Free - Black Gold 2 - Double Black by Clancy Nacht, Thursday Euclid

seeming worried he might not take it, as if he might have been sullied by contact with the cart.
Goldie took it to reassure him, and maybe because he was starting to feel out of his element.
“How do you usually get stuff if you don’t go shopping? You only live a couple of miles from here.”
“I do?” Goldie looked around in amazement. His eyes froze on the items in the basket. “That bag of chips is bigger than my head.”
    Robbie leaned in. “He has people. He can’t just go out in public; he’d get mobbed.”
Goldie walked down an aisle that felt a mile long. Then he remembered that signs hanging from the ceiling indicated the different sections of the store. “Oh, clothing is over there. Anyway, I can shop in some places. I just have to arrange it ahead of time so there’s adequate security.”
“What does Jethro think of that? Don’t you ever go out together?” Cole twined their fingers, a more romantic gesture than Goldie could rationalize, but before he could say anything, Cole was talking to Robbie. “Do you go on these runs for him? How many people does he have? Does Jethro have people too?”
Robbie shrugged. “Sometimes I do, sure. It’s a helluvalot easier than getting a store to shut down so Billy can pick up some lube in the middle of the night.”
Goldie frowned and looked down at the grimy floor. “I go out with Jett. To dinner. Sometimes. When he wants to deal with it, I guess.”
Was that why Jett ran off in the morning? It could be an ordeal for Goldie to go somewhere. As long as they stuck to Beverly Hills and exclusive restaurants, Goldie could travel with relative ease, but those weren’t the sort of places Jett liked.
So far, though, things seemed to be going well. Maybe he was just a hat away from being able to hang with Jett at any time. If they could go out together, maybe Goldie wouldn’t feel so lonely, and maybe the bourgeois desire for family would go away.
“Well, if you were my boyfriend, I’d always think it was worth it.” Cole smiled. “You’re Gold—you. How can you be anything but worth it?”
Cole rested his head on Goldie’s shoulder just long enough to impart solidarity. Jett did that sometimes too, when he was feeling boyish.
Then Cole pulled Goldie’s hand and dragged him toward a display of twentydollar denim. “So like this, see? This is what I usually wear. And stuff like that.”
    Goldie followed Cole’s finger toward a display of cheap hoodies and V-neck tees. The shirts bore various logos, none of which were particularly artistic. Still, Cole bounced as he asked Goldie if he could get some things.
    “Sure, load up the cart.” Goldie slipped his hand from Cole’s grasp and crossed to a rack of flannel shirts. He held one up. It felt stiff, but would Jett like it? He wore flannel sometimes. It wasn’t particularly well made, but perhaps with a few hard washings, some safety pins, and creative fraying, he could make it Jett-able.
    Would Jett be proud that Goldie went out? Surely he’d be surprised. But Goldie could do this. Maybe if he came back with something from a megastore, Jett would see that he could go places.
    Without realizing he was doing it, Goldie wrapped his arms around the empty shirt as if it contained Jett. The ghost of Jett was about the most solid thing he had to hold on to in the daylight hours.
    Cole stacked several pairs of jeans and a dozen shirts in the cart, occasionally glancing over at Goldie with a puzzled expression. Cole disappeared for a few minutes and returned with bags of underpants and socks, along with a single pair of knockoff Chucks, size 13, like Jett’s.
“You thinking of trying out a new look?” Cole directed an odd look at the shirt Goldie was hugging.
    “Oh. No. I thought Jett might like it. He wears things like this sometimes.” Goldie considered telling Cole that Jett wore shoes like the pair he’d picked, but the look on Cole’s face and the fact the boy was unpacking all flannel from the cart