Part of my defense off my gullibility is that, you know, once I express skepticism and doubt (3 times, even) and the "trusted friend" keeps up with the story, I will at that point believe them. Cause I'm not used to friends lying to me and all. :-P
(The worst I ever got fooled was 3rd or 4th grade, Todd Beecher weathered several waves of my skepticism to convince me he was an alien. The line about "my so called parents" sold me; trying to push it and say that his D+D dice were actually some kind of food or power source lost it for him.
Even us trusting fools have SOME limits.
I think the main tell for this story was that the kid was waiting for EB. I don't know the size of that kid, but I would only start something with EB if I had some kind of weapon. . .EB has something of an advantage on the muscle mass side.
Circuit City is the tell, because a guy named EB would shop at Electronics Boutique, aka EBX.