Looking to my left with a raised brow, I found Ricky and Kailey. Ricky had multiple shopping bags in his hand. He struggled to hold them as Kailey waved.
"Funny seeing you here," Kailey said with a grin that reached her eyes. "Are you buying new clothes for the trip too?"
I shook my head. "I'm just picking up some clothes my parents ordered. You’re shopping for the trip?"
“Kailey insisted that she needed some new tops, and I really needed a belt.” Ricky raised the bags in the air weakly. “Clearly it turned into buying a whole new wardrobe. For Kailey, anyway."
"I still have so many other things to do!" Kailey exclaimed with a sigh. "I don't have any clothes packed at all, and I need to get a bunch of travel size items for the plane. I’m also trying toplan out our days at the theme park so we can get on everything we want to.”
"Meanwhile, I haven't even thought about packing yet," Ricky muttered. "All I can think of is how Eli and I are going to try every single dessert that they have. We don’t need clothes to do that.”
“You both need clothes,” his girlfriend grimaced. "And you will make yourselves sick trying to eat all of the park food."
"Exactly." Ricky winked. There was a pause in conversation and Ricky’s eyes searched around me. "Speaking of, where is Eli? I thought he went home with you."
"He did, he’s there now. He, uh…wasn’t in the mood to come with me."
Ricky’s carefree attitude turned tense as he eyes grew with worry. He immediately noticed the unusualness around my words. "What's wrong with him?"
Was it right for me to tell them? It was Eli's business, but Ricky and Kailey were two of the closest people to him, especially Ricky.
I stuffed my hands into my pockets. "His aunt put him out."
Kailey's jaw dropped and Ricky's hardened. Kailey muttered, "That cunt."
Ricky’s eyes narrowed accusatorily. "And you left him alone?"
Maybe that wasn’t the best idea.
"Eli needed space and I needed to cool down, alright? I caught him with a full bottle of alcohol.”
Ricky’s hand cupped his face as he let out a distressed groan. He began pacing in small circles as his hands clenched by his sides while Kailey stood idly. I watched her face form into a frown as I broke the news to them.
“It's alright, I took it from him before he drank any. It's in my car right now,” I explained. “And my parents' liquor cabinet has a lock on it. Not that I think he would steal, I’m just saying.”
"I thought you talked to him," Kailey's eyebrows furrowed as she spoke firmly to her boyfriend.
"I did.” His hand pressed against his chest. “He said he was getting better, he said that he was fixing it.”
“Clearly not!” her voice rose and earned concerned looks from the people around us.
I took a step forward to fill the gap in the line that formed when we were not paying attention. Those around us were doing a poor job of hiding their blatant ear hustling of our conversation. They were all nosy. Then again, we weren’t speaking very quietly so maybe that was on us.
I gestured to the three of us. "He did fix it, he fixed it in front of us. He thought what we couldn’t see couldn’t hurt us.”
There was a dramatic pause as the realization hit Ricky and Kailey like a slap in the face just like it did me.
“I’m scared," Kailey said faintly. "It’s not an option anymore; we have to tell someone. It never was an option."
“He’s not going to want us to,” Ricky grunted.
“I don’t care. I'm telling my parents tonight when they get back from their trip." I took a step forward as the line moved again. “I’m going to try and talk to him again. I need to see where his head is at because he hasn’t been all there since the situation with Macy.”
"Can we come?" Ricky asked, though his firm tone indicated he wasn’t taking no for an answer. “I know that Macy kicking him out hurt him more than he wants to believe.”
I would never deny them from seeing their friend. Anything to prove to Eli that there were multiple people who cared about him.
We waited another fifteen minutes before I was able to check out and leave the store. The couple followed me back to my house and wasted no time rushing out of the car when we made it. I opened the back door of my car and began taking out the bags of clothes that I had picked up and Ricky gave me a hand.
