(A/N: Set pre MU when Sulley and Randy are both five, and go to the same preschool. I think I'm going to make a series out of this. Please Review and tell me what you think, if it's a good start or not.
ALSO, this has been edited to remove Randy having glasses, because I want that to be a theme in a later story.)
«»«»«»«»«»«»
The first time Randall Boggs saw James P. Sullivan, it was all because of a shiny blue tricycle.
Little Growler's preschool was not overly prestigious, large, or expensive, but it was one of Monstropolis's highest rated daycares, known for being friendly and attentive.
As attentive as they could be, at least, with a child that could disappear at will. And five year old Randy wasn't quite ready for a nap, thank you very much, Miss Needles.
As soon as the motherly matron monster put him down on his cot, he waited until her back was turned and squeezed his eyes shut, thinking hard hard hard until he felt the itchy ripple spread over his scales.
He wasn't as good as Mommy and Daddy and Aggie with his special trick yet (he could only do a few colors, and only for a small amount of time) but Mommy said it was really good that he could do even that much to be so little. Aggie hadn't started changing color until she was eight, and she couldn't be nothing as fast as he could.
He didn't know how to explain it when it happened. Sometimes it was an accident, and sometimes he just wanted to feel like a different color. Orange felt like orange, yellow felt like yellow, and nothing felt like... Nothing.
He was better at feeling like nothing than he was at feeling colorful.
Randy did like blue, though. Blue was his favorite color, and his favorite feeling, like the new, shiny sky blue tricycle out on the playground that none of the other kids had ridden yet, and it was calling his name.
None of the teachers busy with putting down the other sugar crazed monsterlings noticed as Randy snuck out of his blankets and slithered out the door to the playground.
It wasn't empty anymore- the other class had come outside for their recess, but he didn't care; he was going to ride that shiny tricycle, just for a little while, and then he'd go back in and take a nap like a good little boy.
He let himself feel like something again and made a beeline for the edge of the playground, and there it was, gleaming in the sun, pretty and blue with perfect black wheels and purple tassels hanging from the handlebars.
He jumped on it, grinning with a mouthful of small sharp teeth, coiling his tail around the seat and pushing the pedals down with his bottom legs, holding the handlebars with his wide chin and his top two arms. It wasn't perfect or easy, but he was riding, zooming around with his fronds waving in the air and feeling like a gazillion dollars, giggling and flashing colors like a rainbow stoplight in his happiness.
"WATCH OUT!"
He didn't see the other bike until it was too late, and he was flying tail over heels off the tricycle and into the grass, landing with a cry and a sickening crunch on his second left arm. Randy immediately began to cry, both from the nasty pain radiating through his arm and the sorry state of his tricycle, laying twisted and dirty on the ground next to an equally wrecked red one. His scales turned a dull, smoky black and he curled in on himself, sobbing.
"Are you okay?!"
Randy glanced up and saw another monster his age running towards him. He shrank away- the other kid was much bigger than him, covered in fur the same color as his tricycle and dotted with purple spots. His short claws dug little trenches in the ground as he ran, and two little horns nubs stuck up out of his fuzz.
He looked funny, too big and too small for himself all at once. His back was bowed a little, making his arms drag against the ground, and his fangs hung out of his mouth, giving him an underbite. Spots of blood stained his pelt from where it dribbled from his gums and his split lip.
"Y-you h-hit me," Randy sniffed accusingly, glaring at him.
The other boy scratched at his arm. "Nu-uh, you hit me," he said.
"Nu-uh, stupid, y-you hit me!"
"I'm not stupid! You're stupid!"
"You LOOK stupid!"
"Nu-uh, your mommy looks stupid!"
"Yeah, well your DADDY'S stupid!"
"My daddy is the biggest, meanest, scariest monster ever!" the other boy shouted. "He'll beat you stupid Daddy up!"
"T-take that b-back you stupid liar!"
"I-whoooaa," the other boy cut off, staring wide eyed at Randy as his scales pricked and shifted in anger. "You can change colors?"
Randy blushed all over, quickly going from an ugly dark green to a faint pinkish red. It must have happened when he hadn't realized. It was like that sometimes. "Y-yeah…"
He braced himself for the weird look and the teasing, but it never came.
"That's so cool!" the other monster exclaimed, forgetting the argument in his astonishment.
Randy blushed harder. "Y-you r-really think so?"
"Yeah! Hey, what's your name?"
"R-Randall Boggs. B-but my sister calls me Randy," he stammered, trying to see of the other kid was lying about thinking his trick was cool. No one else did, except for when they were stepping on his tail in line just to get him to squeal and change colors.
Apparently, he wasn't.
"My name's James P. Sullivan," he said, puffing up his stocky chest proudly. "But everybody calls me Jimmy."
"S-Sullivan?" Randy echoed quietly. Everybody knew about the Sullivans. They were practically celebrities, like movie stars. He had Bill Sullivan's Scarer Card in the pack Aggie gave him for his last birthday, and a poster of him on his bedroom wall.
"Yeah," Jimmy said confidently, grinning at the awed look on Randy's face. Randy blanched to a pasty white color as he imagined the picture of Jimmy's dad staring down at him from over his bed- a huge, hulking, muscular monster, jaw bristling with fangs and huge paws with inch long claws that could swallow him in one gulp- who he'd just called stupid. A bunch of times.
Jeez Louise.
"I-I'm s-s-sorry," Randy gasped, tucking his injured arm closer to his body, terrified that the other monster was really going to tell his daddy. "I-I didn't mean to…I-I mean I…"
"It's okay," Jimmy nodded easily, sitting criss cross next to him. "I'm sorry that I hit you with my bike."
"I-it's okay." Randy mumbled.
And just like that it was over, and everyone was forgiven for any hurts or faults.
By now, the teachers had noticed his absence and rushed out to the playground, and it wasn't hard to spot the both of them among the wreckage of the tricycle accident, especially with Jimmy's mismatched bulk right next to him.
"Hey, Randy?"
"Y-yeah?"
"You wanna play with me tomorrow?"
Randy blinked and stared at the bigger boy in shock, rubbing his eyes with one of his good arms. None of the other kids went out of their way to play with him. But looking at him, Randy could feel the same something welling up in his chest, almost like the something that changed his skin, but not quite.
It was a warm something, hopeful and nice, and it made his scales prickle, but not in the same way as before.
He couldn't say no, could he? Jimmy was the first person to ever be really nice to him…it wouldn't be nice to say no, right?
Mommy always said be polite, and besides, he didn't want Jimmy to hit him for being rude.
Plus, the way Jimmy said it, it didn't really sound like a question. More like he was telling him they were going to play, but for some reason, Randy didn't mind.
"Um…s-sure. Okay."
Jimmy smiled, showing off his underbite to the fullest extent, and Randy had a thought that maybe it wasn't as obvious or ugly as he first thought, and by then the teachers were upon them, squawking about the ruined bikes and whisking Randy away to the nurse's office. He looked back over Miss Needle's shoulder in time to see Jimmy lift a big mitt and wave at him.
In the end, he had to wear a cast on his arm for three weeks, and two of Jimmy's milk teeth were knocked out in the crash, (but that was okay because Jimmy wanted them to come out anyway, so that his big monster fangs could come in.)
Randy was all smiles when he went home to tell his parents and his sister that he'd made a new friend.
With a Sullivan, no less. They were really, really happy when he told them Jimmy's last name.
They played together every day after that, but they never rode the tricycles again. Randy still liked blue, but the paint was never as pretty to him as Jimmy's fur was.
To him, that was a color all its own.
«»«»«»«»«»«»«»
(A/N: Few headcanons here. First, Randy has a sister named Aggie, but I doubt she'll be featured much. Two, I had this thought that Sulley was popular and good looking in college, but he was ironically unattractive as a child. He got hotter as he grew into his body (which Randy notices, of course.
Finally, Sully's father is a bit abusive, and that will also show up later.)