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

There was no siren, no rush. This was Rootbeer’s last ride.
    The ambulance got as far as the corner. Then the white reverse lights came on, and it backed up, coming to a stop in front of the deli. The doors swung wide, and out stepped Rootbeer Racinette, fresh as a daisy.
    â€œHe’s alive!” cried Don.
    The three of us made a run at Rootbeer, catching him in a joyful embrace, blubbering incoherently. Plotnick launched into a tantrum because the police had come to his building for nothing. Our neighbors cheered, and the two attendants craned their necks out the ambulance windows to stare at the man they had pronounced dead just a few minutes earlier.
    Rootbear stretched expansively. “What’s everybody so excited about?”
    I couldn’t believe it. “You were
dead
, Rootbeer! No heartbeat or anything! And I figured because of that hit you took last night …” My voice trailed off.
    The ex-corpse looked mystified for a second, then laughed airily. “I’m into Manchurian Bush Meditation. I learned it from a guru in Buffalo. Your heart slows down to five or six beats a minute, which is probably what fooled you guys. It was an honest mistake.”
    â€œI’ll give you an honest mistake, you degenerate!” raged Plotnick. “If they put you in the ground before you wake up —
that’s
an honest mistake!”
    Rootbeer shrugged. “No hard feelings.”
    The ambulance attendants had hard feelings. They left a lot of rubber on Pitt Street before squealing away onto Bathurst. Plotnick had hard feelings. He stormed back into the deli and sulked behind the counter, sharpening his meat fork. The three of us had hard feelings, too, but to the bizarre giant in the poncho, we didn’t dare say anything.

SIX
    The envelope was postmarked Biarritz, and contained a photograph of my brother frolicking on the beach with a fabulous brunette.
Me and Yvette on the French Riviera. P.S. I forgot to tell you that Rootbeer might be dropping by. He sometimes does this thing where it looks like he’s dead, but it’s really okay.
    Rootbeer was already gone by the time we woke up that morning. None of us had heard him leave, which seemed kind of strange. Not noticing Rootbeer was like not noticing Europe. There was no note, but wherever he was, at least he’d left the car this time. It was parked in front of the deli.
    â€œMaybe he’s gone for good,” said the Peach.
    â€œShhh!” admonished Don. “We don’t want to jinx ourselves.”
    I threw down the Employment section in disgust. “Well, Don, it looks like we blew our chance at having important jobs when we got canned making bubble wands.”
    We’d just bundled the Peach off to dumb Plastics Unlimited with a sarcastic “Have a nice day at work, Honey.” The two of us had gotten up early to prepare him a brown bag lunch consisting of the tidbits we could find in the trash dumpster outside, but he mentioned something about lunch meetings, and left us our garbage, which was starting to smell as we pored over the paper.
    â€œIf he’s going to keep making us look like idiots, the least he can do is fall for our jokes,” was Don’s opinion.
    â€œAll the good summer jobs are taken,” I complained. “We’re too late for anything decent. I wish your uncle had warned us he only needed feeders for five days.”
    â€œHow was he supposed to know the great Doctor of Fuzzology was going to stick his nose into everything? Hey, can I type eighty words a minute?”
    I had to laugh. “You’d be lucky to do eighty words a month.” Don typed with his right index finger:
click
 …
click
 …
click
 …
    Don was undaunted. “Wow! This is a fantastic job! Your own office, a secretary, great money, short hours — we should call these guys.”
    I looked over his shoulder to his pointing finger. “That’s