Before We Were Demons Ch. 00

Randy

On the school bus, I'd learned to sit near the front. Right behind the driver if possible. Outside, it was different. In the open air, I was a sitting duck. The bus was easy. Sit by the decent kids and close to the driver and the troublemakers had a line they couldn't cross without at least some penalties. And after my mom started driving me to school everyday that last half year, the bus was no problem.

It was everything else- lunches, study halls, recesses, gym classes, the few minutes between periods, and after-school activities. All worse. The bus was just the appetizer and dessert of shit on the cake of crap I was forced to eat every day. The worst part was that when I hit fourth grade, all the kids who were the biggest offenders of picking on me had gone to middle school, and the relative peace I got for the last two years in elementary gave my family hope they'd forget about me. Those first few years, the bullying wasn't so bad. The older boys laughed at me and called me stupid names because I was so small, but it wasn't straight-up violent.

It wasn't until I came home covered in bruises in the first month of sixth grade that my mom really freaked out.

"What the hell is going on at that school?" She started, staring at me with a look of horror. "Why aren't the goddamn teachers doing their jobs?"

If anyone was wondering where I get my habitual swearing from, now you know.

"They do it when there's no teachers around, mom, and then they cover it up." That afternoon I was sporting a busted lip, bruises all over my stomach and chest, mud on my pants, and a ripped backpack. What had started as an altercation over the last brownie at lunch had grown into a full-blown ass-kicking from an aggressive, testosterone-raging 14-year old already standing at five-five and shaving. Me at 11 looked like I was 8. I was the runt of the class and the favorite target from the big guys with something to prove.

I never fucking understood it. How did beating up the scrawniest, shortest kid in sixth grade when you were in eighth make you such a fucking badass, Jimmy? I often wonder what that meathead is up to, now. Last I even heard of him, he was kicked out of high school for having a bag of weed and trying to swallow it in front of a teacher. Served the asshole well. I hope he's a miserable puke.

"Even when I went down to the elementary school, that rodent of a principal didn't seem to give a shit," mum continued. I could tell she was pissed because she was brandishing her lighter like she could easily burn something down. "'It's up to your son to avoid antagonizing the other students'," she mocked my former principal, "'He needs to ignore them until they go away. Boys will be boys, Mrs. Strand.'"

"Ugh, their idea of fixing the problem was to sit us in the same room and make us talk about why we were 'angry' at each other," I groaned. "And the real kicker is that if I ever tried to fight back, they'd give me detention too."

"If this shit doesn't stop, so help me, Randy..." I saw the tears in her eyes as she stepped forward to examine my split lip. I knew she blamed herself. I was a preemie with low birth weight, jaundiced, always falling under the ideal height and weight for my age, and I never developed much muscle tone, all because cigarettes are an absolute bitch to quit and she couldn't totally kick the habit while pregnant with me. My sister was luckier. Mom always hated what she deemed the result of her weakness in that her first-born kid was doomed to be this tiny, weak little slip of a boy, and she'd really forced herself to stop to have my little sis. She succumbed to the cravings again after Sunny was born, but hey, it's a hard habit to kick. Reasons why I'll never touch the cancer sticks, right there.

And I don't blame my mom. She's human, and she's a pretty good mom all told. Neither one of my parents is what you would call large or strong, anyway. We're a petite group of people. I mean, my younger sister is just a little taller and less thin than I am- she's a tiny pixie to almost everybody else. I was probably going to be fairly small no matter what, and it's not like my mom wanted to hurt me. She didn't make the other kids pick me as the prime target for the adolescent bullshit, either.

People are just fucking cruel sometimes. I was smart enough then to know I would never want to be 'that guy'. Not that I could really pick on anybody not younger than me by a few years, but I knew I never wanted to inflict pain on anyone else, ever.

That year, sixth grade, would prove to be the worst and best year ever. Worst because I went through so much shit during the first half of the schoolyear, best because of what came next.

We pulled up that day and my mom turned to me in the passenger seat.

"Okay, Randy, just remember: The counselor is going to check up with you after the first week and if things go fine, you can stay after school and do whatever the hell you want. Promise me if anyone starts the same garbage you went through at our shithole, miserable excuse of a school you'll alert your teachers and we'll figure it out." God she was so scared. More scared than I was, really. I'd sort of accepted my fate by then, and I'd also learned a hell of a lot from the final showdown between me and Jimmy.

"I know mom," I answered delicately. "I promise you things are gonna get better here." Travel in packs when able, befriend the other nerds, keep a network of trusted teachers and advisors. She still reached over to ruffle my messy, spiky hair.

"I'm just worried about you, kid," she replied, looking at me hard. I shrugged.

"Why wouldn't you be, after everything I went through? I just gotta make some friends here and I'll get by." She smiled.

"I hope so, kiddo." With a hug, she let me go, pressing my sack lunch into my hand. I opened that door, and unknowingly stepped into my destiny.

Mickey

Midway the through the year, rumors started flying about the fact we were getting a transfer student. Everybody said they'd heard their friend at Mapleleaf Junior saw the whole altercation: This like nine-year old boy getting harassed by the entire junior football team after school, and the entire computer science club jumping on the star quarterback in his defense. A massive brawl erupted in the classic style, nerds vs bullies, and in the end the aggressors were overwhelmed and beaten back by thirty-five kids wielding thick-ass computer programming guides and D&D props. It became legend, and the guy who'd started it was, as the schoolyard lore went, given permanent suspension and was barred from playing sports for the rest of the year. The kid he'd picked on, well... he was coming to us.

It was the middle of the year. Over the summer I'd bloomed, my childhood adorability beginning its change to young adult beauty. I didn't know then just how pretty I'd be all grown up, but by the time the transfer arrived, I was already the subject of many, many crushes, and I loved the attention. Me and Cal were sitting on the steps, a couple of our classmates in pigtails chatting us up about our extracurriculars when the car pulled up. Nothing would have been remarkable about that normally, but first of all, we all knew every car that pulled up and who was in it, and secondly, all the buses had arrived by then and no one knew who or where the new student was. The car suddenly became the focus of all attention. For a minute, nothing happened. The new kid was still in the car, talking to a woman I had to assume was his mom. Their conversation appeared emotional, and we all waited for the door to crack.

When he finally stepped out I don't think any of us were expecting... him. He was tiny- four and a half feet, so thin, hunched forward with his eyes down- dragging a brown bag and with a backpack slung over one shoulder. He began a quiet but brisk walk to the main doors, and didn't even seem to realize everybody was watching, he was just pushing through. I was so mesmerized, tweaked by some sense of fate, that I didn't even think to wave.

"Mickey...? Mickey?" Cal yanked my attention back to the moment.

"Oh sorry," I said, shaking it off. "There's a story there for sure." I jerked my chin in the new kid's direction. He made it to the door a couple of minutes later. Didn't get much chance to talk to him until that afternoon, and when I did, the phrase 'changed my life' was the only appropriate thing I could say.

"Hey, here comes that weedy little transfer student," I overheard one of our resident jerks snickering after the final bell. "Everybody says he had to change schools because he kept getting the snot kicked out of him." Somebody else laughed. I held up my hand and waved at Cal, who immediately saw where I was pointing and nodded at me. He'd heard it too. The guys eyeballing the new kid had stopped in the flood of students and were staring over at the front of the school. I paused in my tracks, somewhat off to the side, but surrounded by moving bodies. Cal ducked down, his height minimized and our presence somewhat lessened. The jerks headed out of the line, away from the buses, sniggering and jostling each other. I did not trust their motives.

"We should keep an eye on this," I mumbled to my best friend, and he nodded in return.

"I've been picking up stray bits of info all day," he replied somberly. We began to move. "Seems that the underlying rumor is true. The kid changed schools because he was getting seriously harassed."

"Well I'd rather not see that continue here," I sniffed. "Seriously, what's the point of being a huge jerk?"

Our path deviated toward the new kid, who had veered straight down the sidewalk and was obviously waiting for his mom in the same spot she'd dropped him off. Probably after the buses cleared out, which gave him at least a twenty-minute window. The jerks closed in, and we followed in stealth. I watched the poor kid finally look up to notice who was approaching, and he got that classic 'deer-in-headlights' look. I gritted my teeth.

"Hey shrimpy," the ringleader mockingly called out. "Waiting for your mommy? What's the matter, can't ride the bus like the rest of us because you're chicken?" I rolled my eyes behind the pack of bullies and Cal and I crept forward. We came up right behind them just as Donny Haywood was sidling up to the new kid's side. He stood there, totally frozen, leaning away from the larger body next to him. "You might as well get used to the pecking order around here, because it ain't gonna be much better than before." I could see the newbie cringe and pull a grimace.

"Ugh, what a fucking Neanderthal," the tiny guy piped up, shaky but defiant. His voice hadn't even started to break yet, and I wondered if he was this small because he was some kind of genius, skipping grades. "What exactly are you trying to prove, here? That you can beat up a lowly sixth-grader one-fifth your size for kicks?" Donny snarled and bent forward to grab the guy, and I nodded. Cal stepped into view, making himself known. Standing at five-eight already, and twice as thick as Haywood, Cal was always the biggest and baddest. And he was backup. Unlike Don, I only needed one.

"There a problem here?" My friend asked, his tone cool. His voice had already started to change at 12, a few months older than I was. I stepped forward, tossing my beautiful locks over one shoulder. I was the king of sixth grade and no one messed with me for risk of total social isolation. Donny had two fistfuls of new kid's jacket, and I sneered.

"Looks like it to me, Cal," I replied equally coolly. "Why don't you remind Donny what it feels like to be someone else's victim?"

"With pleasure," my tall, stoic friend grinned, grabbing the bully by the shirt and lifting him as easily as he might a bag of garbage. The new kid slipped from Don's hands, aghast, as he began to cower. A sizeable crowd had followed us down from the bus pick-up and was watching with rapt fascination, which we realized when the dust had cleared. Donny's goons backed away as their lead jackass was plucked and carried over to some of the ornamental hedges lining the circle, where Cal finally tossed him into the dirt just hard enough to face-plant him.

"Don't come near us again, Donny," I called loudly, full of prim anger. "What the hell's wrong with you?" I then crossed my arms over my chest and turned, finally seeing the crowd erupt in applause. "No one pulls this crap here, got it? We're better than this!" I pointed at the scattered gang of jerks, who ran over to their friend and hoisted him out of the dirt.

"You're just lucky you have your bouncer!" One of them shouted bitterly. They ran off to the boos and jeers of the students, with the girls being the loudest. I grinned.

"Alright, show's over, move along," Calvin was calling, dispersing the crowd.

Finally the new kid caught my attention.

"Holy shit," he cursed, so easily it was kind of shocking. He had quite a mouth on him for such a little guy. "You've got to be like, the last person I ever expected to jump in." A beat passed. He wasn't sure what to do. "No popular kid has ever gone to bat for me like that before." I smiled.

"I couldn't watch that happen," I snipped. "I don't tolerate bullies, and what happened to you at your old school isn't going to happen on my watch. I'm Mickey." I stuck my hand out and waited for him to take it. Looking nervous, he shifted from foot to foot, looking (way) up at my friend, who'd come back over brushing the dirt off his hands. "That's Calvin, aka Cal. Don't worry, he looks badder than he is."

"I'm Randy," the guy finally said, taking my hand with awe. "So... What? Do I pay you protection now, or am I your errand boy...?" He kinda shrugged, motioning toward the both of us with his hand. The foul mouth and his body language seemed to indicate he was nervous, thus making himself sound tougher than he was, but it still kinda took me aback.

"What? No dude, no," I protested, but Cal sniggered and held out his own hand.

"I think I'm gonna like this guy."

Calvin

"As the do-gooder said, I'm Cal. And now that we've stepped in those guys aren't gonna mess with you again. It would be social suicide." Randy shook my hand too, still feeling us out. He'd been through some shit, you could tell. "Relax, man. We're not going to demand anything from you. My boy here just has a soft heart, and he's too damn chivalrous for his own good."

"Well, I appreciate it. I guess the rumors of my transfer kind of beat me here, huh?" The kid sighed, scuffing at the dirt with his foot. "I guess I'm just doomed to be every jerk's punching bag."

"Like hell!" Mickey replied hotly. "As I said, not on my watch. I am not going to tolerate such poor behavior." I had to smile. Even when we were kids, his snits were so adorable. He was like an angry kitten.

"Okay..." Poor Randy was obviously still confused. "Thanks? I appreciate not being in some schlub's armpit on my first day at the new school. My mom would've had a shitfit."

"Are you waiting for her?" Mickey asked, trying to show the guy what we were about.

"Yeah." I mean, it was obvious. Depending on how far he lived, he might not even have a bus assignment as it was.

"Well just to make sure, we'll wait here with you until she comes. No one is going to pick on you with us here." Randy sighed, clearly growing agitated and uncomfortable.

"It's totally okay," the tiny guy held up a hand. "She won't be that much longer." My best friend seemed to have forgotten that other people are not mind-readers, and that Randy didn't know what he was like. I was tired of beating around the bush.

"What my friend is trying to say," I cut in, "is that you're one of us, now. You've been officially adopted."

"Huh?" The confusion was understandable and evident.

"The young Mickey Archibald Smith, Junior, has decreed from this day forth that you, Randy, are an official pack brother-from-another-mother." I declared, in my mock-heraldic tone. "Do not ask how or why you have been chosen; it is done." I emphasized my words with a fancy wave of my hand and a bow. Randy's brow wrinkled, but he cracked a huge, and very real, smile.

"Wait, you mean like, friends? The popular guy wants to be my friend?" The short, skinny dude we would soon call our 'bro' snickered, probably at the irony. "Wow, this already is an improvement. Chuckin' social convention right out the fucking window." Mickey brightened up.

"Yes!" The golden one said, finally communicating clearly. "Not just friends, but brothers. You're one of us. It's our destiny to be forever bros, I can feel it." Just then, the wind stirred up and blew his lustrous curls just enough to make him look majestic. Sometimes I swore the universe actually responded to his optimistic wonderment and supplied him with all the requisite dramatic touches. "Destiny brought you here to meet us. Now we're a true crew!" Randy laughed out loud, and I could tell by his animation that it had been a while since he laughed like that.

"Holy crap man, are you for real?" Randy chuckled, shaking his head. "When did my life become an anime? Jeez, if I was a girl, this would be when I developed the massive secret crush on you that you somehow don't notice no matter how obvious I become." My friend's cheeks pinkened.

"Dude, you just lay it all out there, don't you?" I marveled, truly in awe of our new member's vocabulary and totally unfiltered sense of interaction. "How old are you, exactly?"

"Eleven," he answered sheepishly. "I know I look like I'm eight, but I swear I'm actually in your grade." I nodded.

"No sweat," was my answer. "Welcome to Hillcrest. You're gonna be fine."

Randy

And that was the best day of my life. I gained two awesome bros, and when my mom did arrive to find me smiling, laughing with two new friends, she was so floored and so happy she had to stop herself from bawling- instead inviting Mickey and Cal back to our house for dinner. They graciously accepted, and got in the car to come home with us. Mom even pulled out all the stops that night and made her famous sizzlin' steak fajitas. I was so fucking happy. Our parents became friends too, especially after the story was told from mom to mom.

We were always together after that.

My dear readers, I cannot ever thank you enough for your continued loyalty to my story and your eager patience for the end. It is my pleasure to present this tidbit- the start of a nascent prequel to While Courting Our Demons- as a little precursor to the finale, which I am on the verge of finishing! My NaNoWriMo count has exceeded 50,000 words, and I have only a few key pieces left to write before the entire thing can be polished and posted. This will be a piece I work on primarily after WCoD is finished, but I hope you will enjoy this visit to M, C and R's past. The evolution and strength of their friendship is such a key piece of their choice in the main novel, and I think it's worth exploring how it came to be.

Please enjoy!

-Philippa