Loser by Jerry Spinelli Read Free Book Online Page A

forgotten something. He rushes back to deliver 924 its letter. The Waiting Man is still there.
    Several houses later Donald hears someone behind him calling: “Mailman! Oh mailman!”
    He turns. He has to lift his head to see out from under the brim of the pith helmet.
    A white-haired lady in a mint-green dress is standing on a step waving her letter. She is surrounded by a four-legged aluminum walker. She’s smiling at him. “Thank you, mailman!” she calls.
    Donald calls back, “You’re welcome!” He stands at attention and salutes her.
    Shortly after that comes a moment Donald has not expected. He reaches into the bag and feels nothing but leather. He takes it off and puts it on the sidewalk and peers into it. Nothing. Empty. He has delivered his one hundred letters. Many times he has imagined the start of Take Donald Zinkoff to Work Day; never has he imagined the end of it.
    Clunker Four grumbles at the curb.
    â€œWorkday’s over,” calls his dad. “Time to go home.”
    Reluctantly Donald drags the bag to the car. He gets in. He does not take off the helmet. His father gives him his day’s pay. He puts it in his pocket without looking at it. He cries all the way home.

13. Waiting
    Andrew’s father must have gotten a raise, because by the time Zinkoff enters third grade, Andrew is gone. Moved. To a place outside of town called Heatherwood. To a house with a driveway and a front yard with a tree, Zinkoff hears.
    In November of third grade Zinkoff goes through the worst period in all his eight years. He has surgery. He goes into the hospital and they put him to sleep and the doctor turns the upside-down valve in his stomach right-side up. The good news is that he stops throwing up. The bad news is that he has to miss three weeks of school.
    He drives his mother crazy. “Heaven help me” every ten minutes. On the second day after returning home from the hospital, he tries to sneak off to school. So his mother creates analarm. She places the alarm in front of the front door. If her son ever tries to leave, the alarm goes off. The alarm is Polly.
    Polly is seventeen months old by now. She speaks very little at this point, but one thing she does say is “Bye-bye.” She says it distinctly—in fact, she shouts it—and she says it whenever she sees someone leaving the house. Each morning Mother Zinkoff padlocks the back door. Then she wheels the playpen up against the front door and places Polly inside. Then she goes about her chores, ready to come running whenever she hears “Bye-bye!”
    It happens only once. Mrs. Z comes running to find her son halfway out the door and Polly yelling “Bye-bye!” at the top of her lungs. She also finds a chocolate cupcake mashed in Polly’s hand. A bribe.
    Once Zinkoff understands that escape is impossible, he considers other ways to spend his time. This is critical, because time sits on Zinkoff’s hands like an elephant. He hates to wait. He hates waiting more than anything else.To Zinkoff, waiting means basically this: not moving. He hates waiting in lines. He hates waiting for the bathroom to clear out. He hates waiting for answers, for toast to pop up, for bathtubs to fill, for soup to heat, soup to cool, car rides to end.
    Most of all he hates sleep, the curse of the human race. Every night he protests it, every morning he gets out of it as soon as he can. In fact, as far as Zinkoff is concerned, he doesn’t really sleep. He merely waits all night until it’s time to get up. If pressed, he will admit to going to bed, but not to sleep.
    Relatives and other grown-ups have discovered that they can amuse themselves by asking him, “So Donald, when did you go to bed last night?”
    â€œNine o’clock.”
    â€œAnd when did you go to sleep?”
    â€œI didn’t.”
    â€œYou mean you didn’t sleep all night?”
    â€œNope.”
    Whenever his uncle