Then, Iikka came abruptly back into view, coming through the store entrance and carrying a white plastic bag with him, its contents apparently small and loose. 

"Hey Jason, sorry I vanished on you, I checked the time and saw the Mall is really close to closing, so I made a dash to the PetCo to get these bidental sacrifices." He took a transparent bag of mealworms out from the opaque plastic demonstratively, while the cashier eyed him nervously.

"So yeah, we have to put eggs in our shoes and beat them. It's already dark and everything outside, so you probably need to have already been home. I don't know how strict your parents are about that sort of thing, but you still probably shouldn't keep them waiting. I also need to still get home though, so I had this idea - there's this dirt road between first and second street that's adjacent to that big construction site. I think construction vehicles used it back when the place was still actually being built. We can tear straight on past the place, you can drop me off at the corner, and you can get home within five minutes."

Technically, Iikka's house was in the upperclass suburbs which were directly South along first street, which would have meant only a fifteen minute walk along the road for Iikka normally - except Jason also knew full well that Iikka probably hadn't spent more than six hours at his parents' home in the past week. Of course, he had several bags of mealworms to carry with him, so presumably he actually intended to retreat home for once instead of conveniently forgetting to mention he was instead crashing at the apartments, more than an hour's walk in the opposite direction.