You set off as quickly as you can. The path is dangerous, the icing is slick, and you’d love to get out of this sugar-sweetened nightmare and back to your date. Where on earth... no... where in Candyland(?!) could they possibly be? That’s when you spot it; the Rainbow Shortcut. Made of gorgeously rainbowed, pulled-sugar strands, it’s far more suspension bridge than you had imagined candy could be, and you wonder offhandedly if James Finley had fallen through his board as well. “This is a marvel of engineering!” You exclaim in dorkified excitement, and run forward to touch the rubied, translucent sugared base. It feels cool and smooth under your fingertips, and you feel a deep, dark cherry flavoring flowing into your bloodstream as the sugar seeps in through your skin. You excitedly climb the steps, in a combination of nerdy glee, sugar rush, and excited anticipation. As you cross, you can feel the flavors change below your feet and through the hand grazing the guard rail. You’ll never have to eat again, you think, blissfully high on the pure glucose in your veins. You reach the other side euphorically, but glad to be on solid ground. Well, kind of. You’ve reached the foothills of the Great Gummy Mountains, and the ground underneath you feels spongy and has great bounce. You can see the edge of a path glowing off to the left, and you know that you should get back to business, and it’s probably the all sugar saturating your brain... but a bounce sounds amazing right now.
