From California, Sondra swore she could hear her mother close her eyes and send a silent 'thank you' to God.

"I know; I'm just overreacting... " Mimi's faint German accent halted a bit before trailing off. There was a quiet moment between mother and daughter.

"I stopped at a bakery a few minutes ago and had a cupcake. You know the yellow ones with all the frosting? They even gave me a candle."

Sondra could hear Mimi sniffle. "She always loved white frosting on her cupcakes. She never wanted anything on her birthday but yellow cupcakes with white frosting, even when she was little."

"I still can't believe she's gone."

"She would have been thirty-five. So young."

"I know, Mommy."

"I catch myself thinking about her at the strangest times. Like yesterday, I was getting in the car and was remembering when I was teaching her how to drive. I sat in the driveway crying for twenty minutes."

"I know, Mommy. It's hard."

"Then Mrs. Pinkus came over knocking on the window, yammering on about her dog being hit by a car last year. Like you can compare the two."

"In her mind, you can."

"Sonny, I don't think it'll ever stop hurting."

Sondra shook her head, tears now welling in her eyes. "I know," she said. "I know."

"I sent a box of her things over to your apartment. Mindy said she would keep it for you until you got back. I thought you would want them. I just... I tried to go through it, but... I just couldn't... "

"Yeah, Mindy told me. I won't be back in the apartment for a few weeks, so I'll go through everything... at some point." She paused. "How's Daddy?"

"He's good, good. Working on a new book, so he's down in L.A. for a few days doing some research."

"Oh yeah? What's this one about?"

"He mumbled something about the movies. You know how he gets when he's in the zone."

Sondra chuckled and wiped the back of her hand across her nose. "That I do."

"Oh, oh, speaking of, that's daddy on the other line. I've got to go."

"Tell him I said hey."

"Okay, sweetie." Mimi paused. "I'm so glad you're home. Safe and sound."

Sondra closed her eyes and sighed at the sadness in her mother's voice. "I know. Bye, Mommy."

Sondra hung up and continued down Broadway towards The W where she was staying for a few weeks. She retrieved her cigarettes once more and lit up, sighing with satisfaction as the nicotine flooded through her. As Sondra took drags off her cigarette, she found herself lost in thoughts about Tracy.

It was a warm April day in Manhattan, but the image of her sister lying alone and bloody beneath the blowing and drifting snow of a vicious Chicago winter made Sondra shiver, just like she had that day in India when her mother had called to tell her Tracy was missing. She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, much to the ire of New Yorkers trying to steer around her. Sondra trembled again and wrapped her arms around her waist.

Her cigarette had burned down to a nub and she jumped as the ash stung her finger. She dropped the cigarette on the sidewalk and resumed walking, Tracy's face spinning in her head.

SIX.

Sondra put on her sunglasses as she glided through the lobby of her apartment building on her way outside. The burly new doorman swung the revolving door for her.

"Good morning, Ms. Ellis. Need a cab?"

Sondra smiled. "Please, call me Sondra and no, it's such a nice day out, I'm going to walk. Besides, I need the fresh air," she said, winking at him as she waved her newly extracted cigarette in his direction.

"Have a good day," he laughed.

After a year and a half of criss-crossing the globe for her latest documentary on women's beauty rituals, Sondra had moved back into her apartment a few weeks earlier and had been working nonstop on post-production ever since. Yesterday had been a seventeen-hour day and today promised to be yet another marathon session. She lit up and had just taken her first inhale when she saw a tall, handsome black guy in an obviously expensive suit walking towards her, talking on his cell phone. She stopped dead in her tracks, not believing it was him. He saw her and did a double-take as well.

"Hey, I gotta go," he said just before he hung up. He smiled and swallowed her into a bear hug.

"What are you doing here?" she gasped and laughed as she returned Jack's fierce embrace.

"I'm in town for a few days on business. How are you?"

"I'm okay, I'm okay." She put her hand on her forehead. "Man, how long's it been?"

"I think the last time I saw you was when we came out for the premiere of 'The Deepest Cut' about four years ago."

"Wow, that's right, that's right." Sondra stepped back to take a good look at her sister's ex-boyfriend.

Tracy had met Jack Turner about a month after she'd moved to Chicago. He owned two popular restaurant/bars in Chicago called Dive and Flow, respectively. Tracy was having drinks at Dive with one of the producers from her station when Jack spotted her and introduced himself. They became inseparable within a matter of days. Jack was rich, successful, good-looking, and easygoing, possessing the same energy and wit as Tracy. Everyone had loved Jack and all signs pointed to a walk down the aisle. However, after four years together, they'd suddenly broken up, much to everyone's surprise and, as Sondra joked, devastation.

"You look great," she said in all sincerity. "What are you up to these days?"

"Still in the restaurant business. I'm looking to open up a spot in Harlem."

"Wow. Will this be anything like the other two?"

"Naw, this is going to be more of a fusion thing."

Sondra nodded her head in appreciation. "That's great news. Does that mean you're moving up here?"

"Come on now. You know better than that. I hate New York."

"Watch it," Sondra said with the practiced growl of a New Yorker who despised anyone ragging on her city.

Jack laughed. "I've got a partner I'm going in with. He'll be the man on the street here."

"Ah, okay. Very cool."

"How are you? Really?"

Sondra let out a long, anguished breath. "Do you want the polite answer or the truth?"

Jack stole a quick glance around. "Hey, let's grab a quick cup of coffee. I mean if you have time."

Sondra looked at her watch and nodded. "Yeah, yeah, let me just make a phone call."

Sondra let her production team know she'd be in a little late and she and Jack ducked into a small diner a few feet away where he got them cups of black coffee.

"Thanks," she said as she dumped six packets of sugar and two vials of cream into her mug and stirred.

Jack looked down into his cup. "How are your parents?"

"Um, okay. Mimi's still teaching swimming a few days a week; Daddy's working on a new book."

"That's not what I meant."

"I know."

Sondra looked at the mother and little girl at the next table engaged in a game of pattycake. Her heart skipped as she thought about the children Tracy had longed for and would never have.

Sondra took a deep breath. "Taking each day as it comes. I've actually been hopping all over the world for the past year working on my next documentary. I did come back for a little while, after... " Sondra's voice went whisper soft and she took a sip of her coffee.

Jack hunched over his cup, lost in thought. "Yeah..."

"So you married, kids, what?"

Jack shook his head and ran his hands across the green Formica tabletop. "Nope. I mean I'm dating a couple of people, but not getting married anytime soon or anything."

Sondra frowned, turning over in her mind the words she wanted to say. "So what's your side of the story?" Sondra cocked one eyebrow and waited for Jack to pick up the thread of her inquiry.

Jack slurped on his coffee. "I was stupid."

Sondra took another sip of coffee, watching him.

He ran his lean, massive hands across his face several times before he gave her a wry smile. "Tracy was the love of my life. I'll never love another woman the way I loved her. She wanted to get married, start a family and I was too scared. Typical stupid bullshit. She basically said propose or she was leaving. I didn't, so she did."

Sondra drummed her index finger on the table and pinched her lips together. "Do you regret it?"

Jack gave Sondra a sad smile. "Every day. Honestly, I thought we'd work it out, you know, like she needed time to cool down. I realized too late she wasn't coming back."

"What were you afraid of?"

"Losing my so-called independence. Stupidest thing I ever did was let that woman get away. Next thing I know, she's married to someone else."

Sondra sighed and looked out the window. "Regret is a terrible thing to have to live with."

"If I had it to do over again, I would do it so differently."

"Can't un-ring a bell."

"Did you get to see her before... ?"

Sondra sipped her coffee. "I was her maid of honor. I left for India two days later, so that was the last time I saw her."

"Ah. Right. Of course. What was that, about six months or so before she died?"

Sondra nodded. "Yeah. They didn't have much time."

"I saw her before she... disappeared," he said.

Sondra's head jerked back to face Jack. "What? When?"

"That Friday."

Sondra straightened up, confused. "Did you tell the police?"

"No. I mean, I didn't know what good it would have done. It wasn't like I was the last person to see her. And it wasn't for long. Besides, I didn't want her husband to hear about it, you know, get the wrong idea..."

"How, where?"

Jack ran his tongue across his teeth. "Downtown. She was out running some errands, and kind of like you and I today, we just ran into each other."

"How was she? I mean how did she seem?"

Jack hesitated for a moment. "Unhappy."

"What, like she was having a bad day?"

Jack shook his head and slumped back against the peeling vinyl seat, the material crackling under his movements. "No, that wasn't it." Jack took a deep breath. "Man, I've never told anyone about this." He looked at Sondra.

"Like I said, we ran into each other and I asked if I could buy her a drink for old time's sakes. We went to Ian's, one of our old spots. She was real fidgety. Distracted."

"Okay, Jack, to be fair, she was probably nervous because that was the first time you guys were seeing each other in a while."

Jack leaned closer. "Sondra, I lived with Tracy for three and a half years. I knew her inside and out. Every mood, every expression. Every little quirk. Something was definitely off."

Sondra pursed her lips. "Alright. Go on."

"I asked her how she was. And she just looked at me, those big, beautiful eyes full of tears and said she was unhappy."

"What did she mean by that? Unhappy about what?"

"That was all she said and as soon as it came out of her mouth, she said she was sorry, and that she had to go. She picked up her stuff and ran out." Jack took a sip of coffee. "And that was the last time I saw her."