Third In Line

Chapter Twenty Four - Divide and Conquer

The supermarket doors slid open as they approached, and the gust of warm air that came from heaters above them blew down and around their bodies, a welcome sensation for any cold and weary travelers but not one that Ellie needed. Her heart rate was through the roof, almost as if it was desperately pumping blood solely to fight back the cold hard terror that had engulfed her ever since they had left the car.

She was having trouble focusing on anything other than how hot her neck was whenever she leaned back against her collar, or how her feet couldn't seem to walk in straight lines, or how it really felt like her stomach was doing somersaults inside her belly.

It was just less nerve wracking to focus on herself rather than what was going on around her, or where they were and what they were doing. Even if the things about herself that she was focusing on were all caused by how nervous she was, she...

"Ellie, poppet, you're clinging too tight" her mother's soothing voice whispered into her ear, forcibly pulling her out of her dazed confusion. She felt a tiny twinge of jealousy at how calm her mother seemed to sound.

"Sorry, Mum" she whispered back, unwrapping her arms from around her mother.

"Well I didn't say you had to let go entirely" Kate grinned down at her, offering her hand to Ellie again. Ellie pulled it back within her grasp immediately.

"Relax honey, we have as much right to be here as everyone else" Carole added, pulling Alex further inside the supermarket by the hand.

They stuck close together, making sure nobody was left behind, although Ellie and her sister seemed like the only ones who were afraid of that prospect. Both of them made sure that they were holding a relative in each hand, and both did their best to manoeuvre the five of them out of the way just in case someone came along and broke their chain.

"Okay, we have a lot of shopping to do" Carole sighed as she pulled a shopping trolley from the waiting pile.

"How much?" Alex asked, her lip quivering in fear.

Carole showed them her shopping list. The writing was too small for Ellie to make out, but she could easily see that it extended from the top of the page to the bottom.

"Graaaannnny" Ellie groaned loudly whilst Alex seemed to be struck dumb by the sheer amount of items they needed to find.

"Well what did you expect? We have two big family dinners this weekend. We need the supplies" Carole reminded her.

"I don't know. I thought we were just getting some milk or something!" Ellie argued back.

The three adults among them giggled together, making her even more grumpy. "You aren't getting off that easy Elle" her aunt teased.

Carole folded the shopping list and carefully tore it into two halves, then handed one half to Kate. "We'll split up. I can take Alex and Pip and we'll do the frozen food, fruit, vegetables and the stuff we can get at the bakery."

"I need to get some stuff from the chemist too" Pippa added.

"So I'll take Ellie and we'll do everything else" her mother nodded confidently as she pulled out her own shopping trolley from the pile.

"Wait, wait, we're splitting up?" Ellie blurted out.

"Yeah, shouldn't we stick together as a team?" Alex squeaked nervously.

"Girls, its Tesco's, not Afghanistan" her mother snickered, which caused the adults to break into another round of giggles.

"Hah" Ellie replied sarcastically.