The Search for Shiny Things: Part 4

"These are delicious," the teddy said, and before the panda bear's despairing eyes gnawed the head off of a deliciously brown monkey. "Raspberry and marzipan and chocolate."

"Those are candle ingredients!" protested the panda bear.

The teddy considered that while chewing down the exquisitely textured caramel body of the chocolate monkey. "That doesn't sound like the kind of candles I've ever heard about."

"It's what the wizard said that taught me candle-making," said the panda bear.

"Most wizards are crazy," said the teddy confidently. "I am training to become a wizard, so I know."

The panda bear watched the teddy eat his way through a row of purple bats, and finish with a fantastic banana gold ingot, and over time, a new shine came into little eyes. "You like my candles, I mean, my candy," said the panda bear. "And you're not becoming sick."

"I like them very much, they are most excellent," said the teddy. He would have eaten the entire room, but he was raised to have manners after all.

"Perhaps I should become a candy maker, instead of a candle maker," said the panda bear. "You have opened my panda eyes, teddy bear. A whole new better life for me."

The teddy was taken aback with such grand claims.

"Here," said the panda bear, and handed the teddy four candy canes. "These are my finest candles, I mean candies, I want you to have them. You can hang them in the tree, if you ever find one."

"You should come visit us and see the tree," said the teddy bear.

The panda bear assured the teddy that it would indeed come and see the tree, although the panda bear did not think the teddy would ever find a tree, because panda bears, while friendly, unlike other bears were not necessarily averse to polite lies. And then the teddy took its leave, thanking the host for the lunch. Outside, the teddy looked at the house, that was probably more yellow than brown, or possibly more brown than yellow.

"I helped," the teddy established to itself, and continued down the road.