Act of God

star for the week.”
    “How long did the acting last?”
    “Not long. Darbra’s big on looks, but short on talent. I saw her once. She kind of... overplayed things, in order to stand out, you know?”
    Pretty frank for a good friend talking to a stranger like me. “You stayed in touch after school, then?”
    “More or less. We both settled in the area. She bounced around, workwise. Mostly Mac-jobs.”
    “I’m sorry?”
    “Mac-jobs, like the fast food. Office temp, morning shift in a health club, the kind of short-term stuff that’s all your generation will let our generation have the chance to do.” I’d forgotten. “How long have you lived here?”
    “About a year? Yeah, about. We were both looking at the same time, and these like identical one-bedrooms came up in this building. I guess I saw the ad first, in the paper, and Darb was having lunch with me, and we came over together to see them. We liked both places, so we tossed a coin, and I won.”
    “You won?”
    “The higher-floor unit. Less noise from the street.”
    “You both were looking at one-bedrooms?”
    Wickmire suddenly grew cautious. “That’s right.”
    “Why?”
    “What do you mean, why?”
    “Well, a free-lance writer and a free-lance everything, I’d have thought two college friends might try to room together, save some money.”
    A shrug that didn’t quite come off. “Prices were right, the recession and all. Besides, our allergies don’t match.”
    “I don’t get you.”
    “Darb has a cat. I’m allergic to their dander.”
    “What’s her allergy?”
    The coy smile. “I’ll let you guess when we see her place.” Moving right along. “Ms. Proft talk with you much about work?”
    Another shrug, this one real. “What’s to tell? Boring, boring, bor- ing, except for one special somebody.”
    “Who?”
    “She won’t tell me. Darb’s like that. I came in on her once, on the phone, talking baby sweet talk to somebody. She was rolling her eyes, and I tried to make her laugh, but she held on till she hung up, then she and I roared till I thought we’d pee our—uh-oh, did I shock you?”
    “Not yet.”
    “Gives me something to shoot for.”
    Again the rising voice. “Ms. Wickmire—”
    “I decided I’d rather you call me ‘Traci.’ ”
    “Traci.”
    “I mean, if I can call you anything I want, you should be able to call me anything you want, right?”
    The rising voice was the only coloring on the flirting lines, because she didn’t deliver them with anything else. “Traci—”
    “And I’ll call you ‘John.’ ”
    “Traci, she never told you who at work it might have been?”
    “No, I just asked her, ‘Who the fuck was that, your sugar I daddy?’ Oh-uh, I just used ‘fuck.’ Now I have shocked you.”
    “My generation doesn’t shock that easily, all the practice we’ve gotten holding yours back.”
    Wickmire rubbed the knuckles of her toes. “I think you’re a lot more clever than you show at first, John.”
    “What did Ms. Proft—”
    “As long as we’re so flexible with names, can we call her ‘Darbra’?”
    “Fine.” 9
    “I mean, it’s a super name, and there’s at least a chance she’s dead, so why not speak nice about her?”
    The air felt a little cold. “You think she’s dead?”
    “I don’t know. But she is missing, and you started me way back in college with her, so I have to think you believe it’s a... ‘distinct possibility.’ Why do you think I’ve been telling you all this so straight?”
    “Traci, what exactly did Darbra say when you asked her who the man on the other end of the phone was?”
    “I don’t know, something like, ‘Yeah, kind of.’ ”
    “Kind of what?”
    “Kind of her sugar daddy, I guess.”
    “Do you remember when this was?”
    “A month, six weeks ago. It was no big thing with Darb, John.”
    I took some notes. “What was no big thing?”
    “Talking to a man on the phone. She had her share.”
    No lift to that sentence. “She saw a lot of men?”
    “Saw them, touched them, fucked them. There, if that doesn’t shock you, I don’t know what will.”
    “How many?”
    “We could check her bedpost for notches.”
    “How many recently that you know of?”
    “How many. Well, sugar daddy, whoever he is. The married guy, and—”
    “What married guy?”
    “This guy, lived out in the suburbs somewhere. They were a thing almost since we moved in here. I used to see him when he’d come in to Darb’s for a little... what did