Jun paused as he searched down the candy aisle at a supermarket in downtown San Francisco. For once he wasn't in his transformed state. Not that it really mattered, he still looked the same either way. Just, like this, his hair wasn't blue, and he wasn't dressed in that martial arts like outfit. Other than that it was pretty much the same.

He was supposed to visit Julia today, and he'd promised to bring her some sweets. He didn't know if she'd like Pocky, or mochi, since those would probably be relatively exotic things to a girl from the 1950s. So other kinds of Japanese sweets would be out of the question. That left western-style supermarkets. Which was where he'd ended up.

After a moment, he picked up a chocolate bar. Seemed like a pretty standard sweet. But no, maybe not. As he read the ingredients, he realized something -- high fructose corn syrup. They didn't have that in the 1950s, did they? Probably not. Or if they did, it wasn't in widespread use; he didn't exactly know when the switchover happened. But still, a typical modern candy bar would probably taste like pouring a bowl of sugar directly into the girl's mouth. Not fun.

Jun frowned, and put the candy bar back. Bad idea. What else? Gum drops? Nope, HFCS. Mint leaves? Nope, artificial mint flavoring that would probably be too strong... and also HFCS. Gummy bears? Nope, HFCS again. Ugh, wasn't there anything that wasn't riddled with this stuff?!

Not here, Jun realized. But what about those artisan candies they make in small batches? Wasn't there a food truck kind of thing that centered its gimmick around being able to see the candymakers pull the taffy? And aren't there a bunch of those artisan candy stores around here somewhere? And wasn't licorice popular about then?

With a nod, Jun turned and headed out of the aisle, and out of the store. He had an artisan candy store to find! Probably lots of artisand candy stores. And he also had to pray his meager 'adventurer's salary' would be enough to get more than just one or two pieces. After what she'd been through, Julia deserved a LOT of candy...