"And that was how I got all this candy in my hair," Vanellope smirked, looking up at her hair.
Lorain smiled at the girl as she went on about herself. She felt as though little gaps in her head were being filled, like Vanellope had been right about Lorain forgetting about her.
Lorain crossed her legs from her spot on Vanellope's bed, "What about your backstory?"
"Well…I'm not really sure what happened to me before the game was plugged in because I've got pixlexia," Vanellope says, her body glitching half a foot to the left just to prove a point, "But after the game was plugged in I knew that racing was in my code but King Candy wouldn't let me race for some reason so that made me really bummed out. Um…I managed to get a kart from the Kart-Bakery and took it out on one of the bonus tracks to try and practice but before I could even get in the kart, Taffyta and Rancis showed up and chased after me. I tripped when I passed Diet-Cola Mountain and fell through the secret opening out front and ended up here. So I live here now in the Mountain."
"What about racing? Have you ever tried to get back on the track?" Lorain asked, crossing her legs.
"Not really. I can't now. Not with the rules there are to racing anyway. You need a coin from your previous winnings to get into the roster race and since I've never been in a race I don't have any coins…" Vanellope sighed, "Plus the other racers totaled my kart so I have nothing to race with. I would go back to the Kart-Bakery and make a new one but King Candy has it ordered that I'm not allowed within a hundred feet of that place…"
"Oh…" Lorain blinked, rubbing her arm, "Well…that sucks."
"Yeah…It does suck. Big time…" Vanellope laid back on her bed, "But it's okay here I guess. I don't mind the boiling Diet-Cola. It keeps me entertained."
"Oh…well, uh, let's change to topic. What's your favorite food? Color? Animal?" Lorain tried to make their conversation a bit happier.
"I love ice cream! Chocolate ice cream," Vanellope clarifies, "I like the color sea-foam green. Um…and my favorite animal is a uni-candy-corn!"
"Uni-candy-corn?" Lorain laughs, "What's that?"
"It's like a Vanilla-Pony but with a candy-corn horn on its head!" Vanellope smiles, "They're so awesome!"
"I've never soon a uni-candy-corn before…" Lorain says.
"I could take you to see him! There's one out in the candy corn fields!" Vanellope jumps up onto her feet.
"We can go and see him tomorrow if you want?" Lorain smiles, "I wold go with you to see him today but-"
"The anniversary party," Vanellope finishes for her, "Yeah…I know."
"Are you going to the party?" Lorain asks, getting to her feet.
"Probably not…I don't have much fun at them anyway…" Vanellope says with a weak smile, "But you should go and have fun without me. I'll be right here tomorrow."
"Are you sure?" Lorain says, "I mean, I can stay here-"
"No, you go," Vanellope says, dropping back down onto her bed, "I'm fine here. Really."
"If you say so…" Lorain smiles and begins backing away towards the door, "I'll see you tomorrow, Vanellope."
"Promise?" Vanellope smirks.
"Promise," Lorain smiles and waves, "Bye, Vanellope."
"Bye…" Vanellope smiles and waves back as Lorain exits Diet-Cola Mountain.
Lorain pulls her goggles over her eyes and jumps in her car before starting it with a turn of the key. Her car hummed loudly as she drove off towards the castle where she knew that King Candy would be waiting for her.
With a flick of her wrist her goggles were tugged off her face and they landed on the front seat of her car, her red curls flowing freely around her face. She quickly fluffed it out with her hands and looked herself over in the rear-view mirror before nodding to herself and climbing out of the car and heading down to her room. She normally would have gone to the throne room but Minty had made her a dress especially for the occasion.
The dark red licorice dress was strapless and held snug to her body. Around her middle was a white chocolate ribbon that tied into a bow in the back. When the dress reached her mid-thighs it fluffed out like a princess's dress in a high-low fashion, but underneath the red licorice fabric was another layer of white chocolate that went completely to the floor.
When she reached her room she hurried inside and closed the door behind her. Lorain was already running late from her little talk session with Vanellope and she couldn't waste any more time. She instantly went to her closet and pulled out the hanger that held the dress before quickly changing into it. Lorain brushed her hair before tying it up in a simple ponytail and looking herself over quickly in the mirror. That's when she realised she still had on her high-tops; the shoes' tips sticking out from under the dress.
Knock knock knock
Lorain swirled around to the door and dashed over to it, grabbing her cardigan on the way and pulling it on. She opened the bedroom door and saw Sour Bill standing there. Her smile instantly dropped, "Oh…it's you."
"Sorry to disappoint you," Sour Bill said blandly before handing her a small box, "Here."
"What's this?" Lorain asks, taking the box from him. It was about the size of her fist.
"A gift from King Candy," Sour Bill says before turning and walking away, "He'll be down soon."
Lorain smiled, "Thanks Bill!" Then she closed the door and looked down at the box. It was decorated in a red and white lace patterned paper and a small pink bow sat on the top. Slowly she lifted the lid from the box upward and set it off to the side.
Lorain's eyes widened and she reached into the box, pulling out a red tiara. She gasped and turned it over in her hands, "It's so pretty…and familiar…"
She reached up and placed the tiara on her head. Lorain smiled up at it and looked at herself in the mirror. She looked like a princess…who was wearing sneakers. Lorain giggled at the thought and fixed the tiara before spinning once in front of the mirror.
That tiara looked so familiar and it bugged her just looking at it. Where had she seen it from before?
There was another knock at her door and she rushed over, opening the door. King Candy stood there awkwardly and smiled up at her, "Hey…"
"Hey, Turbo," she smiled and pulled him into a hug, "I love the gift you got me. Why didn't you just give me it when you came down though?"
King Candy's brow furrowed in confusion. Gift? What gift? Well if she thought he gave her a gift he may as well go along with it.
"Uh…I wanted you to get a chance to look at it before we had to leave," King Candy tried, hoping that it would work with the 'gift' he had gotten her.
"Oh…well I love it! Can we get going? I want to get there before the other racers crowd all the tables."
"Sure we can go," King Candy smiles and holds out a hand. She takes it and smiles back as the two of them begin walking off towards the throne room where the party was to be held. Now that she was out in the hallway she could clearly hear the music coming from down the hall, muffled by the walls of the castle.
She looked over at King Candy as he gestured to the doors. She opened the doors and grinned, she had remembered the anniversary parties with the music and the lights but this was just spectacular! There were lights shining everywhere and Gloyd Orangeboar stood behind a large DJ booth, a pair of headphones around his neck.
"This looks so amazing!" Lorain grins, spinning into the room and looking around her. The majority of the citizens were crowded onto the dance floor while the rest were scattered around the large room and the rest of the castle.
"I'm glad you think so," King Candy smiled brightly.
Lorain looked over at him and pulls him towards her, "Come on! Let's go and dance!"
King Candy stumbled over his feet as she pulled him into the middle of the dance floor. The bells on his shoes were barely auditable over the pounding music coming from the cotton-candy speakers.
The licorice girl all but towered over the other people on the dance floor. The citizens only went up to her knees and the racers up to her stomach. King Candy was the only one that really came close to the girl's height and even the top of his eyes only came to her chin.
Lorain laughed and jumped up and down, dancing along with the music. King Candy began to dance along with her, as he was used to wild parties like the ones he used to throw after a day of racing back in Turbo Time.
Lorain on the other hand was not used to these kind of parties. She was usually one of the girls to skip the party and hang out in her room by herself or with Jubileena if she didn't want to go to the party either. But now she was at the party. With a lot of people. A lot.
"I don't think I've ever seen this many people in the castle before," Lorain smiles and takes his hands in hers as they dance, "You throw some pretty great parties."
King Candy smirked, "You should have seen the parties I used to throw back in my own game. You would have loved them."
"If you were there then I'm sure I would have," Lorain's smile grows as she spins, her dress fluffing out around her.
He felt his smirk grow; he was becoming to get more comfortable talking around the girl now. It felt weird to open up to someone after such a long time being alone.
Gloyd scratched the record and the music skipped and cracked but just as he was about to say something Jubileena jumped in front of the microphone and held her hand up high , "Top of the hour! Which means it's time for a slow song!"
The other racers seemed to groan while the candy citizens squealed in anticipation.
"Now calm down, it's just one song," Jubileena rolled her eyes and the music changed into a song with a slower speed. Music from a piano poured from the speakers. The little jujube girl looked over at King Candy and winked before hopping down from the DJ booth.
King Candy's grin instantly fell to a grimace. He wasn't used to dancing with a partner unless it involved grinding up on each other but that was defiantly not the type of dance that Jubileena was hinting at.
The other people around them slowly began to pair off into couples and began to dance in ballroom style dancing.
Lorain seemed to get the same feeling and awkwardly that he felt but cautiously took a step closer to him. She placed a hand on his shoulder and held his hand in her free one while his other hand rested on her hip. The two began to dance and slowly eased into a comfortable rhythm of steps.
Jubileena and Candlehead sighed from the sidelines, watching the two from a nearby table.
"You interrupted my favorite song for this?" Rancis asked, hands on his hips.
"Sh!" Candlehead hissed sharply, "We're watching our masterpiece play itself out."
"They're so cute together," Jubileena sighs, chin resting in her palms.
"Hey Swizzle, check out this gag-fest," Rancis says with a chuckle but when his friends doesn't answer the looks around, "Swizzle?"
"Sorry, man. She got to me first…" Swizzle shrugs from the dance floor as he danced with Minty.
"Oh come on!" Rancis groans.
Taffyta walks over to his side and shakes her head, popping the lollypop out of her mouth, "Wanna dance, Fluggerbutter?"
He looked over at her in shock, "Seriously?"
"Your window of opportunity is closing," Taffyta glares at him.
"I'll take what I can get," he smiles and takes her hand in his, pulling her out onto the dance floor.