Read Online Losing Joe's Place by Gordon Korman - Free Book Online

didn’t make us any more confident when he said he had to wait until it got dark. But how could we face him and say, “Rootbeer, which bank are you going to knock off?” because on the chance, however slight, that his plans were lawful and honest, he’d be pretty insulted. And even though we’d only just met him this morning, we’d already learned that people who insulted Rootbeer Racinette invariably ran into
bad luck
.
    â€œI’ll need one of you to come with me,” Rootbeer announced when the sun began to set.
    That did it. Don suddenly developed a terrible headache, and Ferguson locked himself in the bathroom, obviously with no intention of coming out. I could have made a fuss, demanded we draw straws or flip a coin, but I didn’t. It was Joe’s apartment and Joe’s friend, and the job of going with him fell to me.
    Just before nine, Rootbeer declared the time was right. I followed him, my empty stomach rumbling ominously, as though it knew that my next meal was going to be served at Chez Penitentiary, on a tin plate.
    We got into the car, and Rootbeer drove at a hundred miles an hour to an area of town even seedier than Pitt Street, if such a thing was possible. We parked in front of an old building that was in the process of either being torn down or collapsing, and Rootbeer started rummaging through the pile of debris, coming up with a long rotted two-by-four. This he carried over his shoulder, like a soldier with an eight-foot rifle, to a dumpy establishment on the corner with a neon sign that just read
Bar
.
    â€œWait here,” he told me, and disappeared inside.
    About five seconds later, a booming voice bellowed,
“Twenty bucks says you can’t hurt me with a shot in the stomach with this two-by-four!”
    I almost died. There was a roar of enthusiasm from the bar, and out onto the street poured eighteen people, Rootbeer in the lead. He collected twenty dollars each from the participants, who were in a spirited argument over who would get to swing the heavy piece of lumber.
    He handed the money to me. “Hold this.”
    â€œFor God’s sake, Rootbeer,” I quavered, “you can’t go through with this! You’ll get killed! Not to mention if we lose, we can’t pay off five cents of that money!”
    â€œNot so loud!” whispered Rootbeer. “People don’t like to bet when they know there’s no money to pay them. They get mad.”
    By this time, the eighteen were taking practice swings with the two-by-four. The whistle of the board through the air was making me queasy, and I watched in a daze as the group elected some guy who had once tried out for the Yankees to take the home run swing.
    There are times in your life when you see something so totally amazing you forget how scared you are and try to make the moment last, because you know you’ll never see anything quite like it again. Whenever I think back to that night, I always see it in super slo-mo, although it was really over in a flash. Rootbeer stood there like a mighty redwood, feet planted, stomach tense under his poncho. The almost-Yankee swung for the upper deck. The board slammed into Rootbeer’s abdomen with a thump that echoed through the streets. The wood splintered. I felt the sidewalk lurch, but Rootbeer didn’t move. He didn’t even flinch.
    He started to whistle, and glanced around the circle of shocked faces. “Nice meeting everybody. We’d better get going. ’Bye.”
    The three of us, me, Rootbeer, and the money, climbed back into the Camaro. Rootbeer indicated that I should drive, and I was overjoyed to take off out of there. Neither of us spoke, so I figured I had to break the ice.
    â€œRootbeer, that was amazing —”
    â€œAaaahhh!!!”
he shrieked in a bone-chilling voice that nearly put me up a telephone pole. “Are you okay?”
    â€œ
Aaaahhh!!!
”
    Now I knew why he’d needed