Free Going Gone by Sharon Sala

and called out.
    “Hey, Paul...Paul Leibowitz! Don’t forget Patsy’s party tonight. It’s at 7:00 p.m.”
    “At seven,” he echoed, and waved.
    Sometimes Hershel went. Sometimes he didn’t. But now that they’d seen him and issued a concrete invitation, he wouldn’t ignore it. Part of his cover was living the lifestyle of a retired businessman with a healthy outlook on social activities.
    The birthday girl, eighty-eight-year-old Patsy Lincoln, had a reputation as something of a matchmaker. She made Hershel nervous, always trying to pair up the singles in the neighboring condos, which made him a prime target of interest. He didn’t want another woman and had managed to evade her suggestions. He wondered absently what it would be like to be eighty-eight years old, then shrugged it off. Without Louise, it didn’t really matter anymore. He was here until he was not.
    By the time he reached his condo, he was uncomfortably warm. The air-conditioning was a welcome relief as he locked the door behind him, then turned on the television before going to wash up.
    Once inside the bathroom, he paused, eyeing himself in the mirror, and then leaned toward it for a closer look. His mustache was in need of a trim and a fresh dye job, and he needed to run the electric razor over his head. Opting for completely bald had been part of the new look, and he didn’t regret it.
    He felt his face to check for whiskers. It needed a bit of a shave as well, but that wouldn’t take long. Even though the plastic surgeon had done wonders at minimizing the burn scars on his face from the boat explosion in Louisiana two years earlier and the other scars left from the injuries he’d suffered in the Missouri tornado last year, only a portion of his face grew whiskers. The need for revenge that had turned him into a killer had also done a number on his appearance. Once he’d used disguises to hide his identity; now he hardly recognized himself. But the need for killing was in the past. He had purposefully avenged his wife’s death in brutal fashion. The authorities who’d ignored him and Louise before would, by God, not forget them again.
    He backtracked into his bedroom, took off his sweaty clothes and then went to shave and shower. He would tend to the dye job tomorrow.
    He emerged a short while later in search of something appropriate to wear. After a quick scan of the closet, he opted for a short-sleeve, button-up shirt with a straight tail. Wearing untucked shirts was common here, and he liked it. He chose a pair of cotton slacks in cinnamon-brown, which coordinated nicely with the pale yellow color of his shirt, and opted for a pair of brown loafers, always striving for lightweight. After the burns he’d suffered, he could no longer tolerate heat, and even though the winter temperatures in this area stayed in the high seventies to low eighties, it didn’t take much for him to feel uncomfortable.
    Once he was dressed, he grabbed his keys and headed for the community center. The security lights at every corner marked the distance as he walked, and since the sun was down, the night was already cooler, which was a relief. He could hear the celebration in full swing even before he saw the building, and when he arrived, both doors were wide-open.
    He walked in unobserved, grabbed a glass of punch and a piece of cake and then found an empty chair at the far end of one table. One of the residents saw him, waved a hello and then resumed his conversation with the people beside him.
    Hershel smiled and nodded, then took a bite of cake. He always thought of Louise when he came to the events. She would have loved every minute of the social life here, right down to the birthday cake. She would have cheated a little on her diabetic regimen just to have the sweets and added more insulin later. Louise always had been one to push a boundary. He took a second bite of cake, washed it down with a sip of punch and made himself quit thinking about Louise.