Pop Goes the Weasel

amazing accomplishment in itself.
    He would be remembered as “quite tall, thin and bald,” or as an “interesting artiste type,” and several people did see him that week in Chelsea in London. I want to be remembered. That’s important .
    He shopped, or at least window-shopped, on the King’s Road and in Sloane Street.
    He went to the cinema in Kensington High Street.
    And the Waterstone’s bookshop.
    Nights, he would have a pint or two at the King’s Head. He mostly kept to himself at the pub.
    He had a master plan. Another game was beginning.
    He saw Lucy and the twins at Safeway one afternoon. He watched them from across rows of baked beans, then followed them down the aisles filled with shoppers. No harm, no foul — no problem for anybody.
    He couldn’t resist the challenge, though. The dice started to play in his head. They rattled the number he wanted to hear.
    He kept walking closer and closer to the family, careful to keep his face slightly averted, just in case, but still watching Lucy out of the corner of his eye, watching the twins, who were perhaps more dangerous.
    Lucy was examining some wild Scottish salmon. She finally noticed him, he was sure, but she didn’t recognize him — obviously. Neither did the twins. Dumb, silly little girls — mirrors of their mother.
    The game was on again — so delicious. He’d been away from it for a while. He had the book money, his advance from the trial tell-all, which he kept in Switzerland. He had bummed around the Caribbean after his escape by boat from Jamaica. He’d gone to San Juan and been tempted to act up there. Then on to Europe — first to Rome, Milan, Paris, Frankfurt, and Dublin, and finally home to London. He’d strayed only a couple of times on the whole trip. He was such a careful boy now.
    It felt just like old times as he got oh-so-close to Lucy in the shopping aisle. Jesus, his physical tics were back. He was tapping his foot nervously and shaking out his hands.
    He’d have thought she’d notice that, but she was such a vacuous blond cow, such a cipher, such a waste of his time; even now, as he got closer and closer, only a foot or two away, she still didn’t recognize him
    “Oh Loo-cy … it’s Ricky,” he said, and grinned and grinned. “It’s me, darling. ”
    Swish. Swish . He swiped at her twice, back and forth, as they passed like strangers in the aisle at Safeway. The blows barely crisscrossed Lucy’s throat, but they cut it inches deep.
    She dropped to her bony knees, both hands clutching her neck as if she were strangling herself. And then she saw who it was, and her blue eyes bulged with shock and pain and finally with what seemed to be a terrible sadness.
    “Geoffrey,” she managed in a gurgling voice, as blood bubbled from her open mouth.
    Her last word on Earth. His name.
    Beautiful for Shafer to hear — the recognition he craved — revenge for all of them. He turned away, forced himself to, before he did the twins as well.
    He was never seen again in the Chelsea neighborhood, but everyone would remember him for as long as they lived.
    God, would they remember .
    That tall bald monster.
    The one in all-black clothes, the inhuman freak.
    The heartless killer who had committed so many horrible murders that even he had lost count.
    Geoffrey Shafer.
    Death.