors of her building. Noor barely recognized the entryway. 

This time, Noor’s key fob made no sound at all. She tried two, three, four times. A concierge sat at the front desk, but the usual attendant had been replaced by someone who looked suspiciously like Isla. Noor knocked incessantly at the glass. There were plenty of people in the lobby: argyle sweater Isla, long bob Isla, late-for-dressage Isla, can’t-wait-to-tell-you-about-her-injector Isla. A half dozen khaki-and-polo husbands of Isla. None of them seemed to hear. Noor’s courteous taps turned into fist-banging. She pounded the glass. 

“Step away from the door, ma’am.”

Noor wheeled around to find a policeman in aviators behind her. 

“Oh—officer. I called you. There’s been a mistake. This woman has taken my apartment. She’s completely delusional—and I think she reprogrammed the fob reader.”

“You can’t access this building without authorization, ma’am,” the officer said. “And you can’t damage property.”

“I have a key,” Noor repeated. “It’s right here. I’m telling you, please, this woman changed the locks. This is my home. I can prove it.”

At that moment, original Isla strode through the double doors in oversized cat-eye shades, wearing one of Noor’s hijabs as a neckerchief. She dragged Ginny on a leash behind her. 

“She—officer, that’s her!” 

The officer restrained Noor, who watched defenselessly as Isla marched Ginny down the street.

“She has my dog. Ginny—Virginia Woolf, come to mama!”

“Calm down,” the officer said, tightening his grip. “You’re accusing this person of what, exactly?”

Noor tried to steady herself before she responded, to look him in the eye. She imagined he had a wife wanting him at home in a few hours, a German Shepherd, maybe, a blue-eyed buzz-cut kid who wore his dad’s badge for Halloween.

“She took my home. Look, I can show you pictures on my phone—that’s my dog. My condo. I live in 609.”

“Let’s check on that,” the officer said, rapping on the glass. The receptionist, pink power suit Isla, immediately cracked the door and popped her perfectly-conditioned head out. 

“Yes?”

“Miss, can you confirm for me who lives in 609?”

Corporate Barbie Isla didn’t miss a beat. 

“Of course, sir. 609 was recently purchased—” 

Noor restrained her eyebrows.

“—by a very nice couple from Manhattan. He’s a financier, she founded an NGO that crochets sweaters for naked mole rats.”

“Thank you much.”

The officer tipped his hat at concierge Isla. She shut the door. He wheeled on Noor.

“Easy case. If this is a real estate issue, take it up with the Agency.”

“The Agency she—they—work for?”

“These things take time to resolve. You need to go through the proper channels. Find a solution that’s suitable to both parties.”

“The proper channels? That human centipede took my dog!”

“There’s no need for name calling, ma’am. I can’t help if you’re going to be uncivilized.” 

Foreseeing the logical progression of the conversation, Noor turned her back on the officer. She would return to the Agency and make an appeal directly to their office. She’d stay until closing if need be. Her walk broke into a jog. Would she ever be able to return home? 

Noor began to run. 

#

When Noor arrived at 48 Irving Street, she couldn’t believe her eyes. 

The Agency was gone. 

She paced the block half a dozen times, touching the bricks. But there was no storefront between the corner thrift and DeBakey’s. It was like the Agency never existed. 

Noor stared at the unfamiliar street, her street, her neighborhood. The place she once believed she and Hamza would raise children. Around her, people rippled across the sidewalk. 

Suddenly and irreparably exhausted, Noor felt gravity in a way she never had before. The rain restarted, fat droplets pelting the sidewalk. Shielding her eyes, Noor noticed a slender tin mailbox hammered into the red brick between the bakery and the secondhand store. She approached it in disbelief. 

The Agency was inscribed below the box in colonial font. Remembering the key in her pocket, Noor fit it to the lock. 

The mailbox contained a single candy heart. Pink, with red letters. Raindrops pooling, Noor placed the candy heart in the palm of her hand:

WELCOME HOME.

The rain intensified. Red ink bled down her fingers, the candy heart disintegrating into shimmering silt. 

Nadia Djamila is an Algerian-American writer based in the Washington, D.C. area. Her work is published or forthcoming in Sonora Review, 101 Words, and GomerBlog.