Skateboard Renegade Read Online Free PDF

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     out he was a thief!
    Zach finally got the reaction he wanted on Labor Day, when the whole family went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Halper and all
     the Halper cousins. The adults groaned and moaned, and gave him lectures about his future and about being a sheep blindly
     following the herd and about the evils of “pop culture.”
    “He's gonna be just like Seymour,” Aunt Belle said, shaking her head and clucking her tongue.
    “You mean, 'Skeeter'?” Uncle Fred asked sarcastically. “That's what he calls himself these days, you know—what kind of a name
     is that, 'Skeeter'? It's short for
mosquito,
isn't it?”
    Zach loved his uncle Skeeter, his mom's youngerbrother. “The retro-hippie,” she sometimes called him, but she always smiled when she talked about him. And every week they
     talked for a long time on the phone.
    “Mosquito? Why would he name himself after a mosquito?” Aunt Belle wondered.
    “What can I tell you?” Uncle Fred said with a shrug. “He lives out there in Los Angeles someplace and never gets a job. I
     don't know how he lives.”
    “Anyway,” Aunt Belle said with another look at Zach, “this one takes after him.”
    Zach remembered the time Uncle Skeeter came to stay with them for a week, when Zach was only five. Skeeter hadn't been too
     grown up to play with him. It was like being with a very big kid, Zach remembered. Hey, if he reminded them of Uncle Skeeter,
     that was okay with him.
    Zach tried to ignore their muttering and the looks they were giving him. Taking a hint from Uncle Skeeter, he concentrated
     his attention on the little kid cousins, who obviously thought Zach was the coolest thing on wheels.
    “How do you make your hair stick up like that?” little cousin Marcella wondered.
    “Did it hurt when they stuck a hole in your ear?” cousin Nicky asked. “I'd be too chicken to let anyone do that to me.”
    “You're so brave!” Marcella said, gazing at him with open admiration.
    Well, it
had
taken guts to do what he'd done, Zach thought proudly. He'd gone in alone, too, without his friends there to support him.
    Yeah, brave, that's me, he thought, almost believing it.
    The next morning he was still thinking about his heroics as he stood in front of the bedroom mirror, getting ready for his
     first day at Amherst Academy.
    Zach still thought the haircut looked ridiculous on him. But the stylist had assured him it was way cool, and the little kids
     all liked it—except for Zoey, who didn't count—so he guessed it looked okay after all.
    All in all, Zach was feeling pretty good about things, considering that he was going to a new school, where everyone else
     knew one another, and he didn't know one single solitary soul.
    Gazing at himself in the mirror, he held his handsout to either side, pretending he was skateboarding. Today, with his grounding over, he'd go right over to Moorehead Park
     after school to see the guys. They'd compare haircuts and earrings and first days of school. He wanted to let them know he
     was still one of them, even if he did go to a different school now.
    Zach struck another pose—as if he'd just pulled off an amazing stunt on his board and was basking in the applause of the crowd.
     That's when he heard Zoey laughing and clapping behind him.
    “Whoo-oo!!” she catcalled, mocking him by striking a pose herself. “There he is, Mr. Cool himself!”
    Zach was about to say something nasty. But then he thought,
No, I'm the mature one. I'll just let it go by, like it doesn't bother me.
And he did, chillin' as he walked past her toward the front door. “Yeah, that's right,” he said. “I
am
Mr. Cool.”
    “Let's go, you two. Mom and I have to get to work!” Dad called from the car.
    Zoey got dropped off first. She still went to good old Coleridge Elementary. Zach shook his head as he watched her walk up
     the steps with her little girlfriends.
Zoey doesn't know how lucky she is,
hethought. Zach still had great memories from his years