Free The Grim Spectre by Ralph L. Angelo Jr. Page B

back, and keeping you safe from your own foibles, Phylo.”
    Zeus nodded and said, “An’ you just make sure you keep doin’ just that, Oscar,” he replied with a pointed finger.

Chapter 15
     
     
    “Hey Bobby! Are you in there?” a muffled female voice called from the hallway outside Bobby Terrano’s door.
    Groggily at first, then with almost instantly renewed clarity Bobby’s eyes focused and he sat up quickly, suddenly wide awake.
    ‘Oh no!’ he thought, ‘That’s Tammy, she’s here and I’m in my costume yet. I must’ve slept the whole day away.’
    He looked down at the blood stained costume and quickly felt beneath the shirt. Only a slight scar remained.
    ‘The magic belt, it healed me again, but it took the whole day. I must’ve been hurt worse than I thought.’
    “Bobby do you hear me?” Tammy said, while pounding on the door.
    ‘What do I do? I can’t get changed outta this thing fast enough,’ Bobby thought.
    With a quick thought Bobby turned invisible, and intangible, stepping back into a wall between his apartment and the next. An instant later Tammy entered, using the key Bobby had hidden under his door mat. She looked around, her face screwed up in a combination of surprise and worry.
    “Well I’ll be,” she began, “He’s not in here, but I swear I heard him moving around. So where is he? He never stopped by to drive me nuts at work like he always does. I don’t get it. I hope he’s all right. Then she noticed the sofa, with the dried blood stains on it and her eyes went wide in fear. “Oh Bobby!” she cried, covering her face with both hands, “The hospitals! I have to check the hospitals. Oh no, I hope he’s there and not dead in some alley somewhere, oh Bobby!” she cried and ran out the door of the apartment, pulling it closed behind her.
    An instant later the Grim Spectre emerged from his hiding spot. He had peeked his invisible face through the wall and seen the entire display of Tammy’s concern and worry.
    “Great, how am I going to explain this one?” Bobby said aloud.
    He walked into his bedroom and stripped off the bloody costume, then hid it all in a false bottomed drawer in his dresser. Carefully he held the wide golden belt and thought ‘You need to look like a regular leather belt now.’ Instantly the belt complied and it changed shape into a run of the mill leather belt. Quickly he ran into the shower and washed. A few moments later he was dressing in a fresh pair of slacks and clean shirt.
    ‘I’m going to have to find Tammy and tell her I’m okay,’ he thought to himself. ‘Then I have to find that crazy priest who attacked me, I mean The Grim Spectre last night, and I have to teach him a lesson he’s not gonna forget.’
    He looked toward his dresser one last time then removed the bloody shirt from the hidden drawer.
    ‘Then I have to get this cleaned.’
    He shoved the dirty and bloody shirt into a bag and headed toward the door. Opening it he stepped cautiously outside, and seeing no one around he reached under the door mat and removed the key Tammy had replaced there.
    ‘I’m not leaving this around anymore, that’s for sure.’
    He placed the key in his pocket and hurried down the staircase toward the front door of the apartment building.
    Bursting out onto the street Bobby looked in both directions but he knew Tammy was long gone.
    ‘Dammit, now what do I do?’ he thought.
    Bobby snapped his fingers and said “The Paper, that’s where I can find her.” He hailed a passing cab and quickly jumped in. Fifteen minutes later he exited the cab door and bounded up the staircase toward the door of the old building.
    Once inside the city room he shouted, “George, have you seen Tammy? Just now I mean, has she been back here in the last couple of minutes?”
    George Kowalski looked up from a stack of papers in his hands and focused on the disheveled young man running toward him.
    “Whoa, slow down, Bobby. Yes, Tammy was just here and she