. . .𝗣𝗔𝗥𝗔𝗖𝗢𝗦𝗠

On The Rox is alive around him, the Sunset Strip just waking up for yet another night of LA-elite debauchery. The air is thick with cigar smoke and alcohol, hardwood floors sticky under his loafers. The sting of cheap gin and burning tobacco scratches at his throat, and the large fish tank in the corner is nothing more than a sharp blotch of light that’s cutting through the haze. More than once he’s zoned out of the conversation, letting his eyes focus on the slow kaleidoscopic dance of the fish.

It all faintly reminds him of New York, Studio 54 its own groovy microcosm amidst the concrete jungle. Reminds him of that night he saw you there across the floor, his bleeding heart clutched tightly in the mercy of your hands. 

God, you’d looked ethereal… Like time froze around your frame until the only thing Michael could hear—nineteen and stupid and in love—was his own traitorous heart. The memory-scented heat of your form is sweet as he takes another half-hearted sip of the mimosa.

But, you’re not here right now, and it’s made abundantly clear by the nature of the conversation he’s only now snapping back into.

“That thing’s probably all stale by now, Mike,” slurs Tito, nodding at Michael’s glass.

They’re all jam-packed onto one of the countless sofas in the lounge, Michael in the middle, his brothers forming a wall of broad shoulders and sharp laughter around him.

And they’re only outside because of him, to celebrate the wrap of his filming for Disney’s Captain Eo. It’s the end of July, 1985, and Michael wishes nothing more than to finish this damn drink and take the drive down to Mid-Wilshire. The drive down to you.

Your voice whirs around his head from earlier, when you’d urged him to have a fun night with his brothers wearing that shiny smile of yours. Ain’t nothing worth his time in Sunset Boulevard right now more than the girl who convinced him to go out in the first place.

“Man, worry about yourself,” Michael bites back with a small smile. 

He takes a swing, swallowing with a gulp. It’s not like he can even taste the alcohol, really; it’s more psychological. Chasing the placebo rather than the actual thing, much like he’s trying to convince himself that going out tonight was better than spending time with you after hardly seeing you for weeks. Disney had demanded a lot from him, and apart from that one time he’d brought you and Elizabeth to hang out on set, the only times he spoke to you were over the phone.

He sours, taking another sip.

His neck is warm and flushed from the swirling haze of the bar, the hairs on his nape rising with each glance someone pins him with in rum-dipped recognition. But he’s not here to be recognized no more than anyone else, so the phantom glances remain just that. Phantoms.

Although, hm… There’s a soft, grating dissonance that’s making Michael’s lip twitch in annoyance. Somebody—whose face he can’t make out under this lighting—is sitting at the white spinet piano, fingers idly striking the keys in a whole different rhythm than the song playing. It’s a goddamn mess and it’s pissing Michael off, which is the only reason he rejoins the conversation around him.

“Yeah, Tito… You leave Mike alone, now…” laughs Marlon, shoulder nudging Michael’s. “He can’t go crawlin’ back to Tink all drunk and disorderly—”

“And why’s that, Mike?” asks Jermaine, lips curling around the whiskey glass he’s refilled thrice by now. “Afraid you’ll get too tipsy an’ accidentally call her sugar instead of sugarpie honeybunch?”

Like the song, I Can’t Help Myself. Get it? It’s funny, or so his brothers think. It sends a wave of rumbling, tipsy laughter throughout the sofa, and Michael bites the inside of his cheek with a hum. They’re always pulling this mess. Calling him soft and vanilla for loving on his girl. What’s new?

(They don’t do it to Marlon, though, no. It’s Michael who’s the softie, the sensitive one, the pussywhipped. He’s a grown man with a whole engagement ring on his finger, but to them he’ll always be that little boy who got caught red-handed leafing through a Playboy mag on camera.)

“God forbid, God forbid!” cackles Marlon.

“I keep saying it but nobody listens,” Randy starts, leaning in conspiratorially as if he’s about to let them into secrets about the female sex previously untapped in. “That sweet-talkin’ game? I swear, ladies dry up faster than the Sahara. Wanna get her sweating like a sinner in church? You have to be a little cold with it—”

Michael’s left hand—his good one—bypasses Marlon and flicks Randy’s ear, making him howl and spit up bubbles of his drink. It just makes them laugh harder, though.

“Calm down, big daddy, damn!” Jermaine chuckles and pats him on the shoulder. Michael’s lips curl down to a frown, the citrusy mimosa now bitter on his tongue. “Hit a nerve?”

“You’re all fools,” Michael groans, grabbing his aviators from the coffee table and pushing them up the bridge of his nose. Now they can’t see him and he can’t really see that well either, but it’s something he can make peace with. It’s not like he’s aching to stare into their mugs any longer than he needs to.

Damn, he misses you.

“No, no,” Tito pipes up. “He’s not too far off.”

“Why would I cuss out my girl? In what world is that supposed to turn her on?” Michael asks, mind flooding with your face. 

Back when you were still teenagers and that… boy had broken your heart. Your first boyfriend, the one before Michael. You’d call him sniffling, asking if you could come over and hang out in his room because your house felt too small and your body felt too wrong. The look in your eyes would tear him apart, every single time. Cleave him in two, root and stem. That asshole made you feel that way, because he was mean and stupid to a flower he had no business holding. Michael’s flower.

He never wants to make you feel this way, ever. So, what in the world are these fools on about?

“Look, Mike, we know you’re all about that tender lovin’ care of yours, alright? Nobody talked about cussing a girl out,” sighs Randy. “But sometimes… A lady needs to get her world rocked, you get what I’m saying?”

“I—” He stutters. “What do you know about treatin’ a lady, Randy? Please. I take care of my girl just fine, not that it’s any of your business to be talking about anyway—”

“Is that right, Mr. Big Shot? You do? Marlon, what about you? What d’you say?” chuckles Jermaine, raising his empty cup in a salute.

Marlon all but chokes. “Uh-uh, nah. No way. We’re not bringing Carol into this. Full stop.”

“Oh, okay!” jumps Michael, jaw tightening. “So you’re fine talking about my girl then, is that it? I oughta lay you out—”

Marlon raises both hands in a surrendering shrug, and Tito says: “Look, look, look, Mikey. Mike, man, nobody’s trying to be disrespectful. We love Tink, you know that. But it’s true! You know… it’s the same with mine. She loves it when I get a little rough, a little wild. Says it makes her feel… small, or whatever. Women love that stuff. They love knowin’ they got the power to make you lose control. Randy’s onto something—”

“I don’t need to know ‘bout your wife like that.” Michael’s shoulders clench, bottom lip lodged under his teeth, neck flushing. Even so… Tito’s words linger, taking root inside Michael’s brain, making him chew his lip in thought. 

‘Love knowing they got the power to make you lose control.’ But lose control, how? He already does lose control, doesn’t he? When he’s sweating, slurring, panting above you, his thrusts sloppy and his mind a blissed out haze. When he’s under you, letting his hands grope and squeeze on every bit of softness that’s just begging to be touched. When he tells you how much he wants to… make you a momma.

Making love with you is beautiful, sweet, gentle; exactly how it should be. It’s so good it makes him lose his mind. That’s losing control, isn’t it?

He’s about to engage—actually engage—in the conversation when Jermaine somehow ruins it. 

Because, of course he does.

With a barely-contained grin, sly and dumb and utterly Jermaine-like, he slurs: “Uh, yeah, you do!” He winces, as if what he’s about to say next is a duty imposed on him that can’t be avoided. “Sorry, sugarplum… Y’know, maybe, the reason that wedding ain’t happened yet is because of all that vanilla TLC—”

There it is. 

(It’s a goddamn miracle the peace lasted so long already.)

It all happens in under a few seconds, and Michael’s glad he’s no longer the scrawny little kid they could mess around in their brotherly spats. He’s real glad.

When Michael gets Jermaine by the nape in a death grip, his brother only howls between his choked and drunken laughs. The sofa’s in disarray as Marlon’s hands fall on Michael’s shoulders to try and push him back; Randy and Tito are clicking glasses over the chaos, downing the rest of their drinks as the entirety of the lounge eyes them in barely-concealed interest.

“Woah–oh! Oh, oh, oh, I got big daddy mad—!”

“Stop saying that, you,” Michael squeezes him when he laughs harder, “schmuck—”

“Just saying! Hey–aye! Just saying, even sweet PYT’s need their world rocked once in a while, Mike! Or you might end up in a cuckho—”

“That’s it,” Michael exhales.

With his tight grasp still on Jermaine’s nape, he pushes himself off the couch, using his brother as momentum and sending Jermaine’s head between his knees before letting him go. Jermaine’s so drunk he only cackles in response, clutching his ribs as if he hasn’t had a laugh this good in years.

Michael’s fuming. His right hand starts to pulse painfully from all the jostling, making him wince, bearing his teeth in a hiss as he cradles it close to his chest. And, to Marlon’s credit, he notices. 

Unsurprisingly. If anyone was to notice, it’d be Marlon.

“Shut your mouth, man,” he hisses to Jermaine, whose laughs have dwindled down to giggles, few and far in-between. “Mike, c’mon, sit down. Finish your drink.”

Michael clicks his teeth, catching Bill’s gaze from the bar where he’s been nursing a beer for the past hour or so. With a nod from Michael, Bill picks up his hat and leaves a few crisp dollars on the counter, crossing the lounge as Michael levels his brothers with a clenched jaw.

“I’m going to see her, since she’s the one y’all wanna talk about anyway. Bill?”

“I’m right here, joker.”

“Biiill—!” Jermaine echoes, dragging out the syllable and pitching his voice higher to mimic Michael’s cadence. His voice drops into laughter again. “Go rock Tink’s world, joker. She’ll be thanking us!”

Good Lord.

Michael’s not a violent person. Never wants to become one, never has been. Not when he was still a Witness, green and desperate to keep his mother happy because someone in that house ought to have, or when he started introspecting and dismantling the warped values that’d been making his life harder, nor when his relationship with God became a personal journey outside of institutions. No, Michael’s not a violent person at all. 

But, shit, if he doesn’t want to sock Jermaine straight in the jaw right now.

“Mike, nawww, c’mon!”

“Are you really leaving? It’s your night!”

“Just sit back down!”

But, Michael’s already off. Bill is close on his trail, giving the rest of the brothers a hat salute with a smile before he follows after the boy that’s been giving him the best hell for fourteen years now.

It’s just past 12AM when you hear keys jingling in the door.

Your apartment’s been quiet for the past few hours. There’s an old lady next door who always stays up late to watch Jeopardy reruns, the volume cranked up so high it’s almost like Alex Trebek’s in your living room. You don’t really mind, though. It fills the silence; almost makes you feel like you’re back home.

You’re lying in bed when the door opens. Freshly showered, smelling of vanilla and citrus, your damp skin making the AC feel heavenly against your skin. You’re lucky the apartment is laid out the way it is; it allows for the unit you have installed in the living area to cool off the entire house. Courtesy of Mike, of course; he wasn’t about to let his girl stew in a non air-conditioned studio.

“Baby!” you call out, jumping off the bed with a quick stretch of your limbs. But he intercepts you on your way to him, big arms closing around your shoulders and pushing you back towards your room. You giggle: “Mikey, what’re you doing? Did you guys have fun?”

You both fall onto the king sized duvet with an unceremonious plomp, a breath punching its way out of you as he starts pecking you softly up the neck and to your cheeks. His weight on you is grounding and delicious, making you sink into the mattress as his sprained hand lies softly by your side.

“Jus’ missed you,” he murmurs against your ear, kissing it in a way that tickles. “Missed my lady… Did you miss me?”

What, like you’d say no? You click your teeth, making him raise his head, staring at you expectantly. “Yes. I missed you. Let me just… Here, let me scoot back to the pillows. C’mon.”

You do, the silk bedding offering sweet friction as you lie back on your plush assortment. Opening your legs, you beckon him to you with a smile. He returns it tenfold. 

And, he just looks so… handsome. His curls are still shiny and perfect (and a bit grown out now at the back, something you adore), smile pushing up against his cheek apples, doe-eyes crinkling as he finds home between your thighs. His head lies gently on the softness of your stomach, breath hot on your pajama blouse. 

And, fuck, his hands… Big as they are, slim and pretty and downright eye-candy. His good palm slides around your waist, curling around you from behind, squeezing you close and making butterflies flit around your stomach.

But your eyes land on his right hand, still sprained and aching. A frown weighs down your lips, and you let your own hands drift down to it. Both of your palms close around it, bringing it closer, and you don’t miss the tiny sigh he lets out.

If his discomfort wasn’t currently tugging at your heartstrings, you’d linger more on the sight that always leaves you pulsing and dumb; the way it takes two hands of yours to cover one of his. No, that’s a lie, both your hands combined aren’t big enough to cover it. God, the things it does to you…

Girl, shut up. Jesus. Fuck.

“You’ve been doing the stretches the doctors gave you, haven’t you?” You swallow around nothing, hoping to keep your thoughts from straying even though it’s too late.

“Mhm, every day,” he murmurs, voice low and featherlight. It looks like he’s about to elaborate, but another thought takes hold of him. “Baby, it’s like, real cold in here—”

“What’s the point of having AC if it’s not cold?” You bend down, kissing his—huge, lean, salivating—fingers still in your hold. “Means we can cuddle more…”

“Well, when y’ put it that way…”

The quiet that washes over you is comfortable. His hand is still in your hold, growing limp as your fingers begin a tender massage near his wrist. Nothing more than a soft rubbing of his skin, but it has him exhaling a gasping moan of relief into you. It affects you more than you’d like to admit.

“You didn’t answer me.”

“Hm?” he hums, staring up at you sideways beneath his lashes. From this angle, his eyes look even rounder. He looks cute as shit.

“Was it fun?”

His groan is so loud and deafening, even your neighbor must’ve heard him over Alex Trebek. You sputter a confused laugh, raising your brows in a question.

He elaborates with a stiff lip. “Oh, Lord… You would not believe the mess these fools were talkin’ tonight. It was just… too much.”

You snort. “Try me.”

“Okay. You asked for it…” He takes a deep breath, exhaling an awkward laugh that makes you even more curious. “They started going on about me being too… soft with you. Talking about how women love,” he gestured halfheartedly with his fingers, wrist still being softly massaged in your hold, “feelin’ small, or… Damn, I don’t even know, just things like that—”

Oh.

Your brain short-circuits. Worse than that one time the TV gave out on a movie night, sputtering its last breaths in painful bursts of static. Maybe even worse than he had years and years ago, that one time you accidentally stumbled on his Playboy stash behind the headboard of his bed. God, he’d been so mortified. Absolutely blown a gasket; wouldn’t let you in his room for near a week.

Well, that’s how you feel now. Dumb and horny and… Full of possibility.

“…Right.” Good one, girl.

“It’s just crazy! You think so, too?”

“Uh-huh.” Don’t even worry about it.

“I mean… I just don’t see it like that,” he says, voice dropping an octave, shifting from where he’s lying and balancing up on his elbows, his calves curling up behind him. Round Bambi-eyes find yours, searching your face for reassurance. “Makin’ love… it’s a beautiful thing. ‘S supposed to be an expression of passion. Complete passion. You’re not supposed to try and make someone you love small. That just sounds so backward to me.”

He pauses, sprained hand turning over in yours so his palm meets your skin, fingers lightly curling around your own.

“It’s supposed to make your heart feel bigger,” he continues, a little breathless, the earnestness in his chest making his words rush out a bit faster. “Like you’re so full of love for a person that you just… you just melt right into them. Y’know? It’s not about being mean or trying to show who’s got the upper hand. It’s about being gentle. Safe. That’s how it’s supposed to be with us.”

Oh, God. You might cry. He’s just so… lovely! And you, you’re—

“Yeah,” you say dumbly, eyes wide like saucers, breaths tighter. “Or, y’know…” His brows furrow in disbelief so quickly it sends you spiralling for a response. “No, I agree! That’s not what I meant. Um. Baby, sorry, but,” your palms come up to his face, clutching his cheeks as you thumb at the hairs on his upper lip. “D’you know how much I love this?”

It’s true, you’re weak for the mustache. It wakes something primal inside you, making you hide his shaving cream in the morning and ‘accidentally’ throw the spare razors he’s stocked up in your cabinet. It’s perfect and it’s yours. 

It doesn’t matter that you brought it up just to pivot. Doesn’t matter at all.

“Why’re you changin’ the subject?”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

“I literally agreed with you.”

“No, no, you said,” his voice raises in pitch, mimicking you, “‘Ooor, you knowww—’”

You laugh, jaw hanging open, palms letting go of his hand to fall flat on the duvet. “I don’t sound like that!”

“You do,” he insists, a stubborn, beautiful grin breaking through. His long fingers gently hook under your wrist. “You absolutely do. And then you gave me that… look.” He tilts his head, dark eyes narrowing with a mix of curiosity and pure mischief. “Elaborate on that for me,” he hums, his voice dropping back down, soft but demanding. “‘Or, I know’ what, mama? What were you gonna say before you started sweet-talkin’ my stache? Hmm? Tell me.”

He’s going to be the death of you one of these days. Six years of having him like this, and he still makes you feel like that floundering nineteen-year-old girl with all the false bravado in the world. Your fingers curl around his own again, careful not to jostle his wrist too much as you bring it to your lips. You give a peck to each finger, watching as his lashes flutter.

“Okay. You know how much I love your hands, too, don’t you?”

He chuckles. “I’m havin’ a bit of trouble, actually…”

He’s so full of shit. He knows it, you know it, and yet it still makes heat flush down your belly. Your teeth get buried on your bottom lip, because two can play this game. 

“Mhm, I do. I love how big they are… when you hold me,” you whisper. Your free hand grabs his other palm, bringing both in front of you, thumbs tracing his knuckles and feeling the stark contrast between your size and his. “Makes me feel like I’m right where I belong. Like nothing can touch me…” You bend down, giving him a lingering kiss that has him sighing into you. “…Except you. ‘Cause I’m yours.”

He lets out a low, shaky breath, the playful smirk completely dropping from his face. His long fingers move to spread out against your waist, the heat of his palms burning right through your clothes as he pulls you just an inch closer. You’re giving a valiant battle against the twitching of your thighs, but it’s futile. Michael can tell.

“Yeah?” he asks, a breathless little syllable against the softness of your stomach he’s now burying his face in. Fingers slowly trailing up and past the hem of your pajama, he raises the fabric up your midriff until he’s free to pepper kisses over your skin.

“What I meant was, was just,” you swallow, because his lips are hotter now, “um… I wouldn’t… mind it, y’know? Not really. Not… at all, even.”

He pauses, looks up at you, lips still on your skin. “Mind… what?”

You gulp, clenching your eyes and looking at the heavens. He’s going to make you say it out loud and there’s nothing you can do about it. You kind of brought that all upon yourself. 

A shy grin pulls at your lips, twitchy and nervous. “Feeling small.”

There’s a pause, a crackling sort of silence that washes over the room.

“Oh,” he says simply. And, it’s kind of funny. The look on his face. His lips just barely parted, eyes beady and brows raised, mind whirring so loudly you can tell just by looking at him. “Oh—?”

“I–I mean,” you rush, “what you said is true. All of it. And I love you, I love us just the way we are, I’m not saying otherwise.” You pause. “I’m not saying I want anything to change. You get that, right?”

“I do.”

You laugh awkwardly, endearingly, cupping his burning cheek. “Doesn’t look like it.”

“No, I–I hear you, baby,” he stammers, palm coming up to completely dwarf yours on his cheek, his skin scorching hot against your own.

Oh, God, you can’t shut up now. “It’s just… y’know, being a little rougher or whatever, it doesn’t change how we love each other. It doesn’t mean you’d treat me bad, or make me feel less, or anything. Or, God forbid, unsafe! I trust you, Mike. More than anybody in the world. It’d be… it’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust.” You’re flustered and spewing word-vomit, heart clawing dangerously up your throat as you heave out: “Ohmygosh, I’m totally blowing this, aren’t I? Am I makin’ any sense? I feel like I’m not makin’ any sense—”

“Shh, just look at me.” His curls tickle your midriff.

Laughing breathlessly, it feels like inhaling for the first time after a dive. “Mike, I—”

“No, look at me. You’re makin’ perfect sense, baby.”

You listen, looking down at him while your heart pounds harsher than a bassline. “I just don’t want you thinking—”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think anything bad. I swear, I don’t.” Biting the inside of his cheek, he asks: “You really mean all that?”

“Yes,” you nod, eyes softening while your thumb strokes his cheek. “More than anything.”

“And you, you wanna feel… small with me? Like what they were sayin’?”

You giggle, looking away before meeting his gaze again, smile so wide it hurts your cheeks to maintain. “I wouldn’t… be opposed. Only with you, though.”

“Oh… Okay. Okay, sweet baby,” he nods, diving back into kissing down your belly. One palm trails to the small of your back to push you against him, making you arch, and the other slowly cups your breast. Cups it whole. “Thank you for tellin’ me, mama…”

Oh, God… “Mike,” you gasp, thighs trembling as his kisses move lower with intent. He squeezes you, just the way you love, not too harshly but just strong enough to leave you hot. Your hand clutches his over your tit, for no other reason than to feel anchored.

Your shorts are flimsy and airy, nothing but a flowy piece of fabric meant for summer, just so you don’t walk around in your panties all day. It takes zero effort for Michael to push it aside and give you a hot kiss, your lacy underwear sporting an embarrassingly wet patch as he takes a deep inhale.

You shudder, locking eyes as his fingers rub over your slit, the feel of it combined with the lace against you making you huff and twitch your hips. “Don’t tease me…”

“But I love teasin’ you,” he grins. “You like that? Hmm?”

“Mike—”

“No, no… You were just talking all that good stuff. Sayin’ how much you love my hands.”

“Well, I do…” God.

“Tell me again. Tell me what you love about ‘em.” His teeth flash in a smile. One hand’s burying itself in the meat of your thigh, gripping so hard you’ll be feeling it tomorrow. The thought shouldn’t send an aching pang down your middle, but it does.

You swallow, gently pushing a stray curl behind his ear, fingers lingering on his forehead. “They’re big… And pretty. Just like you.”

He nods feverishly, as if he can’t even hear you through the haze in his head. Eyes locked on where you need him most, his palm drifts down to cup you.

You jump, goosebumps razing on your skin, a whimper fighting its way out of your throat as your brows furrow. The very tips of his fingers are reaching over the panties’ waistband, tickling the tufts of hair peeking over. He’s cupping you whole and it’s making you dizzy. It’s not something you weren’t aware of before, but fuck. It never gets old.

“They do look big on you, don’t they? Look how small you look under me right now. Look…” he trails off, pressing chaste kisses on the inside of your thigh, lips dancing over your stretch marks, close enough to where you’re aching but far enough to keep you on the edge. Just for him.

“I’m looking, M–Mikey…” You fumble a bit, grinding against his unmoving hand, choking on a hiccup when he suddenly peels the damp fabric off of you and the cold air hits you.

And, when he enters a finger inside? He does so slowly. Then a second, lungs heavy as he sneaks glances at you from beneath his lashes, watching you writhe with a hung jaw and that cute little furrow you get on your forehead.

(You get it when you’re thinking, or when you’re angry, or when a stubborn Letraset sheet just won’t rub off for the dry-transfer. Or… in situations like right now, when the pleasure is gut-deep and visceral. When he makes you feel this way.)

His pace is slow, filling you gently, rhythm a steady push-and-pull as he… Oh, God… As he bottoms out.

You gasp. He shushes: “I’m sorry, baby, I’m sorry, I’ll go slower… It feels good?”

You feel so full. Stuffed to the brim, even though you’ve taken his fingers a thousand times before. It still feels new, sacred, special. You moan a pretty sound that makes him hum appreciatively, fingers unbreaking the brutally delicious pace. It must go on for at least ten minutes, that deep stretch of him driving you crazy, your bedroom filled with nothing but the squelching noises of your slick, his fingers soaked with you.

At some point, you look down and really focus on the sight; Michael, on his stomach, the thickness of your thighs hugging him. His curls shiny and a bit wind-swept, his bottom lip between his teeth, his eyes hooded and drunken.

And, his fingers. Pumping in-and-out of your soppy warmth, like… Like you’re a ragdoll, something he needs to pull apart, helpless against him. Fuck. Fu—

When he lays a tiny kiss on your puffy clit, you wheeze: “Mi–Micha–el—!”

“You’re so pretty…” he whispers, that soft voice of his coming from deep inside his throat, making him sound like he’s just woken up. “Such a pretty mama for me. You need to come, baby?”

“Y–ye–ah, yeah, yeah, yeahyeahyeah—” 

You’re chasing it, hips shifting in place, grinding up into nothingness as his pace stays steady, sweat trailing down the dip of your back as you choke on a hiccup.

He gives your clit another swirling lick, and you’re gone.

It washes over you dizzyingly. And after weeks of (unwanted but unavoidable) abstinence, it’s leg-curling. Catastrophic, even. It leaves you mumbling nonsense onto the side of your pillow, hands splayed around your head powerlessly, like a halo. 

And Michael’s right here for you—whispering sweet-nothings from down below—but for the half-minute it takes for you to come down, it sounds more like static. Grazing your ears but not truly sticking.

You’re panting when he comes up for a kiss, your taste on his tongue potent. You exhale a sigh into him, and he swallows it down with a smile. You don’t miss the tiny wince that jumps out of him, the way he softly twists his wrist in place, fingers curling and uncurling. 

And, there, right on his cheek: streaks of brown makeup that’re washing off, leaving behind the milky beige exposed to the warm light of your lamps. It tugs at your heartstrings. You wish he’d just ditch the makeup altogether; you’ve said so in the past, many times. But public scrutiny and decades of insecurities can’t simply come undone by his girl’s sweet words only, no matter how much you wish they could.

It doesn’t mean you’ll stop trying, though.

“Baby, c’mon,” you urge him, fixing your underwear and shorts as you slip out of bed. Your thighs are shaky, something that doesn’t go unnoticed by either of you. “Up, up, up—”

“Girl, where are you goin’?”

You roll your eyes playfully, grabbing him by his good wrist and making him follow you to the small cramped bathroom. It’s a tight fit—nothing like his family’s at Hayvenhurst—but it’s intimate. Cozy. You love that you have to brush up against each other every time someone wants to move past.

The toilet’s facing the door, and the vanity is right beside it. You flick the lightswitch and make Michael sit on the closed toilet lid, facing you as you rummage through the cabinet for your makeup-removing cleanser and cotton pads. All the while, he’s watching you with this loving, faraway look in his eyes. A tiny grin pulls at the corners of his lips the more you huff.

You turn to look at him, just for a second, fighting back a smile of your own. You’d pay good money to be inside his head sometimes.

(The world would, too. When they call him eccentric, closed-off, peculiar. Strange and wacky. Someone to be cracked open and picked clean from the inside-out just so they can be the first to report on it. He’s had to put up with it ever since you met him, and it still feels like the world’s hang-up on that version of him they wanted to keep frozen; before he grew up, took agency of himself, stopped giving them everything they wanted. Before the vitiligo, the lupus, the accident. Before he skyrocketed himself so high they could only claw at his feet to drag him down.)

But, that’s not who’s sitting in front of you now. Michael Jackson, the superstar. It’s just Mikey, your fiancé. Your childhood sweetheart. The boy who made you realize that love doesn’t have to hurt to be life-changing.

You jump on your tiptoes to perch yourself on top of the vanity, pedicured feet landing on the inside of Michael’s spread thighs on the toilet lid. Your knees lock, and Michael leans forward to rest his chin on top of them. You’re still sensitive from the orgasm, but it’s a quiet and warm sort of ache. You can see that he must be half-hard too, his pants sporting the tiniest tent, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Look up?” you gently instruct as his lashes flutter.

“You don’t got to do this,” he murmurs while you pour the solution on a cotton pad and begin wiping at the brown foundation that’s caking his skin. It comes off in thick strokes, the pad twisting and turning around your hold as you try to utilize every drop.

 “I know,” you answer, and continue anyway.

His skin looks pretty, brown and pinkish pale. Your thumb brushes his cheek, dumping the used cotton pad on the vanity behind you before kissing on his vitiligo patches. You pull back with a sigh, hands wordlessly closing around the cleanser as you pour another pad. You don’t stop looking at him, not even for a second.

“You’re staring,” he huffs, chin moving against your knees with his words. You wash more makeup off, on his other cheek and down his jaw.

“Am I makin’ you nervous, playboy?” You smirk, wiggling your brows.

“A bit,” he giggles.

You snort, shaking your head. “Only you could finger a girl to oblivion and act all shy when she looks at you, Mike!”

He chokes out a high-pitched flustered laugh, warmth creeping up his neck and cheeks as his large hand reaches up to squeeze your calf. He hides his face back down against your knees, broad shoulders shaking.

“Hush up—”

“Are you gonna make me?” You raise your brows suggestively, bursting into a giggle-fit when he raises his head from your knees. “What? Had to make you look up somehow. You still have makeup left.”

“You’re something else, baby. You really are.”

“Ditto,” you murmur in concentration as you remove the last bits of leftover foundation coating his neck. Then, you do his hands, careful of his wrist, across both palms and up his forearms. “All doneee,” you sing, pecking his nose before climbing down the vanity. 

“C’mere, girl…” He clicks his teeth. You’re halfway to the door before you feel his hand curling around your waist, resting on your lower belly that’s still fluttering from his touch. He comes up behind you, lips softly grazing against your ear, body flush on yours. “You think we’re done? I missed you too much…”

Your heart licks up your ribs, a smile creeping up your face. “Aye, aye, captain…” you drag out seductively, fighting to swallow down your giggles.

He pulls his head back, just a bit. “What now?”

You snort: “Get it? Like, Captain EO?”

He squeezes you, but you can tell he’s fighting back a laugh. “Baby, if you don’t get your behind on that bed right n—”

 He doesn’t have to tell you twice.

Your words stay with Michael for months.

‘It’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust. I wouldn’t be opposed. Only with you.’

Every time he touched you, every time he made love to you, there’d be a tiny voice on the back of his head. Whispering your words back to him on repeat, telling him to manhandle you the way you said would feel good, have his way with you in a manner he’s never done before. Telling him to… fuck you.

But, every time, he’d chicken out. His hold would loosen into a gentle caress, words spilling out like honey on your skin; soft and sweet and familiar. Safe.

And, the worst thing is? You wouldn’t say a thing about it. As if that conversation never happened. As if it hasn’t been plaguing his mind for months on end, making him feel inadequate, undeserving. You never claimed as such, he knows. He knows he’s not being fair to himself, but he feels like he’s been letting you down spectacularly. He feels like a joke, or a fraud, or both.

He hates it. Hates himself for it. What kind of man is he if he can’t keep you satisfied?

Maybe his brothers were right…

The months slip by quickly, and soon enough, January 27th of 1986 arrives in all its starstruck glory. You’ve been waiting for this day for over a year. For Michael’s achievement, sure, but for yours as well.

Last Christmas—at the end of December of ‘84—you’d been approached by none other than Prince. Yes, that Prince, with whom Michael was convinced he’d have to fight for God’s bestowment of divine inspiration. And, really, you shouldn’t have been as surprised as you’d been. 

A lot of things had changed since that time you were waxing paste-ups for LA Weekly in Sunset Boulevard, just barely dipping your toes in the industry. Since that first job of yours in 1979, you’d moved on to bigger things.

It must’ve been late 1981 when you were approached by a music promoter from Slash Records, then still operating out of a tiny office above a shop in West Hollywood. They offered you cash under the table to quit the paper and design graphics full-time for their label, and the look on Gina’s face when she found out why you were quitting? 

Oh, priceless!

What followed was a fun job filled with eye-gouging neon-inked concert gig flyers, which you’d go out and staple onto Hollywood telephone poles with Layla, the only other artist on the team. God, you loved Layla; you got each other through some really frustrating times. You’ll forever be grateful to her.

Half of your days were spent doing actual design, and the other half answering phones, wrapping promotional brochures in mailers, and avoiding the landlord who loved to corner you near the elevator about whatever the label’s owner did to piss him off that day. But, what took up most of your time was hand-crafting typographic logos for the bands.

By that point you’d already worked with Michael, though. Just a little bedroom project that turned into one of your most important collaborations to date. You’d made the lettering on his album cover for Off The Wall. Just the letters! Handwritten and chalk-like, and Epic Records’ official art directors had handled the final layout.

The letters, though? They were yours. Plastered all across the world. Over twenty million copies! You never told anybody at Slash. Nobody except Layla. You hadn’t been approached for the letters on your boyfriend’s album, you’d been approached for you and you alone. You weren’t about to give them something to talk about; you’d learned that lesson from Gina.

But, well… It became a harder secret to keep once Thriller came out. You free-handed the golden cursive on that cover, too. And, holy shit. Highest selling album of all time. Of all fucking time! With your letters on it! Sure, Epic Records credited their corporate art team, but to anyone who matters? Your name got around a bunch.

It was bound to. After all, you were the short film’s leading lady. Not only that, but you worked on its storyboards alongside an incredibly talented creative team that younger-you would’ve only dreamed of being a part of. Your raw sketches felt amateur in comparison to theirs, but their praise and assurance more than accounted for the imposter syndrome that’d almost paralyzed you.

The making-of documentary crew shadowed you extensively during the whole process, and somehow—in some inconceivably mind-numbing way—you weren’t just a young, scrappy, self-made illustrator anymore. You’d wormed your way up the ranks of pop culture’s royalty. Carved a spot right beside Michael: completely different circles, but next to him anyway.

In the beginning, you kind of hated it. Ever since you’d graduated HS and decided to pursue an artistic career without further schooling, you’d sworn to yourself you’d never grasp at Michael’s influence. When the fruits of your labor started bearing fruit, well, self-doubt was only natural. 

Because ultimately, your success had come from Michael.

Or, at least, that’s what your insecurities screamed at you. It was something Michael shut down very quickly, and you’re deeply grateful for it. ‘That’d only be true if you weren’t good,’ he’d told you. ‘I jus’ gave you a platform. It’s networking, nothing else. Quit that thinking, baby, okay? I’m not joking.’

You did. Exorcised it quickly and without much further thought, because you had no other choice. Once the Thriller film hit the streets, you skyrocketed from obscurity to… whatever you are now.

You still don’t know how to feel about that. It all had spiralled out of your control, out of Michael’s as well. He knew you never wanted this; being recognized, photographed, analyzed. You didn’t want… what he had. And he never blamed you for it, just how you never blamed him either. Things just… are what they are. Nothing you can do about it except smile and look pretty for the cameras, for people you don’t know that call out your name.

In early 1984, you landed a marketing position for Intralink Film Graphic Design; Anthony Goldschmidt was a brilliant man to work under. To learn under. He and his team had created the E.T. poster in 1982, which blew your mind. You were working with these guys? Like, holy shit.

And then, enter Prince. Circa December of the same year, reaching you through Michael of all people, asking you to make the album cover art for Around The World In A Day. The project would require at least four weeks of nonstop work, and you took a leave of absence from work to take it on.

Prince described his vision as a ‘surrealist psychedelic mindfuck;’ his words, not yours. Working with him was kind of the same. A mindfuck, all throughout. An incredible, unbelievable mindfuck.

Michael had been… weirdly civil about the entire thing. Okay, maybe not ‘weirdly,’ per se. There was no real animosity from his side, and after those eight Grammys and the Thriller sales? They weren’t in the same sphere anymore, and it was a fact they were both painfully aware of.

It is now a little over a year later. Prince is up for three categories in the AMAs, Michael’s up with Lionel for Song Of The Year… And here you are.

Walking inside the Shrine Auditorium hanging off Michael’s arm, the red carpet outside a pandemonium of flashing camera-bulbs and cloying perfumes. It was just you, Michael, and Elizabeth Taylor in the limo; the rest of the Jacksons have their own ride, and you got no idea if they’ve already arrived or been seated or still on the way.

Your eyes grow hazy from the cigar smoke swirling all around, Michael’s arm wrapped tightly over your shoulders as he leads you inside. Elizabeth is trailing behind you, well-accustomed to the white wall of light and dizzying shouts from the attention-getters.

“I get that it’s their job,” you huff as you walk through the doors, relieved from the screaming crowd even though the energy inside is still buzzing, “but can’t they just… be better at it? My ears damn-near burst.”

Michael’s fixing the collar of your bedazzled blazer-dress, black with striking gold accents to match his own military-esque suit. It cuts off just at the first quarter of your thighs (a bit longer at the back so as to avoid any accidents), giving way for the glittering sheer tights you’re wearing underneath. A thick gold belt is wrapped around your waistline, buckle shiny and squared.

Standing next to Mike, it’s clear who you came with. If the matching engagement rings aren’t any indication.

“Are you trying to reason with the sharks, sweetheart? Oh, they’ll eat you alive unless you treat them like the scum they are,” Elizabeth laughs.

You chuckle, gently shooing Michael’s fussing hands away, grabbing onto the inside of his elbow and joining the rest of the crowd deeper into the lobby. It’s cavernous, with intricate chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, the carpet a deep maroon under your heels.

As you walk past people you never would’ve imagined seeing, let alone knowing, a pit forms in your stomach. An ugly, scraping feeling of imposterism; hollow, but familiar. What the fuck are you even doing, waving at Whitney Houston and smiling at Cyndi Lauper?

Who are you next to them? Michael’s arm candy? A fellow creative? 

Both? Neither?

It’s not like you haven’t interacted with celebrities before. Paul McCartney, Elizabeth… Diana Ross. (You are not getting into this right now, no way. It’s bad enough that she’s hosting this shit). Many others, too. But you were always introduced as Michael’s girl, not someone they could work with; someone on equal footing.

Gosh, you hate when you get like this. They’re nothing more than people, you know that, but still. Your mind’s running faster than your feet can keep up with.

Giving your head a shake, you turn to look at Elizabeth. “Don’t know how you’ve been putting up with it as long as you have.” Squeezing Michael’s arm, the smile he sends you makes you warm. “Both of you.”

“Thick skin, darling,” she sighs, moving to step beside you. “Thick skin.”

You hum. Glancing at Michael, you ask: “D’you know where your family’s sitting? I wanna say hello. They’re presenting, aren’t they? Janet and La Toya?”

“We should jus’ find them after, baby,” he sighs, looking around aimlessly. “Yeah, Rebbie too—”

A voice butts in from the side: “If it isn’t my lucky charm.”

Huh?

All three heads turn at the same time, searching for the interjector.

Oh! Prince.

His hair is slicked down in thick rivulet-like waves, and it might just be the tamest you’ve ever seen him dress. He’s in a simple black tuxedo, polished dress shoes, black bowtie to match. His makeup is mild, too; just a striking smokey-eye over red-blushed cheeks. He looks good.

“Who?” you ask once your mind catches up, a grin pulling at you. “Me?”

“Who else?” Prince retorts, his voice that smooth suave drawl you became accustomed with. He’s standing in front of you, nodding politely at both Michael and Elizabeth. “Good evening.”

You feel Michael’s arm tense when he returns the nod. Giving his bicep a squeeze, your eyes don’t leave Prince. “I think you’re overestimating me,” you grin.

“No such thing,” he waves you off. “You look beautiful tonight.”

“She does, doesn’t she?” Michael smiles, tight-lipped as he kisses your temple.

“Thank you,” you flush, but you don’t really know who you’re answering.

“Wish me luck?” Prince raises his brows, smile wide and eyes hooded. He always has that look, like every woman he speaks to unravels something inside him. You learned quickly not to take it to heart.

“You don’t need luck,” you laugh, sneaking a look behind him at the quickly-moving crowd spilling inside the auditorium seats. “But I think if we don’t hurry, they might close the doors on us.”

“You’re right. I’d love to catch up after, though.”

“We should really get to our seats,” Michael cuts in smoothly, tightening his grip on your arm. “Have a good night, Prince.”

“Oh,” you murmur, taken aback by the coldness in his voice. You look at Prince, noting the sly look he wears. Ugh. Men and their dick-swinging contests. “Yeah, we’ll, uh, see you on the other side. Good luck.”

He clicks his teeth, stepping to the side as Michael starts nudging you forward, Elizabeth following. “Thought you said I don’t need luck?”

“Can’t hurt!” you sing out, and just like that, Prince gets swallowed by the crowd.

The three of you are seated at the front row center orchestra. It takes a while to reach it, but once you do, you sit cross-legged down next to Michael—whose palm finds your knee immediately—with Elizabeth on your right side.

Just a few feet in front of you is the lip of the humongous stage, and the countless towering screens on the backdrop are lit up in radiant red-blue scribbled stars. The scale of the room is massive, the balcony on the back packed with thousands of people. And when you look over your shoulder, you’re met with a sea of the most famous faces on earth, all waiting for the broadcast to go live.

It’s hard to keep your expression neutral once the show actually starts. Because she’s up there, presenting, smiling and swaying and being her usual unbearable self.

Diana. That bug-eyed bitch.

You’re not one for a cat-fight—you’re too self-respecting—but her? Her, you’d gladly slap the dentures off of. Well, it might be petty of you, but can anybody blame you? She hasn’t stopped drooling after Michael ever since both of you were teenagers (and she was pushing retirement). Even after Michael’s rejections and avoidance, the woman just won’t let up: offers to co-write her songs, come on her shows, to entertain a flirtation that is downright perverted.

Michael respects her artistry and mentorship too much to tell her to go to hell. You have no such qualms. You’re choosing to remain civil, though. 

As much as possible.

She’s still bitter about her exclusion from We Are The World, you’re sure. It’s clear in the way she spots Michael in the front row, giving him a wide smile. It falls hilariously flat once her eyes catch on you, palms entwined with Michael’s on your lap, your fingers caressing up his arm.

God damn, woman, you think. Didn’t she just get married to some Swede? Ugh, you can’t keep up.

She doesn’t matter, though. The show must go on, and soon enough, Janet’s on stage. She looks really pretty, red-lipped with a bold black eye, the silver details on her dress glittering under the stage lights. She’s excitedly presenting the award for Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist. And—

“Prince!” Janet reads from the card, the auditorium bursting in a loud explosion of cheers and whistles.

“Oh! O–oh, my gosh! Yay! Wooo–oh!” you laugh in surprise, clapping until the flesh of your palms hurt, twisting your neck to spot Prince as he gets up from a few rows back and struts towards the stage.

But, instead of walking past you, he stops. Smiles down at you, sly and confident, extending a palm with raised brows. You short-circuit for a second too long, the moment extending and twisting in slow-motion out of your control, because this is live, you’re on air, fucking move—!

Michael’s palm falls from your knee as Prince effortlessly tugs you to your feet and leads you up the stage, not even looking back. Michael’s hand twitched instinctively, but before he could even think of reacting, you were halfway across the stage.

What the fuck? Why’d he bring you up? Oh, God, is he going to make you speak? You’re not prepared, this was not a fucking part of—

The spotlights are even worse from up here. All six and a half thousand faces of the crowd blend into one big, amorphous blob of shadow; a whispering sea of faces that’s analyzing your every move as Prince accepts the award and the theater grows louder for him. You manage to give Janet a shoulder rub before she’s ushered backstage with the rest of the presenters, and now she’s gone too.

Oh, what the hell? It’s not just thousands watching you, it’s millions. You’re being telecasted, breathless beside Prince, smile so wide and plastic it makes your jaw ache. You don’t know how to stand without looking awkward, out of place, like someone who doesn’t belong.

Your hands are shaking. Fuck. It’s a fluttering sensation, tingles flitting just under your skin. You try to clench them, but it just looks weird, so you press them flush against your thighs. It feels like your whole body’s shivering, and it’s fucking mortifying—

Prince notices.

He wraps an arm around the dip of your waist, pressing you flush against his side. You exhale a breath so shaky it makes him rub his thumb on your side, your palm finding purchase between his shoulder blades. He gives you a small nod of assurance, moreso a question than anything else. His eyes drift all across your features to make sure you’re fine, and you nod back with a gulp.

Smiling comes easier this time around.

It’s better like this, thank fuck. The feeling of another body is grounding. In the front row, you search for Michael. He’s right where you left him, fists clenched at his sides, lips pursed and eyes so dark they border on furious.

What—?

“Thank you…” Prince starts, leaning forward to the microphone stand. He’s holding the heavy glass trophy on one hand, you on the other. “They give you these little statues to tell you that you’ve done a good job.” He smiles subtly, arm slightly tightening around your waist. “But music is a lonely room, ‘til someone comes along and paints the walls for you. This… beautiful creature right here, she took the sounds inside my head and painted them for the whole world. She learned my colors.”

He pauses, turns to look at you completely. You don’t know what to do other than laugh incredulously, shy and flushed under the praise. Your mind’s scrambling to digest everything, but you think it’ll take several days for tonight’s events to sink in. 

‘Thank you,’ you mouth to him.

He continues: “Some people want to keep the brightest stars locked away in a cage, but genius belongs to the world. And tonight, she belongs up here. With me.” He says your name, first and last, nodding: “Thank you. And thank you to Dick Clark, and to LA.”

The auditorium erupts in thunderous applause, and it almost knocks you clean out. You’re slack-jawed amidst the cacophony of the cheers, jokingly grimacing before an excited howl of a laugh rips itself out. (God, you hope the mics don’t catch it). Untangling from Prince’s side, your arms shoot open, and he accepts the hug earnestly.

“Oh, my God, you’re crazy. You have no idea how much this means to me,” you whisper to his ear, squeezing before you let him go to step back.

“What’d I tell you?” he asks as he motions you down the stairs. “Lucky charm.”

It makes you laugh, and it feels as though you’re walking on a cloud. You plop onto your seat wearing your happiest and most radiant smile, waving at the camera operator that’s aiming for you. And, Michael is…

Oh.

Uh-oh.

He’s mad. As in, mad-mad.

It’s easy enough to tell. It’s not rocket science, especially with him; Michael can’t poker-face for shit. It looks like he’s entirely clouded over, darkened and closed off, lips tight and eyes glazed over in focus as he rubs his thigh. You’re intimately familiar with that look: he’s fuming.

Fucking Prince. Jesus. Why’d he have to bring you up there, and hold your waist, and flirt despite the ring on your finger, and—

And—

And… Say all those beautiful things about your art. Praise your talent. Shout you out publicly, by name, to millions of people, at one of the most important events in the industry. Huh…

Oh. Hell no. What does Mike have to be fuming over? Because Prince touched you? Because it’s the 1800s and you’re property, only allowed to be celebrated behind-the-scenes? Is that it?

Michael’s hand curls around your wrist, and his hold is bruising. You almost comment on it, something snarky and biting, but it gets caught behind your teeth and you swallow it down. It’s not the time, nor place.

Just sit, look pretty, yada-yada-yada.

The AMAs slip by quickly after Prince’s win. You smile, and clap, and cheer. You lean over to Elizabeth, whispering commentary and coughing to mask your snorts. You hold Michael’s arm, even though you’re getting pins and needles from the way he’s squeezing you.

And, when We Are The World wins Song Of The Year (an inevitability, an outcome as sure as the sun rising every morning), you set aside your irritation to kiss him deeply as congratulations. The cameras catch it, and even though you didn’t intend for it, it makes you giddy. His hand is on your nape, reaching all the way across your jaw. You grin into him before you break apart. Softly, you brush your thumb on his cheek, giving it a pat.

He smiles at you, but it’s not his smile. It’s the cameras’.

Of course, that’s when Diana calls him up to the stage. He pulls you up with him, though. Grip tight as ever, you walk up the stairs for the second time that night. It’s significantly less nerve-wracking, although you feel your nerves snapping for an entirely different reason.

Diana moves to hug and kiss his cheeks, but he maneuvers around her, giving her a half-hearted shoulder pat in thanks. Her eyes close in on you, and you need to remind yourself of the millions of viewers currently watching you and Diana Ross hovering around each other like a pair of panthers. You give her a tight nod, and nothing more.

She’s still the host, which means she has to snap out of it quicker. Michael’s holding the glass statue, smiling out into the world, the cheers from the audience’s standing ovation reaching a crescendo.

Diana screeches: “Why don’t we try to get aaall the performers that were there that night, one year ago, so we can sing We Are The World together? La Toya, the Jacksons, c’mon up to the stage! Alright, is everybody comin’ up? Yeah! We are the worlddd, we are the chiiildren… Elizabeth? We are the ooones who make a brighter dayyy, so let’s start giviiing…! Sing along, would you?”

(Like you said. Still bitter.)

Quincy came up after Lionel, just as the opening notes began filling the space. You locked eyes with Elizabeth, and with a quick work of your wrist you ushered her up. From both wings, people started spilling in, and when you spotted Janet, you waved her over with a smile.

“Felt like I was dying up here,” you tell her, wrapping your arm around her shoulder and burying her to your side as everyone starts swaying to the rhythm.

“I saw,” she giggles.

You click your teeth at her. Michael wraps his arm around your waist, bringing you close, rocking you to the melody. Liz is on his other side, and Diana’s somewhere to your left, begrudgingly sharing a mic with Whitney.

The moment is beautiful. The song is too, and what it stands for, what it’s brought out in people. You’re no singer, but you sing your heart out regardless. Michael’s smiling, his real smile, looking down at you and his sister as the lyrics echo through the theater and thousands of people sway.

He kisses you on the temple, lingering, hot, sharp.

Yet, loving. Always, always loving.

You should’ve known the momentary ceasefire of We Are The World wouldn’t have lasted any longer than the song itself.

“Can’t believe you,” you mutter, unbuckling your golden belt and tossing it on the bed. Michael’s somewhere behind you, stepping out of his loafers. Your heels were tossed at the door, and you’re making quick work of the buttons on the blazer.

The apartment’s quiet, your neighbor next door probably asleep due to the distinct lack of Alex Trebek-ness in the air. The central heating’s buzzing something soft, but the homey warmth does absolutely nothing for the prickling down your nape.

It’s like a minefield in here. One wrong move and you’ll both blow up into pink mist.

“Can’t believe me?” he echoes, undoing his tie and letting it hang around his neck messily. “What’d I do, baby, huh?”

“You were practically boring holes in the side of my head the entire night, Mike. From the moment he called me up.”

He leans against the door frame, unbuttoning his sleeves and suit. “Oh, so I’m supposed to jus’ sit back and smile while another man puts his hands all over you on live TV? While he’s up there acting like he owns you just ‘cause you painted some canvas for him?”

Your jaw falls, fingers stilling mid-button. “He was thanking me! Praising my work in front of the whole industry, and you looked like you wanted to lay him out right on the stage—”

He clicks his teeth, shaking his head dismissively. It makes your jaw clench. “He was being too touchy. You know it, and I know it. He had no business pulling you close like that, saying what he said. It was disrespectful to you, and it was disrespectful to me.”

“It wasn’t like that, at all! You’re completely blowing this out of proportion. You were so tense in the car, y–you wouldn’t even look at me!” Hands shooting out, you gesture animatedly, blazer popped open to reveal your matching underwear. The glittery pantyhose elastic is digging into your waist. “You’re being insane. You’re actually being insane!”

His eyes track down your frame, and he sighs before snapping out of it, beady gaze locking on yours. “No, no,” he shakes his head angrily, “I’m not being insane. I’m bein’ your man, there’s a difference.”

Your entire face sours, lips pursed in disbelief as you walk over to the vanity to remove your bracelets. “Right, riiight, right. So, your version of being my man is icing me out because another artist showed me some appreciation?” A humorless laugh trickles out of you. “You’re just jealous, and I don’t get it, because if we wanna talk about impropriety—”

He tosses his gold belt on the ottoman near the closet along his own blazer, groaning: “Uh-uh, we’re not spinnin’ this old tale again—”

Your silver bangles clang harshly against the catchall bowl. Sucking in a breath, you try to keep your voice steady. It’s a futile battle. Pivoting harshly, you point an accusatory finger, not even certain who you’re blaming. “It’s not old if the bitch still wants you!”

He clicks his teeth, eyes falling shut as he shakes his head. “Don’t talk like that, baby, c’mon—”

You gasp; half a laugh, half a sneer. “Are you kidding me? Are you actually joking right now? You think I don’t see the way she still looks at you? You cut her off years ago, Mike, and she acts like she’s just waiting for a slip-up! So don’t you dare look at me sideways because Prince gave me a hug on-stage. It’s fucking embara—”

“That’s entirely different and you know it. I don’t give her the time of day, I don’t let her get close to me. You, you just let him do it!”

Your eye twitches. “Because we were on-air! What’d you want me to do, make a scene? Shove him off?”

“I don’t care about the cameras!” He gestures out into nothingness, nerves and frustration catching up to him and threatening to blow over. “I don’t care ‘bout making a scene. If a man is putting his hands on my woman, I want him off you. It’s that simple. But you jus’ stood there like it was nothing.”

You pivot back again, clenching your eyes. The rest of your bangles slide off your wrists like water, but your fingers twitch. “It was nothing! Just a congratulatory hug, that’s it! You’re only looking for an excuse to stay mad—”

He’s closer now, you watch him from the mirror. He looks undone; white dress-shirt half open, hair ruffled from running his hands in it, eyes wide and round. He’s breathing heavily, chest panting, and… For a moment only, you forget what you’re arguing about.

“Yeah, okay,” he exhales, nodding to himself. “You’re right, I might be. I am jealous. I, I’m heavily jealous. I don’t want his hands on you, is that so crazy? I don’t want nobody’s hands on you but mine.”

You can’t help it, an incredulous snort jumps out. Twisting to face him, you lean your weight on the vanity, the edge digging into the meat of your ass. You don’t miss the way his eyes jump down: at the fat of your thighs stretching out the pantyhose, on the softness of your stomach still half-covered by the tights. At the way he can only catch a peek of your breasts between the lapels.

He scowls at the sound of your snort. It makes him look… Hm. You have to fight a smirk, biting on the inside of your cheek. It makes him look sexy. All fired up because another man touched you, touched what’s his. It makes heat flash somewhere deep down, causing you to shift in place.

Well. They do say anger is an aphrodisiac…

Crossing your arms, you raise your brows. “Oh… So, now you wanna talk like that? Where was all this mouth when we were at the lounge? You just stood there and stewed, and then you bring all this heavy energy back home to me. How do you think that makes me feel?”

His whole body shakes with his exhale. “You think this ‘s just mouth? You think I’m talkin’ just to talk right now?”

Shrugging, you tilt your head. “I don’t know, Mike. Are you? Because, normally, we’d just tell each other to hush up and walk away, and talk about it later. You don’t ever get like this.”

His eyes, beautiful and glassy, narrow into slits. He squares his shoulders, chest puffing out. Oh? “Maybe I’m tired, baby, huh? Maybe I’m tired of everybody thinkin’ I’m too soft to hold onto what’s mine.”

Oh.

Oh… Dear. God.

That’s what this has been all about? Jesus. He’s always been insecure like that, and it’s just worsening by his brothers’ constant teasing. Prince might be no more than a blotch on Michael’s map now, but it still stings. You dread to think about what Jermaine’s going to say when he sees you both next. No matter how much you reassure Michael, reassure his masculinity, this is what it always boils down to: men and their goddamn dick-swinging contests. 

How does that make any sense? Why is every male on the planet incapable of listening to what the objects of their desire actually like?

It’s a fucking mystery.

You don’t mean to sound patronizing, but a smile slips onto you. As if the past four hours hadn’t happened at all. Like it’s just a game you’re playing; a tug-of-war you’re forfeiting on purpose, the mouse mocking the cat.

“Fine,” you shrug, giggling, shaking your head and raising your hands in surrender. “Fine! Prove it then.” You lean back, wrists landing on the vanity as you rest your upper body. “If you’re so mad about how he touched me, what’re you gonna do about it?”

You didn’t know it was possible, but his eyes?

They get deadly. Lids hooded, brows in a knot, thumb and forefinger pinching the bridge of his nose. He scoffs with a smile that never reaches past his cheeks. “Oh, no. No, no, no… You don’t get to play like that, ma. You don’t get to… poke at me and just laugh it off.”

Your brows pinch together, an unsure grimace on your lips. “Michael—”

“Get on the bed.”

Pause…

…What?

“E–excuse me?” you sputter, a chuckle getting stuck up your throat. “Michael—”

Clicking his teeth, he unbuttons the rest of his white shirt, pulling it out of his waistline, rolling up the cuffs up his sleeve to his elbows. Slowly, one by one, as if you’re boring him. 

“Don’t ‘Michael’ me, baby. Get on the bed. Right there,” he points with his nose, like it’s a nuisance.

Your brows constrict, mouth hanging open. A breath gets stuck somewhere past your lungs. You make no move, and neither does he. And, here you both are: half undressed, panting, suspended mid-air in a standstill that threatens to crumble your resolve completely.

“…You’re serious.”

“Dead serious. Turn around.”

What the fuck? Did you die on the ride back? Is this some sort of purgatory? Heaven, hell, both?

This time, you do move. Slowly, like a fawn caught in a trap, unsure on shaky feet. You stop right at the foot of the bed, the mattress coming up just below your midriff. Eyes studying the frilly pillows, the baby-blue patterns on the duvet, you suck in a breath once you hear his feet moving behind you. Your head tilts to the side. “…Like this?”

“Yeah… yeah, jus’ like that. Stay right there, and don’t move.” His hands land on both your hips, the sensation so sudden that you jump. Your own hands fall on top of his, feeling his tiny twitches immediately.

“Mikey, you’re shaking a little bit,” you whisper, words trailing off into a moaning sigh as he leans down over your shoulder. His body’s flush against yours, soft lips nipping your ear.

“‘Cause you do this to me,” he murmurs, accent thick, curling around you like a net, “you make me lose my mind…”

“I d–do?” you echo. Yes, you do. You’re well-aware. Have been, for near a decade.

His wide palms dance across your front, one splaying over your lower stomach, the other sneaking past the blazer lapel and cupping your breast. All the while, he’s constricting you against him like a boa, until your ribs are stuttering with each breath.

“You, you, always you.” His tongue is licking at your neck, drawing you in, sucking softly where you’re always left squirming and desperate. He nips just at the junction of your jaw, and suddenly untangles himself completely, his warmth a memory. “B–bend,” he clears his throat, your heart flutters, “bend over. Right here.”

“Oh… Okay,” you murmur, lips bruising with the way you’re biting them. Your hands land on the softness of the duvet, feet still on the ground, body falling into the 90° angle effortlessly. The blazer rides up, and Michael gasps hard at the sight of your ass; you’d chosen a silky black thong, your sheer tights still glistening despite the warm dimmed lights of the vanity.

His hand comes up, groping your flesh over the pantyhose, and the sensation’s dizzying. 

“No,” he breathes, and your eyes widen in confusion. “Not like this…” His palm finds purchase at the small of your back, pushing you forward, causing you to raise your knees to climb up the mattress on all fours. He pushes on your back, making you fall on your cheek, arching for him until he’s satisfied. 

You’re still at the edge of the bed, but now… Now, you feel exposed. For him.

Your breaths are shaky. “How…” You swallow, lips puffy against the comforter, heat swirling inside you like tendrils. “H–how do I look?”

“Beautiful,” he punches out.

His hands are still shaking. They drift up your ass and latch onto the elastic band, peeling the tights off you slowly. Torturously. Goosebumps wash over every inch of skin he exposes to his hungry eyes, the friction with the nylon leaving behind tingles. He snaps them off your feet, rubbing your calves once he tosses them on the floor.

The gasp that claws its way out of you when he buries his head into your pussy is broken.

The angle makes everything more intense, makes you feel helpless in the most delicious way. And Michael is breathing in your warmth, inhaling you like you’re the sweetest perfume, big palms digging into your hips and ass.

“Mike,” you whine.

“Always playing,” he says against you, kissing you over the silky fabric. It makes you gasp. “Always… testin’ me. Do you get like this for anyone else, lovey?”

“No,” you mewl as he continues licking. His tongue is hot, making you light-headed, toes curling as he eats you through the panties. He’s making a mess… You’re making a mess. You feel it; the hot gush of wetness slowly leaking out as he has you spread like this, mouth sloppily working you until you have no idea where you end and his spit starts. Oh, God. “Only you, o–only y—”

The slap on your asscheek is sharp, and stinging. It wasn’t harsh, barely stronger than a smack, but it has your eyes popping open like corks. 

You gasp, voicing breaking into a whine as his big hand rubs lovingly over the spot.

“How’d that feel?” Michael asks. He sounds winded. Honeyed. With that soft lilt you could recognize in a sea of voices.

“G–good,” you cry, heart threatening to spill up your throat. “Really, really good…”

He peels away your panties in the same slow, agonizing manner. By the point they’re past your ankles, you’re shaking like a leaf. You hear his sharp intake of breath, and something compels you to turn. To look at him. When you do?

Holy. Sh—

“OhmyGod,” you mewl, jaw nearly unhinging. You clench around nothing.

He’s got your panties in his mouth by the gusset, inhaling and pressing and licking, eyes closed in bliss.

“Mmh…” his shoulders fall, and he leans down close to kiss your cheek, near your jaw. From the corner of your eye, you see him pocketing them. He pecks your ear, fingers expertly undoing his pants. “I want… to fuck you, baby. Like this. Can I? Will you let me?”

You’ve never… Never like this. He always likes to look in your eyes, or be draped across from you, that way you’re connected completely. Deeply. So he can kiss you and shower you with his loving care, and you can get lost in it together. He’s never called it fucking, either. It’s always making love or loving on his lady, always sweet, hot, intimate. Beautiful.

But this… This is dirty. It’s debased, and lewd. Pornographic. So, so hot. Fuck, fu—

“Please, please, please, Mike,” you sob. It actually hurts, his absence inside you. The sensation is so hot it’s jumped right back into freezing. You’re drowning in it, the angle intensifying it into a crescendo. You need him.

“You’re doin’ so good for me right now, baby. I mean it.” Oh, there he is… Solid against you, rubbing his flushed tip in your wetness, catching against your puffy clit and making you keen.

You gasp, one breath and another: “M–Mikey, please…”

Another slap. Same controlled intensity as the first, same delicious sting that makes your feet curl upwards. You choke around a breath.

“See? You listen so much better when you ain’t running that mouth.” He hums in appreciation, voice suave and dripping with condescension. But his hands on your hips are still shaking. “I’m really proud of you.”

“I always listen to you,” you pout. Lie.

But that, ‘I’m proud of you?’ God… It always leaves you melting. Now? Now, you’re drunk on it.

He chuckles, soft and airy. “No, you don’t. But you’re bein’… a real good girl for me now. Keep staying just like that.”

He’s teasing you. He’s fucking patronizing you. He’s making you… feel small. And, damn it, it leaves you hotter than you’ve ever felt before. It’s a brand new dizzying rush, and you can’t take it anymore. He’s tapping himself against your clit, and you push your hips back, crying: “Jus’ put it in, put it in! Mmnnhhh–oh m–my God—”

He does, slowly, and you both gasp.

It feels so… different. Michael’s already big, but in this position, it feels like he’s about to split you in two. And your baby’s breathing so hard behind you—hands strong and big and shaky—the shape of him making you sting and ache deliciously. He moans something broken, facade slipping, his pace bruising. He’s fucking you like he’s got something to prove, and you’re writhing with every sharp and deep thrust, hands clutching the duvet until your knuckles shake.

It hurts a bit. Or, rather, stings. Stretches you. Makes you moan deep down your chest with every stroke. You’re oversensitive, be it from the unfamiliar position or everything else, so you can’t help it when a high-pitched, deep-throated wail rips out of you.

It sounded different from all your other sounds. It sounded pained. And Michael stilled like a statue almost immediately, planting his knees on the mattress and falling forward. His hands land next to your torso, caging you in and supporting him as he kisses your shoulder. 

He breathes, anxious: “You alright, ba—?”

You nod, hot black tears mixed with mascara streaking down your cheeks. You push your hips back against him to no avail, heaving a sob: “I’m fine, Mike, just—”

One palm shoots back, digging into the meat of your hip, stilling you. “No, hold on, stop movin’ for a second. Talk to me, baby. Did I hurt you?”

“Mike!” you punch out, frustrated because he just won’t fucking move. “It felt so g–good… I wanna come so bad, pleeease, please just keep going—”

His hips twitch against you, almost imperceptibly, but not near enough. Breath hot against your cheek, he stays in place, burying his face in your neck and planting his hands again. “Okay…” he sighs around the kisses he’s peppering on your nape. “Okay, I’m right here. I got you. Just breathe for me, mama.”

Oh, his pace is brutal. Unrelenting once he starts, and you want it to last forever. He’s utilizing every bit of those dancer’s hips of his, the squelching wet sounds milking you for every moan you’ve got. You never want this ache to end, it hurts so goo—

Michael’s hand moves. You have half a millisecond to register the blur in your periphery before you feel it. Sneaking under you, past your stomach and your mound. Landing a slap against your swollen clit.

You choke, sputtering, shaking, writhing. “Mike–ah, ahh—!”

No, no, not yet, notyetnotyet…

“Yeah, ‘s good? Your man’s giving it good, baby?”

You’re coming, and it’s scathing. Body folding in on itself, a stinging pleasure spreading from your pussy up your belly like a hot wave, reaching up your eyes and falling into fresh tears. Your shoulders are shaking, and you’re left raw.

But, Mike’s still going.

“D–did, d’you just—?” His sentence gets cut off by his whimper, the feeling of you squeezing him too much, too good. You’re pulsing, milking him, keeping him where you need him most.

You’re still shaking, chest caving in. “Yeah,” you hiccup, “yeah, yeahyeahye–ah… A–ahh!”

When Michael comes inside you, he does so brokenly. His hips drive into you one last time, squeezing you so tight you might be left with marks, flush against you. Deep, snug. Making you feel full with him, his cum warm and sticky. You can’t really feel it right now, but you know you’ll do once he pulls out.

He exhales against your throat. His hands, pretty and veined, sneak beneath the blazer you’ve surely ruined by now, unclasping your bra and wrapping around your tits. And, right now, it feels grounding and soft. Something dragging you back from the ledge as he pulls out, and you feel more like a leaky faucet than a woman.

“Oh, my God…” you groan, thighs twitching as both your releases trickle down. Your pussy makes a valiant effort to keep them in, clenching and puffing, but to no avail. She might be broken. “Oh. My. God.”

Michael falls down on the bed, his head landing on the pillow. You’re not too keen on moving right now, so he has to grab you by your still-raised hips and maneuver you around so you can lie your head on his chest. He wraps one arm over your waist, hugging you close. You have one foot draped between his, ear listening to the drumming beats of his racing heart, the push-and-pull of his lungs almost a lullaby.

“What jus’ happened?” he pants, in awe.

“Mike,” you giggle, just as breathless. “You happened. Where the hell did all that come from?”

“I–I don’t know,” he exhales. “It just… did.”

“Yeah, I’ll say. I think you broke me. Like, officially.”

His eyes clench, and when you twist to look at him, the sight leaves you with cottonmouth. He’s sweaty, forehead glistening, makeup ruined to reveal his small patches of that face you love so much. His curls are sticking to his skin, and those lips look awfully kissable.

“Don’t say that—”

You catch his words just as they slip out, the kiss open-mouthed and soft, tongues caressing each other for a moment before breaking apart. “Why? It’s true. You’ve broken me.”

“Now you’re makin’ me feel bad…” His arm tightens around you, his other palm coming up to rub soothing strokes on your clothed forearm.

He pecks your forehead, and you ask: “Baby, why? Why would you even say that?”

He sucks in a breath, avoiding your gaze. You can tell it takes a lot for him to find the words, let alone say it out loud. “It’s just… We’ve been together for so long, and I jus’… I never saw you give in like that before. Have I… been leaving you wanting?”

Oh, this stupid, stupid boy.

“Hey, look at me. Look at my face, Mike.” You love him so much. It’s clear by the beam that works its way up your cheeks, pearly whites flashing as you lift your head and use one palm on his chest for balance. “Is that what you’ve been thinking about? Ever since… we talked?”

Fingers catching on his jaw, you make him look at you. Really look at you. At your puffy eyes and destroyed makeup, the bruised and pretty lips that would love nothing more than to speak his name always, your cheeks that ache from the smiles he’s pulling out of you.

“Yeah,” he nods, arms tightening.

“Let me make something abundantly clear, alright?” You school your expression into a deadpan. “I’ve loved you since we were sixteen. We could stop having sex tomorrow, and I’d still be the most satisfied woman on Earth. It took a lot to get where we are. There isn’t anybody, not one in the whole world, that makes me feel like you do. Okay? Not some philandering guitarist whose album I worked on, or whoever fucking else. D’you get that?”

Jokingly, you jab a finger on his temple. And, there’s that grin. Slow and sly, pulling at the apples of his cheeks.

“I get that,” he echoes.

“Kiss me,” you urge, eyebrows raised in a challenge. He does, a soft and lingering peck. You smirk. “Now tell me again.”

He rolls his eyes, smile blinding. “I’m your one.”

“Good,” you nod, giving him a kiss before wincing. You weren’t kidding when you told him he might’ve broken you. “Now… Is my one, who loooves meee, gonna run us a bath? With those, um, bathbombs I like? The black raspberry vanilla?”

“I spoil you too much,” he groans playfully, giving your ass a soft smack before getting up.

Undressing right here in front of you, he discards his ruined shirt and pants and underwear on the floor in one fell swoop. As he walks out of the room, you curl over on the bed, eyes following his ass like a moth to a flame.

He’s doing it on purpose. Please, what are you supposed to do? Not stare?

You wolf whistle. He shouts out a, “Hey!” that’s half-muffled by the bathroom door, and you burst into postorgasmic giggles; the kind when everything’s warm and gooey and fun, muscles tired and syrupy.

In the end, you end up falling asleep while waiting for the bath. When Michael comes back in the room, he smiles; eyes softening, heart thundering. With gentle hands, he removes the blazer from your body, draping it over the chair at the vanity. He cleans you up with a warm towel he damped in the bathtub, and climbs into bed with you once he’s done.

He falls asleep with you inside his arms, lulled by the tiny snores you always deny making. (He always indulges.)

(Two weeks later, you’ve just clocked out of work. Sadly, you’d made the mistake of stopping by your local supermarket that always stocks Michael’s favorite OJ.

You’re leaning on your kitchen island, sipping on a glass of store-bought orange juice, the phone receiver balanced between your shoulder and ear. Michael picked up on the first ring. “You’ll never believe how I got recognized at Ralph’s. I’m giving you three tries. Go.”

“Well, obviously from Thriller? A kid or teen?”

You gulp another mouthful of juice. “‘Obviously,’ huh? Humblebrag much? Nope. Try again.”

“The AMAs?”

You mimic an incorrect game-show buzzer. “Close, but no. One more for the million.”

“Girl, jus’ tell me.”

“Forfeiting… Wasn’t expecting that.” The tabloid paper crinkles as you fix it in your hold, clearing your throat. “Does ‘Michael tells Prince to beat it after the on-stage display’ give you any hints? No wrong answers, babe, I believe in y—”

The laugh on the other side of the line is gut-deep. “No way—!”

“Mhm. Fucking paps didn’t even get my good side.”

“Naw, that can’t be right. All you’ve got is good sides, baby.”

You bite your cheek, snorting. “Awe, tha—”

“Right, left, front… Ohhh, that back…”

Your smile falls, neck flushing. “Alright, now. Well, Bernice and her friend don’t seem to think so.”

“Who the hell’s Bernice and her friend?”

“Two old ladies with very strong opinions about my waistline and blowout. Yeah,” you snort when he howls on the other side, “a–apparently, apparently! I look like I haven’t slept since the bicentennial. Whole reason I stopped in the damn market was for your juice, too! Mikeee, stop laughi–iiing—!”)

3leni © 2026 — i do not consent to my work being republished on other platforms or put into ai. do not copy or plagiarize. all edits are by me as well!

On The Rox is alive around him, the Sunset Strip just waking up for yet another night of LA-elite debauchery. The air is thick with cigar smoke and alcohol, hardwood floors sticky under his loafers. The sting of cheap gin and burning tobacco scratches at his throat, and the large fish tank in the corner is nothing more than a sharp blotch of light that’s cutting through the haze. More than once he’s zoned out of the conversation, letting his eyes focus on the slow kaleidoscopic dance of the fish.

It all faintly reminds him of New York, Studio 54 its own groovy microcosm amidst the concrete jungle. Reminds him of that night he saw you there across the floor, his bleeding heart clutched tightly in the mercy of your hands. 

God, you’d looked ethereal… Like time froze around your frame until the only thing Michael could hear—nineteen and stupid and in love—was his own traitorous heart. The memory-scented heat of your form is sweet as he takes another half-hearted sip of the mimosa.

But, you’re not here right now, and it’s made abundantly clear by the nature of the conversation he’s only now snapping back into.

“That thing’s probably all stale by now, Mike,” slurs Tito, nodding at Michael’s glass.

They’re all jam-packed onto one of the countless sofas in the lounge, Michael in the middle, his brothers forming a wall of broad shoulders and sharp laughter around him.

And they’re only outside because of him, to celebrate the wrap of his filming for Disney’s Captain Eo. It’s the end of July, 1985, and Michael wishes nothing more than to finish this damn drink and take the drive down to Mid-Wilshire. The drive down to you.

Your voice whirs around his head from earlier, when you’d urged him to have a fun night with his brothers wearing that shiny smile of yours. Ain’t nothing worth his time in Sunset Boulevard right now more than the girl who convinced him to go out in the first place.

“Man, worry about yourself,” Michael bites back with a small smile. 

He takes a swing, swallowing with a gulp. It’s not like he can even taste the alcohol, really; it’s more psychological. Chasing the placebo rather than the actual thing, much like he’s trying to convince himself that going out tonight was better than spending time with you after hardly seeing you for weeks. Disney had demanded a lot from him, and apart from that one time he’d brought you and Elizabeth to hang out on set, the only times he spoke to you were over the phone.

He sours, taking another sip.

His neck is warm and flushed from the swirling haze of the bar, the hairs on his nape rising with each glance someone pins him with in rum-dipped recognition. But he’s not here to be recognized no more than anyone else, so the phantom glances remain just that. Phantoms.

Although, hm… There’s a soft, grating dissonance that’s making Michael’s lip twitch in annoyance. Somebody—whose face he can’t make out under this lighting—is sitting at the white spinet piano, fingers idly striking the keys in a whole different rhythm than the song playing. It’s a goddamn mess and it’s pissing Michael off, which is the only reason he rejoins the conversation around him.

“Yeah, Tito… You leave Mike alone, now…” laughs Marlon, shoulder nudging Michael’s. “He can’t go crawlin’ back to Tink all drunk and disorderly—”

“And why’s that, Mike?” asks Jermaine, lips curling around the whiskey glass he’s refilled thrice by now. “Afraid you’ll get too tipsy an’ accidentally call her sugar instead of sugarpie honeybunch?”

Like the song, I Can’t Help Myself. Get it? It’s funny, or so his brothers think. It sends a wave of rumbling, tipsy laughter throughout the sofa, and Michael bites the inside of his cheek with a hum. They’re always pulling this mess. Calling him soft and vanilla for loving on his girl. What’s new?

(They don’t do it to Marlon, though, no. It’s Michael who’s the softie, the sensitive one, the pussywhipped. He’s a grown man with a whole engagement ring on his finger, but to them he’ll always be that little boy who got caught red-handed leafing through a Playboy mag on camera.)

“God forbid, God forbid!” cackles Marlon.

“I keep saying it but nobody listens,” Randy starts, leaning in conspiratorially as if he’s about to let them into secrets about the female sex previously untapped in. “That sweet-talkin’ game? I swear, ladies dry up faster than the Sahara. Wanna get her sweating like a sinner in church? You have to be a little cold with it—”

Michael’s left hand—his good one—bypasses Marlon and flicks Randy’s ear, making him howl and spit up bubbles of his drink. It just makes them laugh harder, though.

“Calm down, big daddy, damn!” Jermaine chuckles and pats him on the shoulder. Michael’s lips curl down to a frown, the citrusy mimosa now bitter on his tongue. “Hit a nerve?”

“You’re all fools,” Michael groans, grabbing his aviators from the coffee table and pushing them up the bridge of his nose. Now they can’t see him and he can’t really see that well either, but it’s something he can make peace with. It’s not like he’s aching to stare into their mugs any longer than he needs to.

Damn, he misses you.

“No, no,” Tito pipes up. “He’s not too far off.”

“Why would I cuss out my girl? In what world is that supposed to turn her on?” Michael asks, mind flooding with your face. 

Back when you were still teenagers and that… boy had broken your heart. Your first boyfriend, the one before Michael. You’d call him sniffling, asking if you could come over and hang out in his room because your house felt too small and your body felt too wrong. The look in your eyes would tear him apart, every single time. Cleave him in two, root and stem. That asshole made you feel that way, because he was mean and stupid to a flower he had no business holding. Michael’s flower.

He never wants to make you feel this way, ever. So, what in the world are these fools on about?

“Look, Mike, we know you’re all about that tender lovin’ care of yours, alright? Nobody talked about cussing a girl out,” sighs Randy. “But sometimes… A lady needs to get her world rocked, you get what I’m saying?”

“I—” He stutters. “What do you know about treatin’ a lady, Randy? Please. I take care of my girl just fine, not that it’s any of your business to be talking about anyway—”

“Is that right, Mr. Big Shot? You do? Marlon, what about you? What d’you say?” chuckles Jermaine, raising his empty cup in a salute.

Marlon all but chokes. “Uh-uh, nah. No way. We’re not bringing Carol into this. Full stop.”

“Oh, okay!” jumps Michael, jaw tightening. “So you’re fine talking about my girl then, is that it? I oughta lay you out—”

Marlon raises both hands in a surrendering shrug, and Tito says: “Look, look, look, Mikey. Mike, man, nobody’s trying to be disrespectful. We love Tink, you know that. But it’s true! You know… it’s the same with mine. She loves it when I get a little rough, a little wild. Says it makes her feel… small, or whatever. Women love that stuff. They love knowin’ they got the power to make you lose control. Randy’s onto something—”

“I don’t need to know ‘bout your wife like that.” Michael’s shoulders clench, bottom lip lodged under his teeth, neck flushing. Even so… Tito’s words linger, taking root inside Michael’s brain, making him chew his lip in thought. 

‘Love knowing they got the power to make you lose control.’ But lose control, how? He already does lose control, doesn’t he? When he’s sweating, slurring, panting above you, his thrusts sloppy and his mind a blissed out haze. When he’s under you, letting his hands grope and squeeze on every bit of softness that’s just begging to be touched. When he tells you how much he wants to… make you a momma.

Making love with you is beautiful, sweet, gentle; exactly how it should be. It’s so good it makes him lose his mind. That’s losing control, isn’t it?

He’s about to engage—actually engage—in the conversation when Jermaine somehow ruins it. 

Because, of course he does.

With a barely-contained grin, sly and dumb and utterly Jermaine-like, he slurs: “Uh, yeah, you do!” He winces, as if what he’s about to say next is a duty imposed on him that can’t be avoided. “Sorry, sugarplum… Y’know, maybe, the reason that wedding ain’t happened yet is because of all that vanilla TLC—”

There it is. 

(It’s a goddamn miracle the peace lasted so long already.)

It all happens in under a few seconds, and Michael’s glad he’s no longer the scrawny little kid they could mess around in their brotherly spats. He’s real glad.

When Michael gets Jermaine by the nape in a death grip, his brother only howls between his choked and drunken laughs. The sofa’s in disarray as Marlon’s hands fall on Michael’s shoulders to try and push him back; Randy and Tito are clicking glasses over the chaos, downing the rest of their drinks as the entirety of the lounge eyes them in barely-concealed interest.

“Woah–oh! Oh, oh, oh, I got big daddy mad—!”

“Stop saying that, you,” Michael squeezes him when he laughs harder, “schmuck—”

“Just saying! Hey–aye! Just saying, even sweet PYT’s need their world rocked once in a while, Mike! Or you might end up in a cuckho—”

“That’s it,” Michael exhales.

With his tight grasp still on Jermaine’s nape, he pushes himself off the couch, using his brother as momentum and sending Jermaine’s head between his knees before letting him go. Jermaine’s so drunk he only cackles in response, clutching his ribs as if he hasn’t had a laugh this good in years.

Michael’s fuming. His right hand starts to pulse painfully from all the jostling, making him wince, bearing his teeth in a hiss as he cradles it close to his chest. And, to Marlon’s credit, he notices. 

Unsurprisingly. If anyone was to notice, it’d be Marlon.

“Shut your mouth, man,” he hisses to Jermaine, whose laughs have dwindled down to giggles, few and far in-between. “Mike, c’mon, sit down. Finish your drink.”

Michael clicks his teeth, catching Bill’s gaze from the bar where he’s been nursing a beer for the past hour or so. With a nod from Michael, Bill picks up his hat and leaves a few crisp dollars on the counter, crossing the lounge as Michael levels his brothers with a clenched jaw.

“I’m going to see her, since she’s the one y’all wanna talk about anyway. Bill?”

“I’m right here, joker.”

“Biiill—!” Jermaine echoes, dragging out the syllable and pitching his voice higher to mimic Michael’s cadence. His voice drops into laughter again. “Go rock Tink’s world, joker. She’ll be thanking us!”

Good Lord.

Michael’s not a violent person. Never wants to become one, never has been. Not when he was still a Witness, green and desperate to keep his mother happy because someone in that house ought to have, or when he started introspecting and dismantling the warped values that’d been making his life harder, nor when his relationship with God became a personal journey outside of institutions. No, Michael’s not a violent person at all. 

But, shit, if he doesn’t want to sock Jermaine straight in the jaw right now.

“Mike, nawww, c’mon!”

“Are you really leaving? It’s your night!”

“Just sit back down!”

But, Michael’s already off. Bill is close on his trail, giving the rest of the brothers a hat salute with a smile before he follows after the boy that’s been giving him the best hell for fourteen years now.

It’s just past 12AM when you hear keys jingling in the door.

Your apartment’s been quiet for the past few hours. There’s an old lady next door who always stays up late to watch Jeopardy reruns, the volume cranked up so high it’s almost like Alex Trebek’s in your living room. You don’t really mind, though. It fills the silence; almost makes you feel like you’re back home.

You’re lying in bed when the door opens. Freshly showered, smelling of vanilla and citrus, your damp skin making the AC feel heavenly against your skin. You’re lucky the apartment is laid out the way it is; it allows for the unit you have installed in the living area to cool off the entire house. Courtesy of Mike, of course; he wasn’t about to let his girl stew in a non air-conditioned studio.

“Baby!” you call out, jumping off the bed with a quick stretch of your limbs. But he intercepts you on your way to him, big arms closing around your shoulders and pushing you back towards your room. You giggle: “Mikey, what’re you doing? Did you guys have fun?”

You both fall onto the king sized duvet with an unceremonious plomp, a breath punching its way out of you as he starts pecking you softly up the neck and to your cheeks. His weight on you is grounding and delicious, making you sink into the mattress as his sprained hand lies softly by your side.

“Jus’ missed you,” he murmurs against your ear, kissing it in a way that tickles. “Missed my lady… Did you miss me?”

What, like you’d say no? You click your teeth, making him raise his head, staring at you expectantly. “Yes. I missed you. Let me just… Here, let me scoot back to the pillows. C’mon.”

You do, the silk bedding offering sweet friction as you lie back on your plush assortment. Opening your legs, you beckon him to you with a smile. He returns it tenfold. 

And, he just looks so… handsome. His curls are still shiny and perfect (and a bit grown out now at the back, something you adore), smile pushing up against his cheek apples, doe-eyes crinkling as he finds home between your thighs. His head lies gently on the softness of your stomach, breath hot on your pajama blouse. 

And, fuck, his hands… Big as they are, slim and pretty and downright eye-candy. His good palm slides around your waist, curling around you from behind, squeezing you close and making butterflies flit around your stomach.

But your eyes land on his right hand, still sprained and aching. A frown weighs down your lips, and you let your own hands drift down to it. Both of your palms close around it, bringing it closer, and you don’t miss the tiny sigh he lets out.

If his discomfort wasn’t currently tugging at your heartstrings, you’d linger more on the sight that always leaves you pulsing and dumb; the way it takes two hands of yours to cover one of his. No, that’s a lie, both your hands combined aren’t big enough to cover it. God, the things it does to you…

Girl, shut up. Jesus. Fuck.

“You’ve been doing the stretches the doctors gave you, haven’t you?” You swallow around nothing, hoping to keep your thoughts from straying even though it’s too late.

“Mhm, every day,” he murmurs, voice low and featherlight. It looks like he’s about to elaborate, but another thought takes hold of him. “Baby, it’s like, real cold in here—”

“What’s the point of having AC if it’s not cold?” You bend down, kissing his—huge, lean, salivating—fingers still in your hold. “Means we can cuddle more…”

“Well, when y’ put it that way…”

The quiet that washes over you is comfortable. His hand is still in your hold, growing limp as your fingers begin a tender massage near his wrist. Nothing more than a soft rubbing of his skin, but it has him exhaling a gasping moan of relief into you. It affects you more than you’d like to admit.

“You didn’t answer me.”

“Hm?” he hums, staring up at you sideways beneath his lashes. From this angle, his eyes look even rounder. He looks cute as shit.

“Was it fun?”

His groan is so loud and deafening, even your neighbor must’ve heard him over Alex Trebek. You sputter a confused laugh, raising your brows in a question.

He elaborates with a stiff lip. “Oh, Lord… You would not believe the mess these fools were talkin’ tonight. It was just… too much.”

You snort. “Try me.”

“Okay. You asked for it…” He takes a deep breath, exhaling an awkward laugh that makes you even more curious. “They started going on about me being too… soft with you. Talking about how women love,” he gestured halfheartedly with his fingers, wrist still being softly massaged in your hold, “feelin’ small, or… Damn, I don’t even know, just things like that—”

Oh.

Your brain short-circuits. Worse than that one time the TV gave out on a movie night, sputtering its last breaths in painful bursts of static. Maybe even worse than he had years and years ago, that one time you accidentally stumbled on his Playboy stash behind the headboard of his bed. God, he’d been so mortified. Absolutely blown a gasket; wouldn’t let you in his room for near a week.

Well, that’s how you feel now. Dumb and horny and… Full of possibility.

“…Right.” Good one, girl.

“It’s just crazy! You think so, too?”

“Uh-huh.” Don’t even worry about it.

“I mean… I just don’t see it like that,” he says, voice dropping an octave, shifting from where he’s lying and balancing up on his elbows, his calves curling up behind him. Round Bambi-eyes find yours, searching your face for reassurance. “Makin’ love… it’s a beautiful thing. ‘S supposed to be an expression of passion. Complete passion. You’re not supposed to try and make someone you love small. That just sounds so backward to me.”

He pauses, sprained hand turning over in yours so his palm meets your skin, fingers lightly curling around your own.

“It’s supposed to make your heart feel bigger,” he continues, a little breathless, the earnestness in his chest making his words rush out a bit faster. “Like you’re so full of love for a person that you just… you just melt right into them. Y’know? It’s not about being mean or trying to show who’s got the upper hand. It’s about being gentle. Safe. That’s how it’s supposed to be with us.”

Oh, God. You might cry. He’s just so… lovely! And you, you’re—

“Yeah,” you say dumbly, eyes wide like saucers, breaths tighter. “Or, y’know…” His brows furrow in disbelief so quickly it sends you spiralling for a response. “No, I agree! That’s not what I meant. Um. Baby, sorry, but,” your palms come up to his face, clutching his cheeks as you thumb at the hairs on his upper lip. “D’you know how much I love this?”

It’s true, you’re weak for the mustache. It wakes something primal inside you, making you hide his shaving cream in the morning and ‘accidentally’ throw the spare razors he’s stocked up in your cabinet. It’s perfect and it’s yours. 

It doesn’t matter that you brought it up just to pivot. Doesn’t matter at all.

“Why’re you changin’ the subject?”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

“I literally agreed with you.”

“No, no, you said,” his voice raises in pitch, mimicking you, “‘Ooor, you knowww—’”

You laugh, jaw hanging open, palms letting go of his hand to fall flat on the duvet. “I don’t sound like that!”

“You do,” he insists, a stubborn, beautiful grin breaking through. His long fingers gently hook under your wrist. “You absolutely do. And then you gave me that… look.” He tilts his head, dark eyes narrowing with a mix of curiosity and pure mischief. “Elaborate on that for me,” he hums, his voice dropping back down, soft but demanding. “‘Or, I know’ what, mama? What were you gonna say before you started sweet-talkin’ my stache? Hmm? Tell me.”

He’s going to be the death of you one of these days. Six years of having him like this, and he still makes you feel like that floundering nineteen-year-old girl with all the false bravado in the world. Your fingers curl around his own again, careful not to jostle his wrist too much as you bring it to your lips. You give a peck to each finger, watching as his lashes flutter.

“Okay. You know how much I love your hands, too, don’t you?”

He chuckles. “I’m havin’ a bit of trouble, actually…”

He’s so full of shit. He knows it, you know it, and yet it still makes heat flush down your belly. Your teeth get buried on your bottom lip, because two can play this game. 

“Mhm, I do. I love how big they are… when you hold me,” you whisper. Your free hand grabs his other palm, bringing both in front of you, thumbs tracing his knuckles and feeling the stark contrast between your size and his. “Makes me feel like I’m right where I belong. Like nothing can touch me…” You bend down, giving him a lingering kiss that has him sighing into you. “…Except you. ‘Cause I’m yours.”

He lets out a low, shaky breath, the playful smirk completely dropping from his face. His long fingers move to spread out against your waist, the heat of his palms burning right through your clothes as he pulls you just an inch closer. You’re giving a valiant battle against the twitching of your thighs, but it’s futile. Michael can tell.

“Yeah?” he asks, a breathless little syllable against the softness of your stomach he’s now burying his face in. Fingers slowly trailing up and past the hem of your pajama, he raises the fabric up your midriff until he’s free to pepper kisses over your skin.

“What I meant was, was just,” you swallow, because his lips are hotter now, “um… I wouldn’t… mind it, y’know? Not really. Not… at all, even.”

He pauses, looks up at you, lips still on your skin. “Mind… what?”

You gulp, clenching your eyes and looking at the heavens. He’s going to make you say it out loud and there’s nothing you can do about it. You kind of brought that all upon yourself. 

A shy grin pulls at your lips, twitchy and nervous. “Feeling small.”

There’s a pause, a crackling sort of silence that washes over the room.

“Oh,” he says simply. And, it’s kind of funny. The look on his face. His lips just barely parted, eyes beady and brows raised, mind whirring so loudly you can tell just by looking at him. “Oh—?”

“I–I mean,” you rush, “what you said is true. All of it. And I love you, I love us just the way we are, I’m not saying otherwise.” You pause. “I’m not saying I want anything to change. You get that, right?”

“I do.”

You laugh awkwardly, endearingly, cupping his burning cheek. “Doesn’t look like it.”

“No, I–I hear you, baby,” he stammers, palm coming up to completely dwarf yours on his cheek, his skin scorching hot against your own.

Oh, God, you can’t shut up now. “It’s just… y’know, being a little rougher or whatever, it doesn’t change how we love each other. It doesn’t mean you’d treat me bad, or make me feel less, or anything. Or, God forbid, unsafe! I trust you, Mike. More than anybody in the world. It’d be… it’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust.” You’re flustered and spewing word-vomit, heart clawing dangerously up your throat as you heave out: “Ohmygosh, I’m totally blowing this, aren’t I? Am I makin’ any sense? I feel like I’m not makin’ any sense—”

“Shh, just look at me.” His curls tickle your midriff.

Laughing breathlessly, it feels like inhaling for the first time after a dive. “Mike, I—”

“No, look at me. You’re makin’ perfect sense, baby.”

You listen, looking down at him while your heart pounds harsher than a bassline. “I just don’t want you thinking—”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think anything bad. I swear, I don’t.” Biting the inside of his cheek, he asks: “You really mean all that?”

“Yes,” you nod, eyes softening while your thumb strokes his cheek. “More than anything.”

“And you, you wanna feel… small with me? Like what they were sayin’?”

You giggle, looking away before meeting his gaze again, smile so wide it hurts your cheeks to maintain. “I wouldn’t… be opposed. Only with you, though.”

“Oh… Okay. Okay, sweet baby,” he nods, diving back into kissing down your belly. One palm trails to the small of your back to push you against him, making you arch, and the other slowly cups your breast. Cups it whole. “Thank you for tellin’ me, mama…”

Oh, God… “Mike,” you gasp, thighs trembling as his kisses move lower with intent. He squeezes you, just the way you love, not too harshly but just strong enough to leave you hot. Your hand clutches his over your tit, for no other reason than to feel anchored.

Your shorts are flimsy and airy, nothing but a flowy piece of fabric meant for summer, just so you don’t walk around in your panties all day. It takes zero effort for Michael to push it aside and give you a hot kiss, your lacy underwear sporting an embarrassingly wet patch as he takes a deep inhale.

You shudder, locking eyes as his fingers rub over your slit, the feel of it combined with the lace against you making you huff and twitch your hips. “Don’t tease me…”

“But I love teasin’ you,” he grins. “You like that? Hmm?”

“Mike—”

“No, no… You were just talking all that good stuff. Sayin’ how much you love my hands.”

“Well, I do…” God.

“Tell me again. Tell me what you love about ‘em.” His teeth flash in a smile. One hand’s burying itself in the meat of your thigh, gripping so hard you’ll be feeling it tomorrow. The thought shouldn’t send an aching pang down your middle, but it does.

You swallow, gently pushing a stray curl behind his ear, fingers lingering on his forehead. “They’re big… And pretty. Just like you.”

He nods feverishly, as if he can’t even hear you through the haze in his head. Eyes locked on where you need him most, his palm drifts down to cup you.

You jump, goosebumps razing on your skin, a whimper fighting its way out of your throat as your brows furrow. The very tips of his fingers are reaching over the panties’ waistband, tickling the tufts of hair peeking over. He’s cupping you whole and it’s making you dizzy. It’s not something you weren’t aware of before, but fuck. It never gets old.

“They do look big on you, don’t they? Look how small you look under me right now. Look…” he trails off, pressing chaste kisses on the inside of your thigh, lips dancing over your stretch marks, close enough to where you’re aching but far enough to keep you on the edge. Just for him.

“I’m looking, M–Mikey…” You fumble a bit, grinding against his unmoving hand, choking on a hiccup when he suddenly peels the damp fabric off of you and the cold air hits you.

And, when he enters a finger inside? He does so slowly. Then a second, lungs heavy as he sneaks glances at you from beneath his lashes, watching you writhe with a hung jaw and that cute little furrow you get on your forehead.

(You get it when you’re thinking, or when you’re angry, or when a stubborn Letraset sheet just won’t rub off for the dry-transfer. Or… in situations like right now, when the pleasure is gut-deep and visceral. When he makes you feel this way.)

His pace is slow, filling you gently, rhythm a steady push-and-pull as he… Oh, God… As he bottoms out.

You gasp. He shushes: “I’m sorry, baby, I’m sorry, I’ll go slower… It feels good?”

You feel so full. Stuffed to the brim, even though you’ve taken his fingers a thousand times before. It still feels new, sacred, special. You moan a pretty sound that makes him hum appreciatively, fingers unbreaking the brutally delicious pace. It must go on for at least ten minutes, that deep stretch of him driving you crazy, your bedroom filled with nothing but the squelching noises of your slick, his fingers soaked with you.

At some point, you look down and really focus on the sight; Michael, on his stomach, the thickness of your thighs hugging him. His curls shiny and a bit wind-swept, his bottom lip between his teeth, his eyes hooded and drunken.

And, his fingers. Pumping in-and-out of your soppy warmth, like… Like you’re a ragdoll, something he needs to pull apart, helpless against him. Fuck. Fu—

When he lays a tiny kiss on your puffy clit, you wheeze: “Mi–Micha–el—!”

“You’re so pretty…” he whispers, that soft voice of his coming from deep inside his throat, making him sound like he’s just woken up. “Such a pretty mama for me. You need to come, baby?”

“Y–ye–ah, yeah, yeah, yeahyeahyeah—” 

You’re chasing it, hips shifting in place, grinding up into nothingness as his pace stays steady, sweat trailing down the dip of your back as you choke on a hiccup.

He gives your clit another swirling lick, and you’re gone.

It washes over you dizzyingly. And after weeks of (unwanted but unavoidable) abstinence, it’s leg-curling. Catastrophic, even. It leaves you mumbling nonsense onto the side of your pillow, hands splayed around your head powerlessly, like a halo. 

And Michael’s right here for you—whispering sweet-nothings from down below—but for the half-minute it takes for you to come down, it sounds more like static. Grazing your ears but not truly sticking.

You’re panting when he comes up for a kiss, your taste on his tongue potent. You exhale a sigh into him, and he swallows it down with a smile. You don’t miss the tiny wince that jumps out of him, the way he softly twists his wrist in place, fingers curling and uncurling. 

And, there, right on his cheek: streaks of brown makeup that’re washing off, leaving behind the milky beige exposed to the warm light of your lamps. It tugs at your heartstrings. You wish he’d just ditch the makeup altogether; you’ve said so in the past, many times. But public scrutiny and decades of insecurities can’t simply come undone by his girl’s sweet words only, no matter how much you wish they could.

It doesn’t mean you’ll stop trying, though.

“Baby, c’mon,” you urge him, fixing your underwear and shorts as you slip out of bed. Your thighs are shaky, something that doesn’t go unnoticed by either of you. “Up, up, up—”

“Girl, where are you goin’?”

You roll your eyes playfully, grabbing him by his good wrist and making him follow you to the small cramped bathroom. It’s a tight fit—nothing like his family’s at Hayvenhurst—but it’s intimate. Cozy. You love that you have to brush up against each other every time someone wants to move past.

The toilet’s facing the door, and the vanity is right beside it. You flick the lightswitch and make Michael sit on the closed toilet lid, facing you as you rummage through the cabinet for your makeup-removing cleanser and cotton pads. All the while, he’s watching you with this loving, faraway look in his eyes. A tiny grin pulls at the corners of his lips the more you huff.

You turn to look at him, just for a second, fighting back a smile of your own. You’d pay good money to be inside his head sometimes.

(The world would, too. When they call him eccentric, closed-off, peculiar. Strange and wacky. Someone to be cracked open and picked clean from the inside-out just so they can be the first to report on it. He’s had to put up with it ever since you met him, and it still feels like the world’s hang-up on that version of him they wanted to keep frozen; before he grew up, took agency of himself, stopped giving them everything they wanted. Before the vitiligo, the lupus, the accident. Before he skyrocketed himself so high they could only claw at his feet to drag him down.)

But, that’s not who’s sitting in front of you now. Michael Jackson, the superstar. It’s just Mikey, your fiancé. Your childhood sweetheart. The boy who made you realize that love doesn’t have to hurt to be life-changing.

You jump on your tiptoes to perch yourself on top of the vanity, pedicured feet landing on the inside of Michael’s spread thighs on the toilet lid. Your knees lock, and Michael leans forward to rest his chin on top of them. You’re still sensitive from the orgasm, but it’s a quiet and warm sort of ache. You can see that he must be half-hard too, his pants sporting the tiniest tent, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Look up?” you gently instruct as his lashes flutter.

“You don’t got to do this,” he murmurs while you pour the solution on a cotton pad and begin wiping at the brown foundation that’s caking his skin. It comes off in thick strokes, the pad twisting and turning around your hold as you try to utilize every drop.

 “I know,” you answer, and continue anyway.

His skin looks pretty, brown and pinkish pale. Your thumb brushes his cheek, dumping the used cotton pad on the vanity behind you before kissing on his vitiligo patches. You pull back with a sigh, hands wordlessly closing around the cleanser as you pour another pad. You don’t stop looking at him, not even for a second.

“You’re staring,” he huffs, chin moving against your knees with his words. You wash more makeup off, on his other cheek and down his jaw.

“Am I makin’ you nervous, playboy?” You smirk, wiggling your brows.

“A bit,” he giggles.

You snort, shaking your head. “Only you could finger a girl to oblivion and act all shy when she looks at you, Mike!”

He chokes out a high-pitched flustered laugh, warmth creeping up his neck and cheeks as his large hand reaches up to squeeze your calf. He hides his face back down against your knees, broad shoulders shaking.

“Hush up—”

“Are you gonna make me?” You raise your brows suggestively, bursting into a giggle-fit when he raises his head from your knees. “What? Had to make you look up somehow. You still have makeup left.”

“You’re something else, baby. You really are.”

“Ditto,” you murmur in concentration as you remove the last bits of leftover foundation coating his neck. Then, you do his hands, careful of his wrist, across both palms and up his forearms. “All doneee,” you sing, pecking his nose before climbing down the vanity. 

“C’mere, girl…” He clicks his teeth. You’re halfway to the door before you feel his hand curling around your waist, resting on your lower belly that’s still fluttering from his touch. He comes up behind you, lips softly grazing against your ear, body flush on yours. “You think we’re done? I missed you too much…”

Your heart licks up your ribs, a smile creeping up your face. “Aye, aye, captain…” you drag out seductively, fighting to swallow down your giggles.

He pulls his head back, just a bit. “What now?”

You snort: “Get it? Like, Captain EO?”

He squeezes you, but you can tell he’s fighting back a laugh. “Baby, if you don’t get your behind on that bed right n—”

 He doesn’t have to tell you twice.

Your words stay with Michael for months.

‘It’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust. I wouldn’t be opposed. Only with you.’

Every time he touched you, every time he made love to you, there’d be a tiny voice on the back of his head. Whispering your words back to him on repeat, telling him to manhandle you the way you said would feel good, have his way with you in a manner he’s never done before. Telling him to… fuck you.

But, every time, he’d chicken out. His hold would loosen into a gentle caress, words spilling out like honey on your skin; soft and sweet and familiar. Safe.

And, the worst thing is? You wouldn’t say a thing about it. As if that conversation never happened. As if it hasn’t been plaguing his mind for months on end, making him feel inadequate, undeserving. You never claimed as such, he knows. He knows he’s not being fair to himself, but he feels like he’s been letting you down spectacularly. He feels like a joke, or a fraud, or both.

He hates it. Hates himself for it. What kind of man is he if he can’t keep you satisfied?

Maybe his brothers were right…

The months slip by quickly, and soon enough, January 27th of 1986 arrives in all its starstruck glory. You’ve been waiting for this day for over a year. For Michael’s achievement, sure, but for yours as well.

Last Christmas—at the end of December of ‘84—you’d been approached by none other than Prince. Yes, that Prince, with whom Michael was convinced he’d have to fight for God’s bestowment of divine inspiration. And, really, you shouldn’t have been as surprised as you’d been. 

A lot of things had changed since that time you were waxing paste-ups for LA Weekly in Sunset Boulevard, just barely dipping your toes in the industry. Since that first job of yours in 1979, you’d moved on to bigger things.

It must’ve been late 1981 when you were approached by a music promoter from Slash Records, then still operating out of a tiny office above a shop in West Hollywood. They offered you cash under the table to quit the paper and design graphics full-time for their label, and the look on Gina’s face when she found out why you were quitting? 

Oh, priceless!

What followed was a fun job filled with eye-gouging neon-inked concert gig flyers, which you’d go out and staple onto Hollywood telephone poles with Layla, the only other artist on the team. God, you loved Layla; you got each other through some really frustrating times. You’ll forever be grateful to her.

Half of your days were spent doing actual design, and the other half answering phones, wrapping promotional brochures in mailers, and avoiding the landlord who loved to corner you near the elevator about whatever the label’s owner did to piss him off that day. But, what took up most of your time was hand-crafting typographic logos for the bands.

By that point you’d already worked with Michael, though. Just a little bedroom project that turned into one of your most important collaborations to date. You’d made the lettering on his album cover for Off The Wall. Just the letters! Handwritten and chalk-like, and Epic Records’ official art directors had handled the final layout.

The letters, though? They were yours. Plastered all across the world. Over twenty million copies! You never told anybody at Slash. Nobody except Layla. You hadn’t been approached for the letters on your boyfriend’s album, you’d been approached for you and you alone. You weren’t about to give them something to talk about; you’d learned that lesson from Gina.

But, well… It became a harder secret to keep once Thriller came out. You free-handed the golden cursive on that cover, too. And, holy shit. Highest selling album of all time. Of all fucking time! With your letters on it! Sure, Epic Records credited their corporate art team, but to anyone who matters? Your name got around a bunch.

It was bound to. After all, you were the short film’s leading lady. Not only that, but you worked on its storyboards alongside an incredibly talented creative team that younger-you would’ve only dreamed of being a part of. Your raw sketches felt amateur in comparison to theirs, but their praise and assurance more than accounted for the imposter syndrome that’d almost paralyzed you.

The making-of documentary crew shadowed you extensively during the whole process, and somehow—in some inconceivably mind-numbing way—you weren’t just a young, scrappy, self-made illustrator anymore. You’d wormed your way up the ranks of pop culture’s royalty. Carved a spot right beside Michael: completely different circles, but next to him anyway.

In the beginning, you kind of hated it. Ever since you’d graduated HS and decided to pursue an artistic career without further schooling, you’d sworn to yourself you’d never grasp at Michael’s influence. When the fruits of your labor started bearing fruit, well, self-doubt was only natural. 

Because ultimately, your success had come from Michael.

Or, at least, that’s what your insecurities screamed at you. It was something Michael shut down very quickly, and you’re deeply grateful for it. ‘That’d only be true if you weren’t good,’ he’d told you. ‘I jus’ gave you a platform. It’s networking, nothing else. Quit that thinking, baby, okay? I’m not joking.’

You did. Exorcised it quickly and without much further thought, because you had no other choice. Once the Thriller film hit the streets, you skyrocketed from obscurity to… whatever you are now.

You still don’t know how to feel about that. It all had spiralled out of your control, out of Michael’s as well. He knew you never wanted this; being recognized, photographed, analyzed. You didn’t want… what he had. And he never blamed you for it, just how you never blamed him either. Things just… are what they are. Nothing you can do about it except smile and look pretty for the cameras, for people you don’t know that call out your name.

In early 1984, you landed a marketing position for Intralink Film Graphic Design; Anthony Goldschmidt was a brilliant man to work under. To learn under. He and his team had created the E.T. poster in 1982, which blew your mind. You were working with these guys? Like, holy shit.

And then, enter Prince. Circa December of the same year, reaching you through Michael of all people, asking you to make the album cover art for Around The World In A Day. The project would require at least four weeks of nonstop work, and you took a leave of absence from work to take it on.

Prince described his vision as a ‘surrealist psychedelic mindfuck;’ his words, not yours. Working with him was kind of the same. A mindfuck, all throughout. An incredible, unbelievable mindfuck.

Michael had been… weirdly civil about the entire thing. Okay, maybe not ‘weirdly,’ per se. There was no real animosity from his side, and after those eight Grammys and the Thriller sales? They weren’t in the same sphere anymore, and it was a fact they were both painfully aware of.

It is now a little over a year later. Prince is up for three categories in the AMAs, Michael’s up with Lionel for Song Of The Year… And here you are.

Walking inside the Shrine Auditorium hanging off Michael’s arm, the red carpet outside a pandemonium of flashing camera-bulbs and cloying perfumes. It was just you, Michael, and Elizabeth Taylor in the limo; the rest of the Jacksons have their own ride, and you got no idea if they’ve already arrived or been seated or still on the way.

Your eyes grow hazy from the cigar smoke swirling all around, Michael’s arm wrapped tightly over your shoulders as he leads you inside. Elizabeth is trailing behind you, well-accustomed to the white wall of light and dizzying shouts from the attention-getters.

“I get that it’s their job,” you huff as you walk through the doors, relieved from the screaming crowd even though the energy inside is still buzzing, “but can’t they just… be better at it? My ears damn-near burst.”

Michael’s fixing the collar of your bedazzled blazer-dress, black with striking gold accents to match his own military-esque suit. It cuts off just at the first quarter of your thighs (a bit longer at the back so as to avoid any accidents), giving way for the glittering sheer tights you’re wearing underneath. A thick gold belt is wrapped around your waistline, buckle shiny and squared.

Standing next to Mike, it’s clear who you came with. If the matching engagement rings aren’t any indication.

“Are you trying to reason with the sharks, sweetheart? Oh, they’ll eat you alive unless you treat them like the scum they are,” Elizabeth laughs.

You chuckle, gently shooing Michael’s fussing hands away, grabbing onto the inside of his elbow and joining the rest of the crowd deeper into the lobby. It’s cavernous, with intricate chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, the carpet a deep maroon under your heels.

As you walk past people you never would’ve imagined seeing, let alone knowing, a pit forms in your stomach. An ugly, scraping feeling of imposterism; hollow, but familiar. What the fuck are you even doing, waving at Whitney Houston and smiling at Cyndi Lauper?

Who are you next to them? Michael’s arm candy? A fellow creative? 

Both? Neither?

It’s not like you haven’t interacted with celebrities before. Paul McCartney, Elizabeth… Diana Ross. (You are not getting into this right now, no way. It’s bad enough that she’s hosting this shit). Many others, too. But you were always introduced as Michael’s girl, not someone they could work with; someone on equal footing.

Gosh, you hate when you get like this. They’re nothing more than people, you know that, but still. Your mind’s running faster than your feet can keep up with.

Giving your head a shake, you turn to look at Elizabeth. “Don’t know how you’ve been putting up with it as long as you have.” Squeezing Michael’s arm, the smile he sends you makes you warm. “Both of you.”

“Thick skin, darling,” she sighs, moving to step beside you. “Thick skin.”

You hum. Glancing at Michael, you ask: “D’you know where your family’s sitting? I wanna say hello. They’re presenting, aren’t they? Janet and La Toya?”

“We should jus’ find them after, baby,” he sighs, looking around aimlessly. “Yeah, Rebbie too—”

A voice butts in from the side: “If it isn’t my lucky charm.”

Huh?

All three heads turn at the same time, searching for the interjector.

Oh! Prince.

His hair is slicked down in thick rivulet-like waves, and it might just be the tamest you’ve ever seen him dress. He’s in a simple black tuxedo, polished dress shoes, black bowtie to match. His makeup is mild, too; just a striking smokey-eye over red-blushed cheeks. He looks good.

“Who?” you ask once your mind catches up, a grin pulling at you. “Me?”

“Who else?” Prince retorts, his voice that smooth suave drawl you became accustomed with. He’s standing in front of you, nodding politely at both Michael and Elizabeth. “Good evening.”

You feel Michael’s arm tense when he returns the nod. Giving his bicep a squeeze, your eyes don’t leave Prince. “I think you’re overestimating me,” you grin.

“No such thing,” he waves you off. “You look beautiful tonight.”

“She does, doesn’t she?” Michael smiles, tight-lipped as he kisses your temple.

“Thank you,” you flush, but you don’t really know who you’re answering.

“Wish me luck?” Prince raises his brows, smile wide and eyes hooded. He always has that look, like every woman he speaks to unravels something inside him. You learned quickly not to take it to heart.

“You don’t need luck,” you laugh, sneaking a look behind him at the quickly-moving crowd spilling inside the auditorium seats. “But I think if we don’t hurry, they might close the doors on us.”

“You’re right. I’d love to catch up after, though.”

“We should really get to our seats,” Michael cuts in smoothly, tightening his grip on your arm. “Have a good night, Prince.”

“Oh,” you murmur, taken aback by the coldness in his voice. You look at Prince, noting the sly look he wears. Ugh. Men and their dick-swinging contests. “Yeah, we’ll, uh, see you on the other side. Good luck.”

He clicks his teeth, stepping to the side as Michael starts nudging you forward, Elizabeth following. “Thought you said I don’t need luck?”

“Can’t hurt!” you sing out, and just like that, Prince gets swallowed by the crowd.

The three of you are seated at the front row center orchestra. It takes a while to reach it, but once you do, you sit cross-legged down next to Michael—whose palm finds your knee immediately—with Elizabeth on your right side.

Just a few feet in front of you is the lip of the humongous stage, and the countless towering screens on the backdrop are lit up in radiant red-blue scribbled stars. The scale of the room is massive, the balcony on the back packed with thousands of people. And when you look over your shoulder, you’re met with a sea of the most famous faces on earth, all waiting for the broadcast to go live.

It’s hard to keep your expression neutral once the show actually starts. Because she’s up there, presenting, smiling and swaying and being her usual unbearable self.

Diana. That bug-eyed bitch.

You’re not one for a cat-fight—you’re too self-respecting—but her? Her, you’d gladly slap the dentures off of. Well, it might be petty of you, but can anybody blame you? She hasn’t stopped drooling after Michael ever since both of you were teenagers (and she was pushing retirement). Even after Michael’s rejections and avoidance, the woman just won’t let up: offers to co-write her songs, come on her shows, to entertain a flirtation that is downright perverted.

Michael respects her artistry and mentorship too much to tell her to go to hell. You have no such qualms. You’re choosing to remain civil, though. 

As much as possible.

She’s still bitter about her exclusion from We Are The World, you’re sure. It’s clear in the way she spots Michael in the front row, giving him a wide smile. It falls hilariously flat once her eyes catch on you, palms entwined with Michael’s on your lap, your fingers caressing up his arm.

God damn, woman, you think. Didn’t she just get married to some Swede? Ugh, you can’t keep up.

She doesn’t matter, though. The show must go on, and soon enough, Janet’s on stage. She looks really pretty, red-lipped with a bold black eye, the silver details on her dress glittering under the stage lights. She’s excitedly presenting the award for Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist. And—

“Prince!” Janet reads from the card, the auditorium bursting in a loud explosion of cheers and whistles.

“Oh! O–oh, my gosh! Yay! Wooo–oh!” you laugh in surprise, clapping until the flesh of your palms hurt, twisting your neck to spot Prince as he gets up from a few rows back and struts towards the stage.

But, instead of walking past you, he stops. Smiles down at you, sly and confident, extending a palm with raised brows. You short-circuit for a second too long, the moment extending and twisting in slow-motion out of your control, because this is live, you’re on air, fucking move—!

Michael’s palm falls from your knee as Prince effortlessly tugs you to your feet and leads you up the stage, not even looking back. Michael’s hand twitched instinctively, but before he could even think of reacting, you were halfway across the stage.

What the fuck? Why’d he bring you up? Oh, God, is he going to make you speak? You’re not prepared, this was not a fucking part of—

The spotlights are even worse from up here. All six and a half thousand faces of the crowd blend into one big, amorphous blob of shadow; a whispering sea of faces that’s analyzing your every move as Prince accepts the award and the theater grows louder for him. You manage to give Janet a shoulder rub before she’s ushered backstage with the rest of the presenters, and now she’s gone too.

Oh, what the hell? It’s not just thousands watching you, it’s millions. You’re being telecasted, breathless beside Prince, smile so wide and plastic it makes your jaw ache. You don’t know how to stand without looking awkward, out of place, like someone who doesn’t belong.

Your hands are shaking. Fuck. It’s a fluttering sensation, tingles flitting just under your skin. You try to clench them, but it just looks weird, so you press them flush against your thighs. It feels like your whole body’s shivering, and it’s fucking mortifying—

Prince notices.

He wraps an arm around the dip of your waist, pressing you flush against his side. You exhale a breath so shaky it makes him rub his thumb on your side, your palm finding purchase between his shoulder blades. He gives you a small nod of assurance, moreso a question than anything else. His eyes drift all across your features to make sure you’re fine, and you nod back with a gulp.

Smiling comes easier this time around.

It’s better like this, thank fuck. The feeling of another body is grounding. In the front row, you search for Michael. He’s right where you left him, fists clenched at his sides, lips pursed and eyes so dark they border on furious.

What—?

“Thank you…” Prince starts, leaning forward to the microphone stand. He’s holding the heavy glass trophy on one hand, you on the other. “They give you these little statues to tell you that you’ve done a good job.” He smiles subtly, arm slightly tightening around your waist. “But music is a lonely room, ‘til someone comes along and paints the walls for you. This… beautiful creature right here, she took the sounds inside my head and painted them for the whole world. She learned my colors.”

He pauses, turns to look at you completely. You don’t know what to do other than laugh incredulously, shy and flushed under the praise. Your mind’s scrambling to digest everything, but you think it’ll take several days for tonight’s events to sink in. 

‘Thank you,’ you mouth to him.

He continues: “Some people want to keep the brightest stars locked away in a cage, but genius belongs to the world. And tonight, she belongs up here. With me.” He says your name, first and last, nodding: “Thank you. And thank you to Dick Clark, and to LA.”

The auditorium erupts in thunderous applause, and it almost knocks you clean out. You’re slack-jawed amidst the cacophony of the cheers, jokingly grimacing before an excited howl of a laugh rips itself out. (God, you hope the mics don’t catch it). Untangling from Prince’s side, your arms shoot open, and he accepts the hug earnestly.

“Oh, my God, you’re crazy. You have no idea how much this means to me,” you whisper to his ear, squeezing before you let him go to step back.

“What’d I tell you?” he asks as he motions you down the stairs. “Lucky charm.”

It makes you laugh, and it feels as though you’re walking on a cloud. You plop onto your seat wearing your happiest and most radiant smile, waving at the camera operator that’s aiming for you. And, Michael is…

Oh.

Uh-oh.

He’s mad. As in, mad-mad.

It’s easy enough to tell. It’s not rocket science, especially with him; Michael can’t poker-face for shit. It looks like he’s entirely clouded over, darkened and closed off, lips tight and eyes glazed over in focus as he rubs his thigh. You’re intimately familiar with that look: he’s fuming.

Fucking Prince. Jesus. Why’d he have to bring you up there, and hold your waist, and flirt despite the ring on your finger, and—

And—

And… Say all those beautiful things about your art. Praise your talent. Shout you out publicly, by name, to millions of people, at one of the most important events in the industry. Huh…

Oh. Hell no. What does Mike have to be fuming over? Because Prince touched you? Because it’s the 1800s and you’re property, only allowed to be celebrated behind-the-scenes? Is that it?

Michael’s hand curls around your wrist, and his hold is bruising. You almost comment on it, something snarky and biting, but it gets caught behind your teeth and you swallow it down. It’s not the time, nor place.

Just sit, look pretty, yada-yada-yada.

The AMAs slip by quickly after Prince’s win. You smile, and clap, and cheer. You lean over to Elizabeth, whispering commentary and coughing to mask your snorts. You hold Michael’s arm, even though you’re getting pins and needles from the way he’s squeezing you.

And, when We Are The World wins Song Of The Year (an inevitability, an outcome as sure as the sun rising every morning), you set aside your irritation to kiss him deeply as congratulations. The cameras catch it, and even though you didn’t intend for it, it makes you giddy. His hand is on your nape, reaching all the way across your jaw. You grin into him before you break apart. Softly, you brush your thumb on his cheek, giving it a pat.

He smiles at you, but it’s not his smile. It’s the cameras’.

Of course, that’s when Diana calls him up to the stage. He pulls you up with him, though. Grip tight as ever, you walk up the stairs for the second time that night. It’s significantly less nerve-wracking, although you feel your nerves snapping for an entirely different reason.

Diana moves to hug and kiss his cheeks, but he maneuvers around her, giving her a half-hearted shoulder pat in thanks. Her eyes close in on you, and you need to remind yourself of the millions of viewers currently watching you and Diana Ross hovering around each other like a pair of panthers. You give her a tight nod, and nothing more.

She’s still the host, which means she has to snap out of it quicker. Michael’s holding the glass statue, smiling out into the world, the cheers from the audience’s standing ovation reaching a crescendo.

Diana screeches: “Why don’t we try to get aaall the performers that were there that night, one year ago, so we can sing We Are The World together? La Toya, the Jacksons, c’mon up to the stage! Alright, is everybody comin’ up? Yeah! We are the worlddd, we are the chiiildren… Elizabeth? We are the ooones who make a brighter dayyy, so let’s start giviiing…! Sing along, would you?”

(Like you said. Still bitter.)

Quincy came up after Lionel, just as the opening notes began filling the space. You locked eyes with Elizabeth, and with a quick work of your wrist you ushered her up. From both wings, people started spilling in, and when you spotted Janet, you waved her over with a smile.

“Felt like I was dying up here,” you tell her, wrapping your arm around her shoulder and burying her to your side as everyone starts swaying to the rhythm.

“I saw,” she giggles.

You click your teeth at her. Michael wraps his arm around your waist, bringing you close, rocking you to the melody. Liz is on his other side, and Diana’s somewhere to your left, begrudgingly sharing a mic with Whitney.

The moment is beautiful. The song is too, and what it stands for, what it’s brought out in people. You’re no singer, but you sing your heart out regardless. Michael’s smiling, his real smile, looking down at you and his sister as the lyrics echo through the theater and thousands of people sway.

He kisses you on the temple, lingering, hot, sharp.

Yet, loving. Always, always loving.

You should’ve known the momentary ceasefire of We Are The World wouldn’t have lasted any longer than the song itself.

“Can’t believe you,” you mutter, unbuckling your golden belt and tossing it on the bed. Michael’s somewhere behind you, stepping out of his loafers. Your heels were tossed at the door, and you’re making quick work of the buttons on the blazer.

The apartment’s quiet, your neighbor next door probably asleep due to the distinct lack of Alex Trebek-ness in the air. The central heating’s buzzing something soft, but the homey warmth does absolutely nothing for the prickling down your nape.

It’s like a minefield in here. One wrong move and you’ll both blow up into pink mist.

“Can’t believe me?” he echoes, undoing his tie and letting it hang around his neck messily. “What’d I do, baby, huh?”

“You were practically boring holes in the side of my head the entire night, Mike. From the moment he called me up.”

He leans against the door frame, unbuttoning his sleeves and suit. “Oh, so I’m supposed to jus’ sit back and smile while another man puts his hands all over you on live TV? While he’s up there acting like he owns you just ‘cause you painted some canvas for him?”

Your jaw falls, fingers stilling mid-button. “He was thanking me! Praising my work in front of the whole industry, and you looked like you wanted to lay him out right on the stage—”

He clicks his teeth, shaking his head dismissively. It makes your jaw clench. “He was being too touchy. You know it, and I know it. He had no business pulling you close like that, saying what he said. It was disrespectful to you, and it was disrespectful to me.”

“It wasn’t like that, at all! You’re completely blowing this out of proportion. You were so tense in the car, y–you wouldn’t even look at me!” Hands shooting out, you gesture animatedly, blazer popped open to reveal your matching underwear. The glittery pantyhose elastic is digging into your waist. “You’re being insane. You’re actually being insane!”

His eyes track down your frame, and he sighs before snapping out of it, beady gaze locking on yours. “No, no,” he shakes his head angrily, “I’m not being insane. I’m bein’ your man, there’s a difference.”

Your entire face sours, lips pursed in disbelief as you walk over to the vanity to remove your bracelets. “Right, riiight, right. So, your version of being my man is icing me out because another artist showed me some appreciation?” A humorless laugh trickles out of you. “You’re just jealous, and I don’t get it, because if we wanna talk about impropriety—”

He tosses his gold belt on the ottoman near the closet along his own blazer, groaning: “Uh-uh, we’re not spinnin’ this old tale again—”

Your silver bangles clang harshly against the catchall bowl. Sucking in a breath, you try to keep your voice steady. It’s a futile battle. Pivoting harshly, you point an accusatory finger, not even certain who you’re blaming. “It’s not old if the bitch still wants you!”

He clicks his teeth, eyes falling shut as he shakes his head. “Don’t talk like that, baby, c’mon—”

You gasp; half a laugh, half a sneer. “Are you kidding me? Are you actually joking right now? You think I don’t see the way she still looks at you? You cut her off years ago, Mike, and she acts like she’s just waiting for a slip-up! So don’t you dare look at me sideways because Prince gave me a hug on-stage. It’s fucking embara—”

“That’s entirely different and you know it. I don’t give her the time of day, I don’t let her get close to me. You, you just let him do it!”

Your eye twitches. “Because we were on-air! What’d you want me to do, make a scene? Shove him off?”

“I don’t care about the cameras!” He gestures out into nothingness, nerves and frustration catching up to him and threatening to blow over. “I don’t care ‘bout making a scene. If a man is putting his hands on my woman, I want him off you. It’s that simple. But you jus’ stood there like it was nothing.”

You pivot back again, clenching your eyes. The rest of your bangles slide off your wrists like water, but your fingers twitch. “It was nothing! Just a congratulatory hug, that’s it! You’re only looking for an excuse to stay mad—”

He’s closer now, you watch him from the mirror. He looks undone; white dress-shirt half open, hair ruffled from running his hands in it, eyes wide and round. He’s breathing heavily, chest panting, and… For a moment only, you forget what you’re arguing about.

“Yeah, okay,” he exhales, nodding to himself. “You’re right, I might be. I am jealous. I, I’m heavily jealous. I don’t want his hands on you, is that so crazy? I don’t want nobody’s hands on you but mine.”

You can’t help it, an incredulous snort jumps out. Twisting to face him, you lean your weight on the vanity, the edge digging into the meat of your ass. You don’t miss the way his eyes jump down: at the fat of your thighs stretching out the pantyhose, on the softness of your stomach still half-covered by the tights. At the way he can only catch a peek of your breasts between the lapels.

He scowls at the sound of your snort. It makes him look… Hm. You have to fight a smirk, biting on the inside of your cheek. It makes him look sexy. All fired up because another man touched you, touched what’s his. It makes heat flash somewhere deep down, causing you to shift in place.

Well. They do say anger is an aphrodisiac…

Crossing your arms, you raise your brows. “Oh… So, now you wanna talk like that? Where was all this mouth when we were at the lounge? You just stood there and stewed, and then you bring all this heavy energy back home to me. How do you think that makes me feel?”

His whole body shakes with his exhale. “You think this ‘s just mouth? You think I’m talkin’ just to talk right now?”

Shrugging, you tilt your head. “I don’t know, Mike. Are you? Because, normally, we’d just tell each other to hush up and walk away, and talk about it later. You don’t ever get like this.”

His eyes, beautiful and glassy, narrow into slits. He squares his shoulders, chest puffing out. Oh? “Maybe I’m tired, baby, huh? Maybe I’m tired of everybody thinkin’ I’m too soft to hold onto what’s mine.”

Oh.

Oh… Dear. God.

That’s what this has been all about? Jesus. He’s always been insecure like that, and it’s just worsening by his brothers’ constant teasing. Prince might be no more than a blotch on Michael’s map now, but it still stings. You dread to think about what Jermaine’s going to say when he sees you both next. No matter how much you reassure Michael, reassure his masculinity, this is what it always boils down to: men and their goddamn dick-swinging contests. 

How does that make any sense? Why is every male on the planet incapable of listening to what the objects of their desire actually like?

It’s a fucking mystery.

You don’t mean to sound patronizing, but a smile slips onto you. As if the past four hours hadn’t happened at all. Like it’s just a game you’re playing; a tug-of-war you’re forfeiting on purpose, the mouse mocking the cat.

“Fine,” you shrug, giggling, shaking your head and raising your hands in surrender. “Fine! Prove it then.” You lean back, wrists landing on the vanity as you rest your upper body. “If you’re so mad about how he touched me, what’re you gonna do about it?”

You didn’t know it was possible, but his eyes?

They get deadly. Lids hooded, brows in a knot, thumb and forefinger pinching the bridge of his nose. He scoffs with a smile that never reaches past his cheeks. “Oh, no. No, no, no… You don’t get to play like that, ma. You don’t get to… poke at me and just laugh it off.”

Your brows pinch together, an unsure grimace on your lips. “Michael—”

“Get on the bed.”

Pause…

…What?

“E–excuse me?” you sputter, a chuckle getting stuck up your throat. “Michael—”

Clicking his teeth, he unbuttons the rest of his white shirt, pulling it out of his waistline, rolling up the cuffs up his sleeve to his elbows. Slowly, one by one, as if you’re boring him. 

“Don’t ‘Michael’ me, baby. Get on the bed. Right there,” he points with his nose, like it’s a nuisance.

Your brows constrict, mouth hanging open. A breath gets stuck somewhere past your lungs. You make no move, and neither does he. And, here you both are: half undressed, panting, suspended mid-air in a standstill that threatens to crumble your resolve completely.

“…You’re serious.”

“Dead serious. Turn around.”

What the fuck? Did you die on the ride back? Is this some sort of purgatory? Heaven, hell, both?

This time, you do move. Slowly, like a fawn caught in a trap, unsure on shaky feet. You stop right at the foot of the bed, the mattress coming up just below your midriff. Eyes studying the frilly pillows, the baby-blue patterns on the duvet, you suck in a breath once you hear his feet moving behind you. Your head tilts to the side. “…Like this?”

“Yeah… yeah, jus’ like that. Stay right there, and don’t move.” His hands land on both your hips, the sensation so sudden that you jump. Your own hands fall on top of his, feeling his tiny twitches immediately.

“Mikey, you’re shaking a little bit,” you whisper, words trailing off into a moaning sigh as he leans down over your shoulder. His body’s flush against yours, soft lips nipping your ear.

“‘Cause you do this to me,” he murmurs, accent thick, curling around you like a net, “you make me lose my mind…”

“I d–do?” you echo. Yes, you do. You’re well-aware. Have been, for near a decade.

His wide palms dance across your front, one splaying over your lower stomach, the other sneaking past the blazer lapel and cupping your breast. All the while, he’s constricting you against him like a boa, until your ribs are stuttering with each breath.

“You, you, always you.” His tongue is licking at your neck, drawing you in, sucking softly where you’re always left squirming and desperate. He nips just at the junction of your jaw, and suddenly untangles himself completely, his warmth a memory. “B–bend,” he clears his throat, your heart flutters, “bend over. Right here.”

“Oh… Okay,” you murmur, lips bruising with the way you’re biting them. Your hands land on the softness of the duvet, feet still on the ground, body falling into the 90° angle effortlessly. The blazer rides up, and Michael gasps hard at the sight of your ass; you’d chosen a silky black thong, your sheer tights still glistening despite the warm dimmed lights of the vanity.

His hand comes up, groping your flesh over the pantyhose, and the sensation’s dizzying. 

“No,” he breathes, and your eyes widen in confusion. “Not like this…” His palm finds purchase at the small of your back, pushing you forward, causing you to raise your knees to climb up the mattress on all fours. He pushes on your back, making you fall on your cheek, arching for him until he’s satisfied. 

You’re still at the edge of the bed, but now… Now, you feel exposed. For him.

Your breaths are shaky. “How…” You swallow, lips puffy against the comforter, heat swirling inside you like tendrils. “H–how do I look?”

“Beautiful,” he punches out.

His hands are still shaking. They drift up your ass and latch onto the elastic band, peeling the tights off you slowly. Torturously. Goosebumps wash over every inch of skin he exposes to his hungry eyes, the friction with the nylon leaving behind tingles. He snaps them off your feet, rubbing your calves once he tosses them on the floor.

The gasp that claws its way out of you when he buries his head into your pussy is broken.

The angle makes everything more intense, makes you feel helpless in the most delicious way. And Michael is breathing in your warmth, inhaling you like you’re the sweetest perfume, big palms digging into your hips and ass.

“Mike,” you whine.

“Always playing,” he says against you, kissing you over the silky fabric. It makes you gasp. “Always… testin’ me. Do you get like this for anyone else, lovey?”

“No,” you mewl as he continues licking. His tongue is hot, making you light-headed, toes curling as he eats you through the panties. He’s making a mess… You’re making a mess. You feel it; the hot gush of wetness slowly leaking out as he has you spread like this, mouth sloppily working you until you have no idea where you end and his spit starts. Oh, God. “Only you, o–only y—”

The slap on your asscheek is sharp, and stinging. It wasn’t harsh, barely stronger than a smack, but it has your eyes popping open like corks. 

You gasp, voicing breaking into a whine as his big hand rubs lovingly over the spot.

“How’d that feel?” Michael asks. He sounds winded. Honeyed. With that soft lilt you could recognize in a sea of voices.

“G–good,” you cry, heart threatening to spill up your throat. “Really, really good…”

He peels away your panties in the same slow, agonizing manner. By the point they’re past your ankles, you’re shaking like a leaf. You hear his sharp intake of breath, and something compels you to turn. To look at him. When you do?

Holy. Sh—

“OhmyGod,” you mewl, jaw nearly unhinging. You clench around nothing.

He’s got your panties in his mouth by the gusset, inhaling and pressing and licking, eyes closed in bliss.

“Mmh…” his shoulders fall, and he leans down close to kiss your cheek, near your jaw. From the corner of your eye, you see him pocketing them. He pecks your ear, fingers expertly undoing his pants. “I want… to fuck you, baby. Like this. Can I? Will you let me?”

You’ve never… Never like this. He always likes to look in your eyes, or be draped across from you, that way you’re connected completely. Deeply. So he can kiss you and shower you with his loving care, and you can get lost in it together. He’s never called it fucking, either. It’s always making love or loving on his lady, always sweet, hot, intimate. Beautiful.

But this… This is dirty. It’s debased, and lewd. Pornographic. So, so hot. Fuck, fu—

“Please, please, please, Mike,” you sob. It actually hurts, his absence inside you. The sensation is so hot it’s jumped right back into freezing. You’re drowning in it, the angle intensifying it into a crescendo. You need him.

“You’re doin’ so good for me right now, baby. I mean it.” Oh, there he is… Solid against you, rubbing his flushed tip in your wetness, catching against your puffy clit and making you keen.

You gasp, one breath and another: “M–Mikey, please…”

Another slap. Same controlled intensity as the first, same delicious sting that makes your feet curl upwards. You choke around a breath.

“See? You listen so much better when you ain’t running that mouth.” He hums in appreciation, voice suave and dripping with condescension. But his hands on your hips are still shaking. “I’m really proud of you.”

“I always listen to you,” you pout. Lie.

But that, ‘I’m proud of you?’ God… It always leaves you melting. Now? Now, you’re drunk on it.

He chuckles, soft and airy. “No, you don’t. But you’re bein’… a real good girl for me now. Keep staying just like that.”

He’s teasing you. He’s fucking patronizing you. He’s making you… feel small. And, damn it, it leaves you hotter than you’ve ever felt before. It’s a brand new dizzying rush, and you can’t take it anymore. He’s tapping himself against your clit, and you push your hips back, crying: “Jus’ put it in, put it in! Mmnnhhh–oh m–my God—”

He does, slowly, and you both gasp.

It feels so… different. Michael’s already big, but in this position, it feels like he’s about to split you in two. And your baby’s breathing so hard behind you—hands strong and big and shaky—the shape of him making you sting and ache deliciously. He moans something broken, facade slipping, his pace bruising. He’s fucking you like he’s got something to prove, and you’re writhing with every sharp and deep thrust, hands clutching the duvet until your knuckles shake.

It hurts a bit. Or, rather, stings. Stretches you. Makes you moan deep down your chest with every stroke. You’re oversensitive, be it from the unfamiliar position or everything else, so you can’t help it when a high-pitched, deep-throated wail rips out of you.

It sounded different from all your other sounds. It sounded pained. And Michael stilled like a statue almost immediately, planting his knees on the mattress and falling forward. His hands land next to your torso, caging you in and supporting him as he kisses your shoulder. 

He breathes, anxious: “You alright, ba—?”

You nod, hot black tears mixed with mascara streaking down your cheeks. You push your hips back against him to no avail, heaving a sob: “I’m fine, Mike, just—”

One palm shoots back, digging into the meat of your hip, stilling you. “No, hold on, stop movin’ for a second. Talk to me, baby. Did I hurt you?”

“Mike!” you punch out, frustrated because he just won’t fucking move. “It felt so g–good… I wanna come so bad, pleeease, please just keep going—”

His hips twitch against you, almost imperceptibly, but not near enough. Breath hot against your cheek, he stays in place, burying his face in your neck and planting his hands again. “Okay…” he sighs around the kisses he’s peppering on your nape. “Okay, I’m right here. I got you. Just breathe for me, mama.”

Oh, his pace is brutal. Unrelenting once he starts, and you want it to last forever. He’s utilizing every bit of those dancer’s hips of his, the squelching wet sounds milking you for every moan you’ve got. You never want this ache to end, it hurts so goo—

Michael’s hand moves. You have half a millisecond to register the blur in your periphery before you feel it. Sneaking under you, past your stomach and your mound. Landing a slap against your swollen clit.

You choke, sputtering, shaking, writhing. “Mike–ah, ahh—!”

No, no, not yet, notyetnotyet…

“Yeah, ‘s good? Your man’s giving it good, baby?”

You’re coming, and it’s scathing. Body folding in on itself, a stinging pleasure spreading from your pussy up your belly like a hot wave, reaching up your eyes and falling into fresh tears. Your shoulders are shaking, and you’re left raw.

But, Mike’s still going.

“D–did, d’you just—?” His sentence gets cut off by his whimper, the feeling of you squeezing him too much, too good. You’re pulsing, milking him, keeping him where you need him most.

You’re still shaking, chest caving in. “Yeah,” you hiccup, “yeah, yeahyeahye–ah… A–ahh!”

When Michael comes inside you, he does so brokenly. His hips drive into you one last time, squeezing you so tight you might be left with marks, flush against you. Deep, snug. Making you feel full with him, his cum warm and sticky. You can’t really feel it right now, but you know you’ll do once he pulls out.

He exhales against your throat. His hands, pretty and veined, sneak beneath the blazer you’ve surely ruined by now, unclasping your bra and wrapping around your tits. And, right now, it feels grounding and soft. Something dragging you back from the ledge as he pulls out, and you feel more like a leaky faucet than a woman.

“Oh, my God…” you groan, thighs twitching as both your releases trickle down. Your pussy makes a valiant effort to keep them in, clenching and puffing, but to no avail. She might be broken. “Oh. My. God.”

Michael falls down on the bed, his head landing on the pillow. You’re not too keen on moving right now, so he has to grab you by your still-raised hips and maneuver you around so you can lie your head on his chest. He wraps one arm over your waist, hugging you close. You have one foot draped between his, ear listening to the drumming beats of his racing heart, the push-and-pull of his lungs almost a lullaby.

“What jus’ happened?” he pants, in awe.

“Mike,” you giggle, just as breathless. “You happened. Where the hell did all that come from?”

“I–I don’t know,” he exhales. “It just… did.”

“Yeah, I’ll say. I think you broke me. Like, officially.”

His eyes clench, and when you twist to look at him, the sight leaves you with cottonmouth. He’s sweaty, forehead glistening, makeup ruined to reveal his small patches of that face you love so much. His curls are sticking to his skin, and those lips look awfully kissable.

“Don’t say that—”

You catch his words just as they slip out, the kiss open-mouthed and soft, tongues caressing each other for a moment before breaking apart. “Why? It’s true. You’ve broken me.”

“Now you’re makin’ me feel bad…” His arm tightens around you, his other palm coming up to rub soothing strokes on your clothed forearm.

He pecks your forehead, and you ask: “Baby, why? Why would you even say that?”

He sucks in a breath, avoiding your gaze. You can tell it takes a lot for him to find the words, let alone say it out loud. “It’s just… We’ve been together for so long, and I jus’… I never saw you give in like that before. Have I… been leaving you wanting?”

Oh, this stupid, stupid boy.

“Hey, look at me. Look at my face, Mike.” You love him so much. It’s clear by the beam that works its way up your cheeks, pearly whites flashing as you lift your head and use one palm on his chest for balance. “Is that what you’ve been thinking about? Ever since… we talked?”

Fingers catching on his jaw, you make him look at you. Really look at you. At your puffy eyes and destroyed makeup, the bruised and pretty lips that would love nothing more than to speak his name always, your cheeks that ache from the smiles he’s pulling out of you.

“Yeah,” he nods, arms tightening.

“Let me make something abundantly clear, alright?” You school your expression into a deadpan. “I’ve loved you since we were sixteen. We could stop having sex tomorrow, and I’d still be the most satisfied woman on Earth. It took a lot to get where we are. There isn’t anybody, not one in the whole world, that makes me feel like you do. Okay? Not some philandering guitarist whose album I worked on, or whoever fucking else. D’you get that?”

Jokingly, you jab a finger on his temple. And, there’s that grin. Slow and sly, pulling at the apples of his cheeks.

“I get that,” he echoes.

“Kiss me,” you urge, eyebrows raised in a challenge. He does, a soft and lingering peck. You smirk. “Now tell me again.”

He rolls his eyes, smile blinding. “I’m your one.”

“Good,” you nod, giving him a kiss before wincing. You weren’t kidding when you told him he might’ve broken you. “Now… Is my one, who loooves meee, gonna run us a bath? With those, um, bathbombs I like? The black raspberry vanilla?”

“I spoil you too much,” he groans playfully, giving your ass a soft smack before getting up.

Undressing right here in front of you, he discards his ruined shirt and pants and underwear on the floor in one fell swoop. As he walks out of the room, you curl over on the bed, eyes following his ass like a moth to a flame.

He’s doing it on purpose. Please, what are you supposed to do? Not stare?

You wolf whistle. He shouts out a, “Hey!” that’s half-muffled by the bathroom door, and you burst into postorgasmic giggles; the kind when everything’s warm and gooey and fun, muscles tired and syrupy.

In the end, you end up falling asleep while waiting for the bath. When Michael comes back in the room, he smiles; eyes softening, heart thundering. With gentle hands, he removes the blazer from your body, draping it over the chair at the vanity. He cleans you up with a warm towel he damped in the bathtub, and climbs into bed with you once he’s done.

He falls asleep with you inside his arms, lulled by the tiny snores you always deny making. (He always indulges.)

(Two weeks later, you’ve just clocked out of work. Sadly, you’d made the mistake of stopping by your local supermarket that always stocks Michael’s favorite OJ.

You’re leaning on your kitchen island, sipping on a glass of store-bought orange juice, the phone receiver balanced between your shoulder and ear. Michael picked up on the first ring. “You’ll never believe how I got recognized at Ralph’s. I’m giving you three tries. Go.”

“Well, obviously from Thriller? A kid or teen?”

You gulp another mouthful of juice. “‘Obviously,’ huh? Humblebrag much? Nope. Try again.”

“The AMAs?”

You mimic an incorrect game-show buzzer. “Close, but no. One more for the million.”

“Girl, jus’ tell me.”

“Forfeiting… Wasn’t expecting that.” The tabloid paper crinkles as you fix it in your hold, clearing your throat. “Does ‘Michael tells Prince to beat it after the on-stage display’ give you any hints? No wrong answers, babe, I believe in y—”

The laugh on the other side of the line is gut-deep. “No way—!”

“Mhm. Fucking paps didn’t even get my good side.”

“Naw, that can’t be right. All you’ve got is good sides, baby.”

You bite your cheek, snorting. “Awe, tha—”

“Right, left, front… Ohhh, that back…”

Your smile falls, neck flushing. “Alright, now. Well, Bernice and her friend don’t seem to think so.”

“Who the hell’s Bernice and her friend?”

“Two old ladies with very strong opinions about my waistline and blowout. Yeah,” you snort when he howls on the other side, “a–apparently, apparently! I look like I haven’t slept since the bicentennial. Whole reason I stopped in the damn market was for your juice, too! Mikeee, stop laughi–iiing—!”)

3leni © 2026 — i do not consent to my work being republished on other platforms or put into ai. do not copy or plagiarize. all edits are by me as well!

On The Rox is alive around him, the Sunset Strip just waking up for yet another night of LA-elite debauchery. The air is thick with cigar smoke and alcohol, hardwood floors sticky under his loafers. The sting of cheap gin and burning tobacco scratches at his throat, and the large fish tank in the corner is nothing more than a sharp blotch of light that’s cutting through the haze. More than once he’s zoned out of the conversation, letting his eyes focus on the slow kaleidoscopic dance of the fish.

It all faintly reminds him of New York, Studio 54 its own groovy microcosm amidst the concrete jungle. Reminds him of that night he saw you there across the floor, his bleeding heart clutched tightly in the mercy of your hands. 

God, you’d looked ethereal… Like time froze around your frame until the only thing Michael could hear—nineteen and stupid and in love—was his own traitorous heart. The memory-scented heat of your form is sweet as he takes another half-hearted sip of the mimosa.

But, you’re not here right now, and it’s made abundantly clear by the nature of the conversation he’s only now snapping back into.

“That thing’s probably all stale by now, Mike,” slurs Tito, nodding at Michael’s glass.

They’re all jam-packed onto one of the countless sofas in the lounge, Michael in the middle, his brothers forming a wall of broad shoulders and sharp laughter around him.

And they’re only outside because of him, to celebrate the wrap of his filming for Disney’s Captain Eo. It’s the end of July, 1985, and Michael wishes nothing more than to finish this damn drink and take the drive down to Mid-Wilshire. The drive down to you.

Your voice whirs around his head from earlier, when you’d urged him to have a fun night with his brothers wearing that shiny smile of yours. Ain’t nothing worth his time in Sunset Boulevard right now more than the girl who convinced him to go out in the first place.

“Man, worry about yourself,” Michael bites back with a small smile. 

He takes a swing, swallowing with a gulp. It’s not like he can even taste the alcohol, really; it’s more psychological. Chasing the placebo rather than the actual thing, much like he’s trying to convince himself that going out tonight was better than spending time with you after hardly seeing you for weeks. Disney had demanded a lot from him, and apart from that one time he’d brought you and Elizabeth to hang out on set, the only times he spoke to you were over the phone.

He sours, taking another sip.

His neck is warm and flushed from the swirling haze of the bar, the hairs on his nape rising with each glance someone pins him with in rum-dipped recognition. But he’s not here to be recognized no more than anyone else, so the phantom glances remain just that. Phantoms.

Although, hm… There’s a soft, grating dissonance that’s making Michael’s lip twitch in annoyance. Somebody—whose face he can’t make out under this lighting—is sitting at the white spinet piano, fingers idly striking the keys in a whole different rhythm than the song playing. It’s a goddamn mess and it’s pissing Michael off, which is the only reason he rejoins the conversation around him.

“Yeah, Tito… You leave Mike alone, now…” laughs Marlon, shoulder nudging Michael’s. “He can’t go crawlin’ back to Tink all drunk and disorderly—”

“And why’s that, Mike?” asks Jermaine, lips curling around the whiskey glass he’s refilled thrice by now. “Afraid you’ll get too tipsy an’ accidentally call her sugar instead of sugarpie honeybunch?”

Like the song, I Can’t Help Myself. Get it? It’s funny, or so his brothers think. It sends a wave of rumbling, tipsy laughter throughout the sofa, and Michael bites the inside of his cheek with a hum. They’re always pulling this mess. Calling him soft and vanilla for loving on his girl. What’s new?

(They don’t do it to Marlon, though, no. It’s Michael who’s the softie, the sensitive one, the pussywhipped. He’s a grown man with a whole engagement ring on his finger, but to them he’ll always be that little boy who got caught red-handed leafing through a Playboy mag on camera.)

“God forbid, God forbid!” cackles Marlon.

“I keep saying it but nobody listens,” Randy starts, leaning in conspiratorially as if he’s about to let them into secrets about the female sex previously untapped in. “That sweet-talkin’ game? I swear, ladies dry up faster than the Sahara. Wanna get her sweating like a sinner in church? You have to be a little cold with it—”

Michael’s left hand—his good one—bypasses Marlon and flicks Randy’s ear, making him howl and spit up bubbles of his drink. It just makes them laugh harder, though.

“Calm down, big daddy, damn!” Jermaine chuckles and pats him on the shoulder. Michael’s lips curl down to a frown, the citrusy mimosa now bitter on his tongue. “Hit a nerve?”

“You’re all fools,” Michael groans, grabbing his aviators from the coffee table and pushing them up the bridge of his nose. Now they can’t see him and he can’t really see that well either, but it’s something he can make peace with. It’s not like he’s aching to stare into their mugs any longer than he needs to.

Damn, he misses you.

“No, no,” Tito pipes up. “He’s not too far off.”

“Why would I cuss out my girl? In what world is that supposed to turn her on?” Michael asks, mind flooding with your face. 

Back when you were still teenagers and that… boy had broken your heart. Your first boyfriend, the one before Michael. You’d call him sniffling, asking if you could come over and hang out in his room because your house felt too small and your body felt too wrong. The look in your eyes would tear him apart, every single time. Cleave him in two, root and stem. That asshole made you feel that way, because he was mean and stupid to a flower he had no business holding. Michael’s flower.

He never wants to make you feel this way, ever. So, what in the world are these fools on about?

“Look, Mike, we know you’re all about that tender lovin’ care of yours, alright? Nobody talked about cussing a girl out,” sighs Randy. “But sometimes… A lady needs to get her world rocked, you get what I’m saying?”

“I—” He stutters. “What do you know about treatin’ a lady, Randy? Please. I take care of my girl just fine, not that it’s any of your business to be talking about anyway—”

“Is that right, Mr. Big Shot? You do? Marlon, what about you? What d’you say?” chuckles Jermaine, raising his empty cup in a salute.

Marlon all but chokes. “Uh-uh, nah. No way. We’re not bringing Carol into this. Full stop.”

“Oh, okay!” jumps Michael, jaw tightening. “So you’re fine talking about my girl then, is that it? I oughta lay you out—”

Marlon raises both hands in a surrendering shrug, and Tito says: “Look, look, look, Mikey. Mike, man, nobody’s trying to be disrespectful. We love Tink, you know that. But it’s true! You know… it’s the same with mine. She loves it when I get a little rough, a little wild. Says it makes her feel… small, or whatever. Women love that stuff. They love knowin’ they got the power to make you lose control. Randy’s onto something—”

“I don’t need to know ‘bout your wife like that.” Michael’s shoulders clench, bottom lip lodged under his teeth, neck flushing. Even so… Tito’s words linger, taking root inside Michael’s brain, making him chew his lip in thought. 

‘Love knowing they got the power to make you lose control.’ But lose control, how? He already does lose control, doesn’t he? When he’s sweating, slurring, panting above you, his thrusts sloppy and his mind a blissed out haze. When he’s under you, letting his hands grope and squeeze on every bit of softness that’s just begging to be touched. When he tells you how much he wants to… make you a momma.

Making love with you is beautiful, sweet, gentle; exactly how it should be. It’s so good it makes him lose his mind. That’s losing control, isn’t it?

He’s about to engage—actually engage—in the conversation when Jermaine somehow ruins it. 

Because, of course he does.

With a barely-contained grin, sly and dumb and utterly Jermaine-like, he slurs: “Uh, yeah, you do!” He winces, as if what he’s about to say next is a duty imposed on him that can’t be avoided. “Sorry, sugarplum… Y’know, maybe, the reason that wedding ain’t happened yet is because of all that vanilla TLC—”

There it is. 

(It’s a goddamn miracle the peace lasted so long already.)

It all happens in under a few seconds, and Michael’s glad he’s no longer the scrawny little kid they could mess around in their brotherly spats. He’s real glad.

When Michael gets Jermaine by the nape in a death grip, his brother only howls between his choked and drunken laughs. The sofa’s in disarray as Marlon’s hands fall on Michael’s shoulders to try and push him back; Randy and Tito are clicking glasses over the chaos, downing the rest of their drinks as the entirety of the lounge eyes them in barely-concealed interest.

“Woah–oh! Oh, oh, oh, I got big daddy mad—!”

“Stop saying that, you,” Michael squeezes him when he laughs harder, “schmuck—”

“Just saying! Hey–aye! Just saying, even sweet PYT’s need their world rocked once in a while, Mike! Or you might end up in a cuckho—”

“That’s it,” Michael exhales.

With his tight grasp still on Jermaine’s nape, he pushes himself off the couch, using his brother as momentum and sending Jermaine’s head between his knees before letting him go. Jermaine’s so drunk he only cackles in response, clutching his ribs as if he hasn’t had a laugh this good in years.

Michael’s fuming. His right hand starts to pulse painfully from all the jostling, making him wince, bearing his teeth in a hiss as he cradles it close to his chest. And, to Marlon’s credit, he notices. 

Unsurprisingly. If anyone was to notice, it’d be Marlon.

“Shut your mouth, man,” he hisses to Jermaine, whose laughs have dwindled down to giggles, few and far in-between. “Mike, c’mon, sit down. Finish your drink.”

Michael clicks his teeth, catching Bill’s gaze from the bar where he’s been nursing a beer for the past hour or so. With a nod from Michael, Bill picks up his hat and leaves a few crisp dollars on the counter, crossing the lounge as Michael levels his brothers with a clenched jaw.

“I’m going to see her, since she’s the one y’all wanna talk about anyway. Bill?”

“I’m right here, joker.”

“Biiill—!” Jermaine echoes, dragging out the syllable and pitching his voice higher to mimic Michael’s cadence. His voice drops into laughter again. “Go rock Tink’s world, joker. She’ll be thanking us!”

Good Lord.

Michael’s not a violent person. Never wants to become one, never has been. Not when he was still a Witness, green and desperate to keep his mother happy because someone in that house ought to have, or when he started introspecting and dismantling the warped values that’d been making his life harder, nor when his relationship with God became a personal journey outside of institutions. No, Michael’s not a violent person at all. 

But, shit, if he doesn’t want to sock Jermaine straight in the jaw right now.

“Mike, nawww, c’mon!”

“Are you really leaving? It’s your night!”

“Just sit back down!”

But, Michael’s already off. Bill is close on his trail, giving the rest of the brothers a hat salute with a smile before he follows after the boy that’s been giving him the best hell for fourteen years now.

It’s just past 12AM when you hear keys jingling in the door.

Your apartment’s been quiet for the past few hours. There’s an old lady next door who always stays up late to watch Jeopardy reruns, the volume cranked up so high it’s almost like Alex Trebek’s in your living room. You don’t really mind, though. It fills the silence; almost makes you feel like you’re back home.

You’re lying in bed when the door opens. Freshly showered, smelling of vanilla and citrus, your damp skin making the AC feel heavenly against your skin. You’re lucky the apartment is laid out the way it is; it allows for the unit you have installed in the living area to cool off the entire house. Courtesy of Mike, of course; he wasn’t about to let his girl stew in a non air-conditioned studio.

“Baby!” you call out, jumping off the bed with a quick stretch of your limbs. But he intercepts you on your way to him, big arms closing around your shoulders and pushing you back towards your room. You giggle: “Mikey, what’re you doing? Did you guys have fun?”

You both fall onto the king sized duvet with an unceremonious plomp, a breath punching its way out of you as he starts pecking you softly up the neck and to your cheeks. His weight on you is grounding and delicious, making you sink into the mattress as his sprained hand lies softly by your side.

“Jus’ missed you,” he murmurs against your ear, kissing it in a way that tickles. “Missed my lady… Did you miss me?”

What, like you’d say no? You click your teeth, making him raise his head, staring at you expectantly. “Yes. I missed you. Let me just… Here, let me scoot back to the pillows. C’mon.”

You do, the silk bedding offering sweet friction as you lie back on your plush assortment. Opening your legs, you beckon him to you with a smile. He returns it tenfold. 

And, he just looks so… handsome. His curls are still shiny and perfect (and a bit grown out now at the back, something you adore), smile pushing up against his cheek apples, doe-eyes crinkling as he finds home between your thighs. His head lies gently on the softness of your stomach, breath hot on your pajama blouse. 

And, fuck, his hands… Big as they are, slim and pretty and downright eye-candy. His good palm slides around your waist, curling around you from behind, squeezing you close and making butterflies flit around your stomach.

But your eyes land on his right hand, still sprained and aching. A frown weighs down your lips, and you let your own hands drift down to it. Both of your palms close around it, bringing it closer, and you don’t miss the tiny sigh he lets out.

If his discomfort wasn’t currently tugging at your heartstrings, you’d linger more on the sight that always leaves you pulsing and dumb; the way it takes two hands of yours to cover one of his. No, that’s a lie, both your hands combined aren’t big enough to cover it. God, the things it does to you…

Girl, shut up. Jesus. Fuck.

“You’ve been doing the stretches the doctors gave you, haven’t you?” You swallow around nothing, hoping to keep your thoughts from straying even though it’s too late.

“Mhm, every day,” he murmurs, voice low and featherlight. It looks like he’s about to elaborate, but another thought takes hold of him. “Baby, it’s like, real cold in here—”

“What’s the point of having AC if it’s not cold?” You bend down, kissing his—huge, lean, salivating—fingers still in your hold. “Means we can cuddle more…”

“Well, when y’ put it that way…”

The quiet that washes over you is comfortable. His hand is still in your hold, growing limp as your fingers begin a tender massage near his wrist. Nothing more than a soft rubbing of his skin, but it has him exhaling a gasping moan of relief into you. It affects you more than you’d like to admit.

“You didn’t answer me.”

“Hm?” he hums, staring up at you sideways beneath his lashes. From this angle, his eyes look even rounder. He looks cute as shit.

“Was it fun?”

His groan is so loud and deafening, even your neighbor must’ve heard him over Alex Trebek. You sputter a confused laugh, raising your brows in a question.

He elaborates with a stiff lip. “Oh, Lord… You would not believe the mess these fools were talkin’ tonight. It was just… too much.”

You snort. “Try me.”

“Okay. You asked for it…” He takes a deep breath, exhaling an awkward laugh that makes you even more curious. “They started going on about me being too… soft with you. Talking about how women love,” he gestured halfheartedly with his fingers, wrist still being softly massaged in your hold, “feelin’ small, or… Damn, I don’t even know, just things like that—”

Oh.

Your brain short-circuits. Worse than that one time the TV gave out on a movie night, sputtering its last breaths in painful bursts of static. Maybe even worse than he had years and years ago, that one time you accidentally stumbled on his Playboy stash behind the headboard of his bed. God, he’d been so mortified. Absolutely blown a gasket; wouldn’t let you in his room for near a week.

Well, that’s how you feel now. Dumb and horny and… Full of possibility.

“…Right.” Good one, girl.

“It’s just crazy! You think so, too?”

“Uh-huh.” Don’t even worry about it.

“I mean… I just don’t see it like that,” he says, voice dropping an octave, shifting from where he’s lying and balancing up on his elbows, his calves curling up behind him. Round Bambi-eyes find yours, searching your face for reassurance. “Makin’ love… it’s a beautiful thing. ‘S supposed to be an expression of passion. Complete passion. You’re not supposed to try and make someone you love small. That just sounds so backward to me.”

He pauses, sprained hand turning over in yours so his palm meets your skin, fingers lightly curling around your own.

“It’s supposed to make your heart feel bigger,” he continues, a little breathless, the earnestness in his chest making his words rush out a bit faster. “Like you’re so full of love for a person that you just… you just melt right into them. Y’know? It’s not about being mean or trying to show who’s got the upper hand. It’s about being gentle. Safe. That’s how it’s supposed to be with us.”

Oh, God. You might cry. He’s just so… lovely! And you, you’re—

“Yeah,” you say dumbly, eyes wide like saucers, breaths tighter. “Or, y’know…” His brows furrow in disbelief so quickly it sends you spiralling for a response. “No, I agree! That’s not what I meant. Um. Baby, sorry, but,” your palms come up to his face, clutching his cheeks as you thumb at the hairs on his upper lip. “D’you know how much I love this?”

It’s true, you’re weak for the mustache. It wakes something primal inside you, making you hide his shaving cream in the morning and ‘accidentally’ throw the spare razors he’s stocked up in your cabinet. It’s perfect and it’s yours. 

It doesn’t matter that you brought it up just to pivot. Doesn’t matter at all.

“Why’re you changin’ the subject?”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

“I literally agreed with you.”

“No, no, you said,” his voice raises in pitch, mimicking you, “‘Ooor, you knowww—’”

You laugh, jaw hanging open, palms letting go of his hand to fall flat on the duvet. “I don’t sound like that!”

“You do,” he insists, a stubborn, beautiful grin breaking through. His long fingers gently hook under your wrist. “You absolutely do. And then you gave me that… look.” He tilts his head, dark eyes narrowing with a mix of curiosity and pure mischief. “Elaborate on that for me,” he hums, his voice dropping back down, soft but demanding. “‘Or, I know’ what, mama? What were you gonna say before you started sweet-talkin’ my stache? Hmm? Tell me.”

He’s going to be the death of you one of these days. Six years of having him like this, and he still makes you feel like that floundering nineteen-year-old girl with all the false bravado in the world. Your fingers curl around his own again, careful not to jostle his wrist too much as you bring it to your lips. You give a peck to each finger, watching as his lashes flutter.

“Okay. You know how much I love your hands, too, don’t you?”

He chuckles. “I’m havin’ a bit of trouble, actually…”

He’s so full of shit. He knows it, you know it, and yet it still makes heat flush down your belly. Your teeth get buried on your bottom lip, because two can play this game. 

“Mhm, I do. I love how big they are… when you hold me,” you whisper. Your free hand grabs his other palm, bringing both in front of you, thumbs tracing his knuckles and feeling the stark contrast between your size and his. “Makes me feel like I’m right where I belong. Like nothing can touch me…” You bend down, giving him a lingering kiss that has him sighing into you. “…Except you. ‘Cause I’m yours.”

He lets out a low, shaky breath, the playful smirk completely dropping from his face. His long fingers move to spread out against your waist, the heat of his palms burning right through your clothes as he pulls you just an inch closer. You’re giving a valiant battle against the twitching of your thighs, but it’s futile. Michael can tell.

“Yeah?” he asks, a breathless little syllable against the softness of your stomach he’s now burying his face in. Fingers slowly trailing up and past the hem of your pajama, he raises the fabric up your midriff until he’s free to pepper kisses over your skin.

“What I meant was, was just,” you swallow, because his lips are hotter now, “um… I wouldn’t… mind it, y’know? Not really. Not… at all, even.”

He pauses, looks up at you, lips still on your skin. “Mind… what?”

You gulp, clenching your eyes and looking at the heavens. He’s going to make you say it out loud and there’s nothing you can do about it. You kind of brought that all upon yourself. 

A shy grin pulls at your lips, twitchy and nervous. “Feeling small.”

There’s a pause, a crackling sort of silence that washes over the room.

“Oh,” he says simply. And, it’s kind of funny. The look on his face. His lips just barely parted, eyes beady and brows raised, mind whirring so loudly you can tell just by looking at him. “Oh—?”

“I–I mean,” you rush, “what you said is true. All of it. And I love you, I love us just the way we are, I’m not saying otherwise.” You pause. “I’m not saying I want anything to change. You get that, right?”

“I do.”

You laugh awkwardly, endearingly, cupping his burning cheek. “Doesn’t look like it.”

“No, I–I hear you, baby,” he stammers, palm coming up to completely dwarf yours on his cheek, his skin scorching hot against your own.

Oh, God, you can’t shut up now. “It’s just… y’know, being a little rougher or whatever, it doesn’t change how we love each other. It doesn’t mean you’d treat me bad, or make me feel less, or anything. Or, God forbid, unsafe! I trust you, Mike. More than anybody in the world. It’d be… it’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust.” You’re flustered and spewing word-vomit, heart clawing dangerously up your throat as you heave out: “Ohmygosh, I’m totally blowing this, aren’t I? Am I makin’ any sense? I feel like I’m not makin’ any sense—”

“Shh, just look at me.” His curls tickle your midriff.

Laughing breathlessly, it feels like inhaling for the first time after a dive. “Mike, I—”

“No, look at me. You’re makin’ perfect sense, baby.”

You listen, looking down at him while your heart pounds harsher than a bassline. “I just don’t want you thinking—”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think anything bad. I swear, I don’t.” Biting the inside of his cheek, he asks: “You really mean all that?”

“Yes,” you nod, eyes softening while your thumb strokes his cheek. “More than anything.”

“And you, you wanna feel… small with me? Like what they were sayin’?”

You giggle, looking away before meeting his gaze again, smile so wide it hurts your cheeks to maintain. “I wouldn’t… be opposed. Only with you, though.”

“Oh… Okay. Okay, sweet baby,” he nods, diving back into kissing down your belly. One palm trails to the small of your back to push you against him, making you arch, and the other slowly cups your breast. Cups it whole. “Thank you for tellin’ me, mama…”

Oh, God… “Mike,” you gasp, thighs trembling as his kisses move lower with intent. He squeezes you, just the way you love, not too harshly but just strong enough to leave you hot. Your hand clutches his over your tit, for no other reason than to feel anchored.

Your shorts are flimsy and airy, nothing but a flowy piece of fabric meant for summer, just so you don’t walk around in your panties all day. It takes zero effort for Michael to push it aside and give you a hot kiss, your lacy underwear sporting an embarrassingly wet patch as he takes a deep inhale.

You shudder, locking eyes as his fingers rub over your slit, the feel of it combined with the lace against you making you huff and twitch your hips. “Don’t tease me…”

“But I love teasin’ you,” he grins. “You like that? Hmm?”

“Mike—”

“No, no… You were just talking all that good stuff. Sayin’ how much you love my hands.”

“Well, I do…” God.

“Tell me again. Tell me what you love about ‘em.” His teeth flash in a smile. One hand’s burying itself in the meat of your thigh, gripping so hard you’ll be feeling it tomorrow. The thought shouldn’t send an aching pang down your middle, but it does.

You swallow, gently pushing a stray curl behind his ear, fingers lingering on his forehead. “They’re big… And pretty. Just like you.”

He nods feverishly, as if he can’t even hear you through the haze in his head. Eyes locked on where you need him most, his palm drifts down to cup you.

You jump, goosebumps razing on your skin, a whimper fighting its way out of your throat as your brows furrow. The very tips of his fingers are reaching over the panties’ waistband, tickling the tufts of hair peeking over. He’s cupping you whole and it’s making you dizzy. It’s not something you weren’t aware of before, but fuck. It never gets old.

“They do look big on you, don’t they? Look how small you look under me right now. Look…” he trails off, pressing chaste kisses on the inside of your thigh, lips dancing over your stretch marks, close enough to where you’re aching but far enough to keep you on the edge. Just for him.

“I’m looking, M–Mikey…” You fumble a bit, grinding against his unmoving hand, choking on a hiccup when he suddenly peels the damp fabric off of you and the cold air hits you.

And, when he enters a finger inside? He does so slowly. Then a second, lungs heavy as he sneaks glances at you from beneath his lashes, watching you writhe with a hung jaw and that cute little furrow you get on your forehead.

(You get it when you’re thinking, or when you’re angry, or when a stubborn Letraset sheet just won’t rub off for the dry-transfer. Or… in situations like right now, when the pleasure is gut-deep and visceral. When he makes you feel this way.)

His pace is slow, filling you gently, rhythm a steady push-and-pull as he… Oh, God… As he bottoms out.

You gasp. He shushes: “I’m sorry, baby, I’m sorry, I’ll go slower… It feels good?”

You feel so full. Stuffed to the brim, even though you’ve taken his fingers a thousand times before. It still feels new, sacred, special. You moan a pretty sound that makes him hum appreciatively, fingers unbreaking the brutally delicious pace. It must go on for at least ten minutes, that deep stretch of him driving you crazy, your bedroom filled with nothing but the squelching noises of your slick, his fingers soaked with you.

At some point, you look down and really focus on the sight; Michael, on his stomach, the thickness of your thighs hugging him. His curls shiny and a bit wind-swept, his bottom lip between his teeth, his eyes hooded and drunken.

And, his fingers. Pumping in-and-out of your soppy warmth, like… Like you’re a ragdoll, something he needs to pull apart, helpless against him. Fuck. Fu—

When he lays a tiny kiss on your puffy clit, you wheeze: “Mi–Micha–el—!”

“You’re so pretty…” he whispers, that soft voice of his coming from deep inside his throat, making him sound like he’s just woken up. “Such a pretty mama for me. You need to come, baby?”

“Y–ye–ah, yeah, yeah, yeahyeahyeah—” 

You’re chasing it, hips shifting in place, grinding up into nothingness as his pace stays steady, sweat trailing down the dip of your back as you choke on a hiccup.

He gives your clit another swirling lick, and you’re gone.

It washes over you dizzyingly. And after weeks of (unwanted but unavoidable) abstinence, it’s leg-curling. Catastrophic, even. It leaves you mumbling nonsense onto the side of your pillow, hands splayed around your head powerlessly, like a halo. 

And Michael’s right here for you—whispering sweet-nothings from down below—but for the half-minute it takes for you to come down, it sounds more like static. Grazing your ears but not truly sticking.

You’re panting when he comes up for a kiss, your taste on his tongue potent. You exhale a sigh into him, and he swallows it down with a smile. You don’t miss the tiny wince that jumps out of him, the way he softly twists his wrist in place, fingers curling and uncurling. 

And, there, right on his cheek: streaks of brown makeup that’re washing off, leaving behind the milky beige exposed to the warm light of your lamps. It tugs at your heartstrings. You wish he’d just ditch the makeup altogether; you’ve said so in the past, many times. But public scrutiny and decades of insecurities can’t simply come undone by his girl’s sweet words only, no matter how much you wish they could.

It doesn’t mean you’ll stop trying, though.

“Baby, c’mon,” you urge him, fixing your underwear and shorts as you slip out of bed. Your thighs are shaky, something that doesn’t go unnoticed by either of you. “Up, up, up—”

“Girl, where are you goin’?”

You roll your eyes playfully, grabbing him by his good wrist and making him follow you to the small cramped bathroom. It’s a tight fit—nothing like his family’s at Hayvenhurst—but it’s intimate. Cozy. You love that you have to brush up against each other every time someone wants to move past.

The toilet’s facing the door, and the vanity is right beside it. You flick the lightswitch and make Michael sit on the closed toilet lid, facing you as you rummage through the cabinet for your makeup-removing cleanser and cotton pads. All the while, he’s watching you with this loving, faraway look in his eyes. A tiny grin pulls at the corners of his lips the more you huff.

You turn to look at him, just for a second, fighting back a smile of your own. You’d pay good money to be inside his head sometimes.

(The world would, too. When they call him eccentric, closed-off, peculiar. Strange and wacky. Someone to be cracked open and picked clean from the inside-out just so they can be the first to report on it. He’s had to put up with it ever since you met him, and it still feels like the world’s hang-up on that version of him they wanted to keep frozen; before he grew up, took agency of himself, stopped giving them everything they wanted. Before the vitiligo, the lupus, the accident. Before he skyrocketed himself so high they could only claw at his feet to drag him down.)

But, that’s not who’s sitting in front of you now. Michael Jackson, the superstar. It’s just Mikey, your fiancé. Your childhood sweetheart. The boy who made you realize that love doesn’t have to hurt to be life-changing.

You jump on your tiptoes to perch yourself on top of the vanity, pedicured feet landing on the inside of Michael’s spread thighs on the toilet lid. Your knees lock, and Michael leans forward to rest his chin on top of them. You’re still sensitive from the orgasm, but it’s a quiet and warm sort of ache. You can see that he must be half-hard too, his pants sporting the tiniest tent, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Look up?” you gently instruct as his lashes flutter.

“You don’t got to do this,” he murmurs while you pour the solution on a cotton pad and begin wiping at the brown foundation that’s caking his skin. It comes off in thick strokes, the pad twisting and turning around your hold as you try to utilize every drop.

 “I know,” you answer, and continue anyway.

His skin looks pretty, brown and pinkish pale. Your thumb brushes his cheek, dumping the used cotton pad on the vanity behind you before kissing on his vitiligo patches. You pull back with a sigh, hands wordlessly closing around the cleanser as you pour another pad. You don’t stop looking at him, not even for a second.

“You’re staring,” he huffs, chin moving against your knees with his words. You wash more makeup off, on his other cheek and down his jaw.

“Am I makin’ you nervous, playboy?” You smirk, wiggling your brows.

“A bit,” he giggles.

You snort, shaking your head. “Only you could finger a girl to oblivion and act all shy when she looks at you, Mike!”

He chokes out a high-pitched flustered laugh, warmth creeping up his neck and cheeks as his large hand reaches up to squeeze your calf. He hides his face back down against your knees, broad shoulders shaking.

“Hush up—”

“Are you gonna make me?” You raise your brows suggestively, bursting into a giggle-fit when he raises his head from your knees. “What? Had to make you look up somehow. You still have makeup left.”

“You’re something else, baby. You really are.”

“Ditto,” you murmur in concentration as you remove the last bits of leftover foundation coating his neck. Then, you do his hands, careful of his wrist, across both palms and up his forearms. “All doneee,” you sing, pecking his nose before climbing down the vanity. 

“C’mere, girl…” He clicks his teeth. You’re halfway to the door before you feel his hand curling around your waist, resting on your lower belly that’s still fluttering from his touch. He comes up behind you, lips softly grazing against your ear, body flush on yours. “You think we’re done? I missed you too much…”

Your heart licks up your ribs, a smile creeping up your face. “Aye, aye, captain…” you drag out seductively, fighting to swallow down your giggles.

He pulls his head back, just a bit. “What now?”

You snort: “Get it? Like, Captain EO?”

He squeezes you, but you can tell he’s fighting back a laugh. “Baby, if you don’t get your behind on that bed right n—”

 He doesn’t have to tell you twice.

Your words stay with Michael for months.

‘It’d be good, because it’s you. Because of the trust. I wouldn’t be opposed. Only with you.’

Every time he touched you, every time he made love to you, there’d be a tiny voice on the back of his head. Whispering your words back to him on repeat, telling him to manhandle you the way you said would feel good, have his way with you in a manner he’s never done before. Telling him to… fuck you.

But, every time, he’d chicken out. His hold would loosen into a gentle caress, words spilling out like honey on your skin; soft and sweet and familiar. Safe.

And, the worst thing is? You wouldn’t say a thing about it. As if that conversation never happened. As if it hasn’t been plaguing his mind for months on end, making him feel inadequate, undeserving. You never claimed as such, he knows. He knows he’s not being fair to himself, but he feels like he’s been letting you down spectacularly. He feels like a joke, or a fraud, or both.

He hates it. Hates himself for it. What kind of man is he if he can’t keep you satisfied?

Maybe his brothers were right…

The months slip by quickly, and soon enough, January 27th of 1986 arrives in all its starstruck glory. You’ve been waiting for this day for over a year. For Michael’s achievement, sure, but for yours as well.

Last Christmas—at the end of December of ‘84—you’d been approached by none other than Prince. Yes, that Prince, with whom Michael was convinced he’d have to fight for God’s bestowment of divine inspiration. And, really, you shouldn’t have been as surprised as you’d been. 

A lot of things had changed since that time you were waxing paste-ups for LA Weekly in Sunset Boulevard, just barely dipping your toes in the industry. Since that first job of yours in 1979, you’d moved on to bigger things.

It must’ve been late 1981 when you were approached by a music promoter from Slash Records, then still operating out of a tiny office above a shop in West Hollywood. They offered you cash under the table to quit the paper and design graphics full-time for their label, and the look on Gina’s face when she found out why you were quitting? 

Oh, priceless!

What followed was a fun job filled with eye-gouging neon-inked concert gig flyers, which you’d go out and staple onto Hollywood telephone poles with Layla, the only other artist on the team. God, you loved Layla; you got each other through some really frustrating times. You’ll forever be grateful to her.

Half of your days were spent doing actual design, and the other half answering phones, wrapping promotional brochures in mailers, and avoiding the landlord who loved to corner you near the elevator about whatever the label’s owner did to piss him off that day. But, what took up most of your time was hand-crafting typographic logos for the bands.

By that point you’d already worked with Michael, though. Just a little bedroom project that turned into one of your most important collaborations to date. You’d made the lettering on his album cover for Off The Wall. Just the letters! Handwritten and chalk-like, and Epic Records’ official art directors had handled the final layout.

The letters, though? They were yours. Plastered all across the world. Over twenty million copies! You never told anybody at Slash. Nobody except Layla. You hadn’t been approached for the letters on your boyfriend’s album, you’d been approached for you and you alone. You weren’t about to give them something to talk about; you’d learned that lesson from Gina.

But, well… It became a harder secret to keep once Thriller came out. You free-handed the golden cursive on that cover, too. And, holy shit. Highest selling album of all time. Of all fucking time! With your letters on it! Sure, Epic Records credited their corporate art team, but to anyone who matters? Your name got around a bunch.

It was bound to. After all, you were the short film’s leading lady. Not only that, but you worked on its storyboards alongside an incredibly talented creative team that younger-you would’ve only dreamed of being a part of. Your raw sketches felt amateur in comparison to theirs, but their praise and assurance more than accounted for the imposter syndrome that’d almost paralyzed you.

The making-of documentary crew shadowed you extensively during the whole process, and somehow—in some inconceivably mind-numbing way—you weren’t just a young, scrappy, self-made illustrator anymore. You’d wormed your way up the ranks of pop culture’s royalty. Carved a spot right beside Michael: completely different circles, but next to him anyway.

In the beginning, you kind of hated it. Ever since you’d graduated HS and decided to pursue an artistic career without further schooling, you’d sworn to yourself you’d never grasp at Michael’s influence. When the fruits of your labor started bearing fruit, well, self-doubt was only natural. 

Because ultimately, your success had come from Michael.

Or, at least, that’s what your insecurities screamed at you. It was something Michael shut down very quickly, and you’re deeply grateful for it. ‘That’d only be true if you weren’t good,’ he’d told you. ‘I jus’ gave you a platform. It’s networking, nothing else. Quit that thinking, baby, okay? I’m not joking.’

You did. Exorcised it quickly and without much further thought, because you had no other choice. Once the Thriller film hit the streets, you skyrocketed from obscurity to… whatever you are now.

You still don’t know how to feel about that. It all had spiralled out of your control, out of Michael’s as well. He knew you never wanted this; being recognized, photographed, analyzed. You didn’t want… what he had. And he never blamed you for it, just how you never blamed him either. Things just… are what they are. Nothing you can do about it except smile and look pretty for the cameras, for people you don’t know that call out your name.

In early 1984, you landed a marketing position for Intralink Film Graphic Design; Anthony Goldschmidt was a brilliant man to work under. To learn under. He and his team had created the E.T. poster in 1982, which blew your mind. You were working with these guys? Like, holy shit.

And then, enter Prince. Circa December of the same year, reaching you through Michael of all people, asking you to make the album cover art for Around The World In A Day. The project would require at least four weeks of nonstop work, and you took a leave of absence from work to take it on.

Prince described his vision as a ‘surrealist psychedelic mindfuck;’ his words, not yours. Working with him was kind of the same. A mindfuck, all throughout. An incredible, unbelievable mindfuck.

Michael had been… weirdly civil about the entire thing. Okay, maybe not ‘weirdly,’ per se. There was no real animosity from his side, and after those eight Grammys and the Thriller sales? They weren’t in the same sphere anymore, and it was a fact they were both painfully aware of.

It is now a little over a year later. Prince is up for three categories in the AMAs, Michael’s up with Lionel for Song Of The Year… And here you are.

Walking inside the Shrine Auditorium hanging off Michael’s arm, the red carpet outside a pandemonium of flashing camera-bulbs and cloying perfumes. It was just you, Michael, and Elizabeth Taylor in the limo; the rest of the Jacksons have their own ride, and you got no idea if they’ve already arrived or been seated or still on the way.

Your eyes grow hazy from the cigar smoke swirling all around, Michael’s arm wrapped tightly over your shoulders as he leads you inside. Elizabeth is trailing behind you, well-accustomed to the white wall of light and dizzying shouts from the attention-getters.

“I get that it’s their job,” you huff as you walk through the doors, relieved from the screaming crowd even though the energy inside is still buzzing, “but can’t they just… be better at it? My ears damn-near burst.”

Michael’s fixing the collar of your bedazzled blazer-dress, black with striking gold accents to match his own military-esque suit. It cuts off just at the first quarter of your thighs (a bit longer at the back so as to avoid any accidents), giving way for the glittering sheer tights you’re wearing underneath. A thick gold belt is wrapped around your waistline, buckle shiny and squared.

Standing next to Mike, it’s clear who you came with. If the matching engagement rings aren’t any indication.

“Are you trying to reason with the sharks, sweetheart? Oh, they’ll eat you alive unless you treat them like the scum they are,” Elizabeth laughs.

You chuckle, gently shooing Michael’s fussing hands away, grabbing onto the inside of his elbow and joining the rest of the crowd deeper into the lobby. It’s cavernous, with intricate chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, the carpet a deep maroon under your heels.

As you walk past people you never would’ve imagined seeing, let alone knowing, a pit forms in your stomach. An ugly, scraping feeling of imposterism; hollow, but familiar. What the fuck are you even doing, waving at Whitney Houston and smiling at Cyndi Lauper?

Who are you next to them? Michael’s arm candy? A fellow creative? 

Both? Neither?

It’s not like you haven’t interacted with celebrities before. Paul McCartney, Elizabeth… Diana Ross. (You are not getting into this right now, no way. It’s bad enough that she’s hosting this shit). Many others, too. But you were always introduced as Michael’s girl, not someone they could work with; someone on equal footing.

Gosh, you hate when you get like this. They’re nothing more than people, you know that, but still. Your mind’s running faster than your feet can keep up with.

Giving your head a shake, you turn to look at Elizabeth. “Don’t know how you’ve been putting up with it as long as you have.” Squeezing Michael’s arm, the smile he sends you makes you warm. “Both of you.”

“Thick skin, darling,” she sighs, moving to step beside you. “Thick skin.”

You hum. Glancing at Michael, you ask: “D’you know where your family’s sitting? I wanna say hello. They’re presenting, aren’t they? Janet and La Toya?”

“We should jus’ find them after, baby,” he sighs, looking around aimlessly. “Yeah, Rebbie too—”

A voice butts in from the side: “If it isn’t my lucky charm.”

Huh?

All three heads turn at the same time, searching for the interjector.

Oh! Prince.

His hair is slicked down in thick rivulet-like waves, and it might just be the tamest you’ve ever seen him dress. He’s in a simple black tuxedo, polished dress shoes, black bowtie to match. His makeup is mild, too; just a striking smokey-eye over red-blushed cheeks. He looks good.

“Who?” you ask once your mind catches up, a grin pulling at you. “Me?”

“Who else?” Prince retorts, his voice that smooth suave drawl you became accustomed with. He’s standing in front of you, nodding politely at both Michael and Elizabeth. “Good evening.”

You feel Michael’s arm tense when he returns the nod. Giving his bicep a squeeze, your eyes don’t leave Prince. “I think you’re overestimating me,” you grin.

“No such thing,” he waves you off. “You look beautiful tonight.”

“She does, doesn’t she?” Michael smiles, tight-lipped as he kisses your temple.

“Thank you,” you flush, but you don’t really know who you’re answering.

“Wish me luck?” Prince raises his brows, smile wide and eyes hooded. He always has that look, like every woman he speaks to unravels something inside him. You learned quickly not to take it to heart.

“You don’t need luck,” you laugh, sneaking a look behind him at the quickly-moving crowd spilling inside the auditorium seats. “But I think if we don’t hurry, they might close the doors on us.”

“You’re right. I’d love to catch up after, though.”

“We should really get to our seats,” Michael cuts in smoothly, tightening his grip on your arm. “Have a good night, Prince.”

“Oh,” you murmur, taken aback by the coldness in his voice. You look at Prince, noting the sly look he wears. Ugh. Men and their dick-swinging contests. “Yeah, we’ll, uh, see you on the other side. Good luck.”

He clicks his teeth, stepping to the side as Michael starts nudging you forward, Elizabeth following. “Thought you said I don’t need luck?”

“Can’t hurt!” you sing out, and just like that, Prince gets swallowed by the crowd.

The three of you are seated at the front row center orchestra. It takes a while to reach it, but once you do, you sit cross-legged down next to Michael—whose palm finds your knee immediately—with Elizabeth on your right side.

Just a few feet in front of you is the lip of the humongous stage, and the countless towering screens on the backdrop are lit up in radiant red-blue scribbled stars. The scale of the room is massive, the balcony on the back packed with thousands of people. And when you look over your shoulder, you’re met with a sea of the most famous faces on earth, all waiting for the broadcast to go live.

It’s hard to keep your expression neutral once the show actually starts. Because she’s up there, presenting, smiling and swaying and being her usual unbearable self.

Diana. That bug-eyed bitch.

You’re not one for a cat-fight—you’re too self-respecting—but her? Her, you’d gladly slap the dentures off of. Well, it might be petty of you, but can anybody blame you? She hasn’t stopped drooling after Michael ever since both of you were teenagers (and she was pushing retirement). Even after Michael’s rejections and avoidance, the woman just won’t let up: offers to co-write her songs, come on her shows, to entertain a flirtation that is downright perverted.

Michael respects her artistry and mentorship too much to tell her to go to hell. You have no such qualms. You’re choosing to remain civil, though. 

As much as possible.

She’s still bitter about her exclusion from We Are The World, you’re sure. It’s clear in the way she spots Michael in the front row, giving him a wide smile. It falls hilariously flat once her eyes catch on you, palms entwined with Michael’s on your lap, your fingers caressing up his arm.

God damn, woman, you think. Didn’t she just get married to some Swede? Ugh, you can’t keep up.

She doesn’t matter, though. The show must go on, and soon enough, Janet’s on stage. She looks really pretty, red-lipped with a bold black eye, the silver details on her dress glittering under the stage lights. She’s excitedly presenting the award for Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist. And—

“Prince!” Janet reads from the card, the auditorium bursting in a loud explosion of cheers and whistles.

“Oh! O–oh, my gosh! Yay! Wooo–oh!” you laugh in surprise, clapping until the flesh of your palms hurt, twisting your neck to spot Prince as he gets up from a few rows back and struts towards the stage.

But, instead of walking past you, he stops. Smiles down at you, sly and confident, extending a palm with raised brows. You short-circuit for a second too long, the moment extending and twisting in slow-motion out of your control, because this is live, you’re on air, fucking move—!

Michael’s palm falls from your knee as Prince effortlessly tugs you to your feet and leads you up the stage, not even looking back. Michael’s hand twitched instinctively, but before he could even think of reacting, you were halfway across the stage.

What the fuck? Why’d he bring you up? Oh, God, is he going to make you speak? You’re not prepared, this was not a fucking part of—

The spotlights are even worse from up here. All six and a half thousand faces of the crowd blend into one big, amorphous blob of shadow; a whispering sea of faces that’s analyzing your every move as Prince accepts the award and the theater grows louder for him. You manage to give Janet a shoulder rub before she’s ushered backstage with the rest of the presenters, and now she’s gone too.

Oh, what the hell? It’s not just thousands watching you, it’s millions. You’re being telecasted, breathless beside Prince, smile so wide and plastic it makes your jaw ache. You don’t know how to stand without looking awkward, out of place, like someone who doesn’t belong.

Your hands are shaking. Fuck. It’s a fluttering sensation, tingles flitting just under your skin. You try to clench them, but it just looks weird, so you press them flush against your thighs. It feels like your whole body’s shivering, and it’s fucking mortifying—

Prince notices.

He wraps an arm around the dip of your waist, pressing you flush against his side. You exhale a breath so shaky it makes him rub his thumb on your side, your palm finding purchase between his shoulder blades. He gives you a small nod of assurance, moreso a question than anything else. His eyes drift all across your features to make sure you’re fine, and you nod back with a gulp.

Smiling comes easier this time around.

It’s better like this, thank fuck. The feeling of another body is grounding. In the front row, you search for Michael. He’s right where you left him, fists clenched at his sides, lips pursed and eyes so dark they border on furious.

What—?

“Thank you…” Prince starts, leaning forward to the microphone stand. He’s holding the heavy glass trophy on one hand, you on the other. “They give you these little statues to tell you that you’ve done a good job.” He smiles subtly, arm slightly tightening around your waist. “But music is a lonely room, ‘til someone comes along and paints the walls for you. This… beautiful creature right here, she took the sounds inside my head and painted them for the whole world. She learned my colors.”

He pauses, turns to look at you completely. You don’t know what to do other than laugh incredulously, shy and flushed under the praise. Your mind’s scrambling to digest everything, but you think it’ll take several days for tonight’s events to sink in. 

‘Thank you,’ you mouth to him.

He continues: “Some people want to keep the brightest stars locked away in a cage, but genius belongs to the world. And tonight, she belongs up here. With me.” He says your name, first and last, nodding: “Thank you. And thank you to Dick Clark, and to LA.”

The auditorium erupts in thunderous applause, and it almost knocks you clean out. You’re slack-jawed amidst the cacophony of the cheers, jokingly grimacing before an excited howl of a laugh rips itself out. (God, you hope the mics don’t catch it). Untangling from Prince’s side, your arms shoot open, and he accepts the hug earnestly.

“Oh, my God, you’re crazy. You have no idea how much this means to me,” you whisper to his ear, squeezing before you let him go to step back.

“What’d I tell you?” he asks as he motions you down the stairs. “Lucky charm.”

It makes you laugh, and it feels as though you’re walking on a cloud. You plop onto your seat wearing your happiest and most radiant smile, waving at the camera operator that’s aiming for you. And, Michael is…

Oh.

Uh-oh.

He’s mad. As in, mad-mad.

It’s easy enough to tell. It’s not rocket science, especially with him; Michael can’t poker-face for shit. It looks like he’s entirely clouded over, darkened and closed off, lips tight and eyes glazed over in focus as he rubs his thigh. You’re intimately familiar with that look: he’s fuming.

Fucking Prince. Jesus. Why’d he have to bring you up there, and hold your waist, and flirt despite the ring on your finger, and—

And—

And… Say all those beautiful things about your art. Praise your talent. Shout you out publicly, by name, to millions of people, at one of the most important events in the industry. Huh…

Oh. Hell no. What does Mike have to be fuming over? Because Prince touched you? Because it’s the 1800s and you’re property, only allowed to be celebrated behind-the-scenes? Is that it?

Michael’s hand curls around your wrist, and his hold is bruising. You almost comment on it, something snarky and biting, but it gets caught behind your teeth and you swallow it down. It’s not the time, nor place.

Just sit, look pretty, yada-yada-yada.

The AMAs slip by quickly after Prince’s win. You smile, and clap, and cheer. You lean over to Elizabeth, whispering commentary and coughing to mask your snorts. You hold Michael’s arm, even though you’re getting pins and needles from the way he’s squeezing you.

And, when We Are The World wins Song Of The Year (an inevitability, an outcome as sure as the sun rising every morning), you set aside your irritation to kiss him deeply as congratulations. The cameras catch it, and even though you didn’t intend for it, it makes you giddy. His hand is on your nape, reaching all the way across your jaw. You grin into him before you break apart. Softly, you brush your thumb on his cheek, giving it a pat.

He smiles at you, but it’s not his smile. It’s the cameras’.

Of course, that’s when Diana calls him up to the stage. He pulls you up with him, though. Grip tight as ever, you walk up the stairs for the second time that night. It’s significantly less nerve-wracking, although you feel your nerves snapping for an entirely different reason.

Diana moves to hug and kiss his cheeks, but he maneuvers around her, giving her a half-hearted shoulder pat in thanks. Her eyes close in on you, and you need to remind yourself of the millions of viewers currently watching you and Diana Ross hovering around each other like a pair of panthers. You give her a tight nod, and nothing more.

She’s still the host, which means she has to snap out of it quicker. Michael’s holding the glass statue, smiling out into the world, the cheers from the audience’s standing ovation reaching a crescendo.

Diana screeches: “Why don’t we try to get aaall the performers that were there that night, one year ago, so we can sing We Are The World together? La Toya, the Jacksons, c’mon up to the stage! Alright, is everybody comin’ up? Yeah! We are the worlddd, we are the chiiildren… Elizabeth? We are the ooones who make a brighter dayyy, so let’s start giviiing…! Sing along, would you?”

(Like you said. Still bitter.)

Quincy came up after Lionel, just as the opening notes began filling the space. You locked eyes with Elizabeth, and with a quick work of your wrist you ushered her up. From both wings, people started spilling in, and when you spotted Janet, you waved her over with a smile.

“Felt like I was dying up here,” you tell her, wrapping your arm around her shoulder and burying her to your side as everyone starts swaying to the rhythm.

“I saw,” she giggles.

You click your teeth at her. Michael wraps his arm around your waist, bringing you close, rocking you to the melody. Liz is on his other side, and Diana’s somewhere to your left, begrudgingly sharing a mic with Whitney.

The moment is beautiful. The song is too, and what it stands for, what it’s brought out in people. You’re no singer, but you sing your heart out regardless. Michael’s smiling, his real smile, looking down at you and his sister as the lyrics echo through the theater and thousands of people sway.

He kisses you on the temple, lingering, hot, sharp.

Yet, loving. Always, always loving.

You should’ve known the momentary ceasefire of We Are The World wouldn’t have lasted any longer than the song itself.

“Can’t believe you,” you mutter, unbuckling your golden belt and tossing it on the bed. Michael’s somewhere behind you, stepping out of his loafers. Your heels were tossed at the door, and you’re making quick work of the buttons on the blazer.

The apartment’s quiet, your neighbor next door probably asleep due to the distinct lack of Alex Trebek-ness in the air. The central heating’s buzzing something soft, but the homey warmth does absolutely nothing for the prickling down your nape.

It’s like a minefield in here. One wrong move and you’ll both blow up into pink mist.

“Can’t believe me?” he echoes, undoing his tie and letting it hang around his neck messily. “What’d I do, baby, huh?”

“You were practically boring holes in the side of my head the entire night, Mike. From the moment he called me up.”

He leans against the door frame, unbuttoning his sleeves and suit. “Oh, so I’m supposed to jus’ sit back and smile while another man puts his hands all over you on live TV? While he’s up there acting like he owns you just ‘cause you painted some canvas for him?”

Your jaw falls, fingers stilling mid-button. “He was thanking me! Praising my work in front of the whole industry, and you looked like you wanted to lay him out right on the stage—”

He clicks his teeth, shaking his head dismissively. It makes your jaw clench. “He was being too touchy. You know it, and I know it. He had no business pulling you close like that, saying what he said. It was disrespectful to you, and it was disrespectful to me.”

“It wasn’t like that, at all! You’re completely blowing this out of proportion. You were so tense in the car, y–you wouldn’t even look at me!” Hands shooting out, you gesture animatedly, blazer popped open to reveal your matching underwear. The glittery pantyhose elastic is digging into your waist. “You’re being insane. You’re actually being insane!”

His eyes track down your frame, and he sighs before snapping out of it, beady gaze locking on yours. “No, no,” he shakes his head angrily, “I’m not being insane. I’m bein’ your man, there’s a difference.”

Your entire face sours, lips pursed in disbelief as you walk over to the vanity to remove your bracelets. “Right, riiight, right. So, your version of being my man is icing me out because another artist showed me some appreciation?” A humorless laugh trickles out of you. “You’re just jealous, and I don’t get it, because if we wanna talk about impropriety—”

He tosses his gold belt on the ottoman near the closet along his own blazer, groaning: “Uh-uh, we’re not spinnin’ this old tale again—”

Your silver bangles clang harshly against the catchall bowl. Sucking in a breath, you try to keep your voice steady. It’s a futile battle. Pivoting harshly, you point an accusatory finger, not even certain who you’re blaming. “It’s not old if the bitch still wants you!”

He clicks his teeth, eyes falling shut as he shakes his head. “Don’t talk like that, baby, c’mon—”

You gasp; half a laugh, half a sneer. “Are you kidding me? Are you actually joking right now? You think I don’t see the way she still looks at you? You cut her off years ago, Mike, and she acts like she’s just waiting for a slip-up! So don’t you dare look at me sideways because Prince gave me a hug on-stage. It’s fucking embara—”

“That’s entirely different and you know it. I don’t give her the time of day, I don’t let her get close to me. You, you just let him do it!”

Your eye twitches. “Because we were on-air! What’d you want me to do, make a scene? Shove him off?”

“I don’t care about the cameras!” He gestures out into nothingness, nerves and frustration catching up to him and threatening to blow over. “I don’t care ‘bout making a scene. If a man is putting his hands on my woman, I want him off you. It’s that simple. But you jus’ stood there like it was nothing.”

You pivot back again, clenching your eyes. The rest of your bangles slide off your wrists like water, but your fingers twitch. “It was nothing! Just a congratulatory hug, that’s it! You’re only looking for an excuse to stay mad—”

He’s closer now, you watch him from the mirror. He looks undone; white dress-shirt half open, hair ruffled from running his hands in it, eyes wide and round. He’s breathing heavily, chest panting, and… For a moment only, you forget what you’re arguing about.

“Yeah, okay,” he exhales, nodding to himself. “You’re right, I might be. I am jealous. I, I’m heavily jealous. I don’t want his hands on you, is that so crazy? I don’t want nobody’s hands on you but mine.”

You can’t help it, an incredulous snort jumps out. Twisting to face him, you lean your weight on the vanity, the edge digging into the meat of your ass. You don’t miss the way his eyes jump down: at the fat of your thighs stretching out the pantyhose, on the softness of your stomach still half-covered by the tights. At the way he can only catch a peek of your breasts between the lapels.

He scowls at the sound of your snort. It makes him look… Hm. You have to fight a smirk, biting on the inside of your cheek. It makes him look sexy. All fired up because another man touched you, touched what’s his. It makes heat flash somewhere deep down, causing you to shift in place.

Well. They do say anger is an aphrodisiac…

Crossing your arms, you raise your brows. “Oh… So, now you wanna talk like that? Where was all this mouth when we were at the lounge? You just stood there and stewed, and then you bring all this heavy energy back home to me. How do you think that makes me feel?”

His whole body shakes with his exhale. “You think this ‘s just mouth? You think I’m talkin’ just to talk right now?”

Shrugging, you tilt your head. “I don’t know, Mike. Are you? Because, normally, we’d just tell each other to hush up and walk away, and talk about it later. You don’t ever get like this.”

His eyes, beautiful and glassy, narrow into slits. He squares his shoulders, chest puffing out. Oh? “Maybe I’m tired, baby, huh? Maybe I’m tired of everybody thinkin’ I’m too soft to hold onto what’s mine.”

Oh.

Oh… Dear. God.

That’s what this has been all about? Jesus. He’s always been insecure like that, and it’s just worsening by his brothers’ constant teasing. Prince might be no more than a blotch on Michael’s map now, but it still stings. You dread to think about what Jermaine’s going to say when he sees you both next. No matter how much you reassure Michael, reassure his masculinity, this is what it always boils down to: men and their goddamn dick-swinging contests. 

How does that make any sense? Why is every male on the planet incapable of listening to what the objects of their desire actually like?

It’s a fucking mystery.

You don’t mean to sound patronizing, but a smile slips onto you. As if the past four hours hadn’t happened at all. Like it’s just a game you’re playing; a tug-of-war you’re forfeiting on purpose, the mouse mocking the cat.

“Fine,” you shrug, giggling, shaking your head and raising your hands in surrender. “Fine! Prove it then.” You lean back, wrists landing on the vanity as you rest your upper body. “If you’re so mad about how he touched me, what’re you gonna do about it?”

You didn’t know it was possible, but his eyes?

They get deadly. Lids hooded, brows in a knot, thumb and forefinger pinching the bridge of his nose. He scoffs with a smile that never reaches past his cheeks. “Oh, no. No, no, no… You don’t get to play like that, ma. You don’t get to… poke at me and just laugh it off.”

Your brows pinch together, an unsure grimace on your lips. “Michael—”

“Get on the bed.”

Pause…

…What?

“E–excuse me?” you sputter, a chuckle getting stuck up your throat. “Michael—”

Clicking his teeth, he unbuttons the rest of his white shirt, pulling it out of his waistline, rolling up the cuffs up his sleeve to his elbows. Slowly, one by one, as if you’re boring him. 

“Don’t ‘Michael’ me, baby. Get on the bed. Right there,” he points with his nose, like it’s a nuisance.

Your brows constrict, mouth hanging open. A breath gets stuck somewhere past your lungs. You make no move, and neither does he. And, here you both are: half undressed, panting, suspended mid-air in a standstill that threatens to crumble your resolve completely.

“…You’re serious.”

“Dead serious. Turn around.”

What the fuck? Did you die on the ride back? Is this some sort of purgatory? Heaven, hell, both?

This time, you do move. Slowly, like a fawn caught in a trap, unsure on shaky feet. You stop right at the foot of the bed, the mattress coming up just below your midriff. Eyes studying the frilly pillows, the baby-blue patterns on the duvet, you suck in a breath once you hear his feet moving behind you. Your head tilts to the side. “…Like this?”

“Yeah… yeah, jus’ like that. Stay right there, and don’t move.” His hands land on both your hips, the sensation so sudden that you jump. Your own hands fall on top of his, feeling his tiny twitches immediately.

“Mikey, you’re shaking a little bit,” you whisper, words trailing off into a moaning sigh as he leans down over your shoulder. His body’s flush against yours, soft lips nipping your ear.

“‘Cause you do this to me,” he murmurs, accent thick, curling around you like a net, “you make me lose my mind…”

“I d–do?” you echo. Yes, you do. You’re well-aware. Have been, for near a decade.

His wide palms dance across your front, one splaying over your lower stomach, the other sneaking past the blazer lapel and cupping your breast. All the while, he’s constricting you against him like a boa, until your ribs are stuttering with each breath.

“You, you, always you.” His tongue is licking at your neck, drawing you in, sucking softly where you’re always left squirming and desperate. He nips just at the junction of your jaw, and suddenly untangles himself completely, his warmth a memory. “B–bend,” he clears his throat, your heart flutters, “bend over. Right here.”

“Oh… Okay,” you murmur, lips bruising with the way you’re biting them. Your hands land on the softness of the duvet, feet still on the ground, body falling into the 90° angle effortlessly. The blazer rides up, and Michael gasps hard at the sight of your ass; you’d chosen a silky black thong, your sheer tights still glistening despite the warm dimmed lights of the vanity.

His hand comes up, groping your flesh over the pantyhose, and the sensation’s dizzying. 

“No,” he breathes, and your eyes widen in confusion. “Not like this…” His palm finds purchase at the small of your back, pushing you forward, causing you to raise your knees to climb up the mattress on all fours. He pushes on your back, making you fall on your cheek, arching for him until he’s satisfied. 

You’re still at the edge of the bed, but now… Now, you feel exposed. For him.

Your breaths are shaky. “How…” You swallow, lips puffy against the comforter, heat swirling inside you like tendrils. “H–how do I look?”

“Beautiful,” he punches out.

His hands are still shaking. They drift up your ass and latch onto the elastic band, peeling the tights off you slowly. Torturously. Goosebumps wash over every inch of skin he exposes to his hungry eyes, the friction with the nylon leaving behind tingles. He snaps them off your feet, rubbing your calves once he tosses them on the floor.

The gasp that claws its way out of you when he buries his head into your pussy is broken.

The angle makes everything more intense, makes you feel helpless in the most delicious way. And Michael is breathing in your warmth, inhaling you like you’re the sweetest perfume, big palms digging into your hips and ass.

“Mike,” you whine.

“Always playing,” he says against you, kissing you over the silky fabric. It makes you gasp. “Always… testin’ me. Do you get like this for anyone else, lovey?”

“No,” you mewl as he continues licking. His tongue is hot, making you light-headed, toes curling as he eats you through the panties. He’s making a mess… You’re making a mess. You feel it; the hot gush of wetness slowly leaking out as he has you spread like this, mouth sloppily working you until you have no idea where you end and his spit starts. Oh, God. “Only you, o–only y—”

The slap on your asscheek is sharp, and stinging. It wasn’t harsh, barely stronger than a smack, but it has your eyes popping open like corks. 

You gasp, voicing breaking into a whine as his big hand rubs lovingly over the spot.

“How’d that feel?” Michael asks. He sounds winded. Honeyed. With that soft lilt you could recognize in a sea of voices.

“G–good,” you cry, heart threatening to spill up your throat. “Really, really good…”

He peels away your panties in the same slow, agonizing manner. By the point they’re past your ankles, you’re shaking like a leaf. You hear his sharp intake of breath, and something compels you to turn. To look at him. When you do?

Holy. Sh—

“OhmyGod,” you mewl, jaw nearly unhinging. You clench around nothing.

He’s got your panties in his mouth by the gusset, inhaling and pressing and licking, eyes closed in bliss.

“Mmh…” his shoulders fall, and he leans down close to kiss your cheek, near your jaw. From the corner of your eye, you see him pocketing them. He pecks your ear, fingers expertly undoing his pants. “I want… to fuck you, baby. Like this. Can I? Will you let me?”

You’ve never… Never like this. He always likes to look in your eyes, or be draped across from you, that way you’re connected completely. Deeply. So he can kiss you and shower you with his loving care, and you can get lost in it together. He’s never called it fucking, either. It’s always making love or loving on his lady, always sweet, hot, intimate. Beautiful.

But this… This is dirty. It’s debased, and lewd. Pornographic. So, so hot. Fuck, fu—

“Please, please, please, Mike,” you sob. It actually hurts, his absence inside you. The sensation is so hot it’s jumped right back into freezing. You’re drowning in it, the angle intensifying it into a crescendo. You need him.

“You’re doin’ so good for me right now, baby. I mean it.” Oh, there he is… Solid against you, rubbing his flushed tip in your wetness, catching against your puffy clit and making you keen.

You gasp, one breath and another: “M–Mikey, please…”

Another slap. Same controlled intensity as the first, same delicious sting that makes your feet curl upwards. You choke around a breath.

“See? You listen so much better when you ain’t running that mouth.” He hums in appreciation, voice suave and dripping with condescension. But his hands on your hips are still shaking. “I’m really proud of you.”

“I always listen to you,” you pout. Lie.

But that, ‘I’m proud of you?’ God… It always leaves you melting. Now? Now, you’re drunk on it.

He chuckles, soft and airy. “No, you don’t. But you’re bein’… a real good girl for me now. Keep staying just like that.”

He’s teasing you. He’s fucking patronizing you. He’s making you… feel small. And, damn it, it leaves you hotter than you’ve ever felt before. It’s a brand new dizzying rush, and you can’t take it anymore. He’s tapping himself against your clit, and you push your hips back, crying: “Jus’ put it in, put it in! Mmnnhhh–oh m–my God—”

He does, slowly, and you both gasp.

It feels so… different. Michael’s already big, but in this position, it feels like he’s about to split you in two. And your baby’s breathing so hard behind you—hands strong and big and shaky—the shape of him making you sting and ache deliciously. He moans something broken, facade slipping, his pace bruising. He’s fucking you like he’s got something to prove, and you’re writhing with every sharp and deep thrust, hands clutching the duvet until your knuckles shake.

It hurts a bit. Or, rather, stings. Stretches you. Makes you moan deep down your chest with every stroke. You’re oversensitive, be it from the unfamiliar position or everything else, so you can’t help it when a high-pitched, deep-throated wail rips out of you.

It sounded different from all your other sounds. It sounded pained. And Michael stilled like a statue almost immediately, planting his knees on the mattress and falling forward. His hands land next to your torso, caging you in and supporting him as he kisses your shoulder. 

He breathes, anxious: “You alright, ba—?”

You nod, hot black tears mixed with mascara streaking down your cheeks. You push your hips back against him to no avail, heaving a sob: “I’m fine, Mike, just—”

One palm shoots back, digging into the meat of your hip, stilling you. “No, hold on, stop movin’ for a second. Talk to me, baby. Did I hurt you?”

“Mike!” you punch out, frustrated because he just won’t fucking move. “It felt so g–good… I wanna come so bad, pleeease, please just keep going—”

His hips twitch against you, almost imperceptibly, but not near enough. Breath hot against your cheek, he stays in place, burying his face in your neck and planting his hands again. “Okay…” he sighs around the kisses he’s peppering on your nape. “Okay, I’m right here. I got you. Just breathe for me, mama.”

Oh, his pace is brutal. Unrelenting once he starts, and you want it to last forever. He’s utilizing every bit of those dancer’s hips of his, the squelching wet sounds milking you for every moan you’ve got. You never want this ache to end, it hurts so goo—

Michael’s hand moves. You have half a millisecond to register the blur in your periphery before you feel it. Sneaking under you, past your stomach and your mound. Landing a slap against your swollen clit.

You choke, sputtering, shaking, writhing. “Mike–ah, ahh—!”

No, no, not yet, notyetnotyet…

“Yeah, ‘s good? Your man’s giving it good, baby?”

You’re coming, and it’s scathing. Body folding in on itself, a stinging pleasure spreading from your pussy up your belly like a hot wave, reaching up your eyes and falling into fresh tears. Your shoulders are shaking, and you’re left raw.

But, Mike’s still going.

“D–did, d’you just—?” His sentence gets cut off by his whimper, the feeling of you squeezing him too much, too good. You’re pulsing, milking him, keeping him where you need him most.

You’re still shaking, chest caving in. “Yeah,” you hiccup, “yeah, yeahyeahye–ah… A–ahh!”

When Michael comes inside you, he does so brokenly. His hips drive into you one last time, squeezing you so tight you might be left with marks, flush against you. Deep, snug. Making you feel full with him, his cum warm and sticky. You can’t really feel it right now, but you know you’ll do once he pulls out.

He exhales against your throat. His hands, pretty and veined, sneak beneath the blazer you’ve surely ruined by now, unclasping your bra and wrapping around your tits. And, right now, it feels grounding and soft. Something dragging you back from the ledge as he pulls out, and you feel more like a leaky faucet than a woman.

“Oh, my God…” you groan, thighs twitching as both your releases trickle down. Your pussy makes a valiant effort to keep them in, clenching and puffing, but to no avail. She might be broken. “Oh. My. God.”

Michael falls down on the bed, his head landing on the pillow. You’re not too keen on moving right now, so he has to grab you by your still-raised hips and maneuver you around so you can lie your head on his chest. He wraps one arm over your waist, hugging you close. You have one foot draped between his, ear listening to the drumming beats of his racing heart, the push-and-pull of his lungs almost a lullaby.

“What jus’ happened?” he pants, in awe.

“Mike,” you giggle, just as breathless. “You happened. Where the hell did all that come from?”

“I–I don’t know,” he exhales. “It just… did.”

“Yeah, I’ll say. I think you broke me. Like, officially.”

His eyes clench, and when you twist to look at him, the sight leaves you with cottonmouth. He’s sweaty, forehead glistening, makeup ruined to reveal his small patches of that face you love so much. His curls are sticking to his skin, and those lips look awfully kissable.

“Don’t say that—”

You catch his words just as they slip out, the kiss open-mouthed and soft, tongues caressing each other for a moment before breaking apart. “Why? It’s true. You’ve broken me.”

“Now you’re makin’ me feel bad…” His arm tightens around you, his other palm coming up to rub soothing strokes on your clothed forearm.

He pecks your forehead, and you ask: “Baby, why? Why would you even say that?”

He sucks in a breath, avoiding your gaze. You can tell it takes a lot for him to find the words, let alone say it out loud. “It’s just… We’ve been together for so long, and I jus’… I never saw you give in like that before. Have I… been leaving you wanting?”

Oh, this stupid, stupid boy.

“Hey, look at me. Look at my face, Mike.” You love him so much. It’s clear by the beam that works its way up your cheeks, pearly whites flashing as you lift your head and use one palm on his chest for balance. “Is that what you’ve been thinking about? Ever since… we talked?”

Fingers catching on his jaw, you make him look at you. Really look at you. At your puffy eyes and destroyed makeup, the bruised and pretty lips that would love nothing more than to speak his name always, your cheeks that ache from the smiles he’s pulling out of you.

“Yeah,” he nods, arms tightening.

“Let me make something abundantly clear, alright?” You school your expression into a deadpan. “I’ve loved you since we were sixteen. We could stop having sex tomorrow, and I’d still be the most satisfied woman on Earth. It took a lot to get where we are. There isn’t anybody, not one in the whole world, that makes me feel like you do. Okay? Not some philandering guitarist whose album I worked on, or whoever fucking else. D’you get that?”

Jokingly, you jab a finger on his temple. And, there’s that grin. Slow and sly, pulling at the apples of his cheeks.

“I get that,” he echoes.

“Kiss me,” you urge, eyebrows raised in a challenge. He does, a soft and lingering peck. You smirk. “Now tell me again.”

He rolls his eyes, smile blinding. “I’m your one.”

“Good,” you nod, giving him a kiss before wincing. You weren’t kidding when you told him he might’ve broken you. “Now… Is my one, who loooves meee, gonna run us a bath? With those, um, bathbombs I like? The black raspberry vanilla?”

“I spoil you too much,” he groans playfully, giving your ass a soft smack before getting up.

Undressing right here in front of you, he discards his ruined shirt and pants and underwear on the floor in one fell swoop. As he walks out of the room, you curl over on the bed, eyes following his ass like a moth to a flame.

He’s doing it on purpose. Please, what are you supposed to do? Not stare?

You wolf whistle. He shouts out a, “Hey!” that’s half-muffled by the bathroom door, and you burst into postorgasmic giggles; the kind when everything’s warm and gooey and fun, muscles tired and syrupy.

In the end, you end up falling asleep while waiting for the bath. When Michael comes back in the room, he smiles; eyes softening, heart thundering. With gentle hands, he removes the blazer from your body, draping it over the chair at the vanity. He cleans you up with a warm towel he damped in the bathtub, and climbs into bed with you once he’s done.

He falls asleep with you inside his arms, lulled by the tiny snores you always deny making. (He always indulges.)

(Two weeks later, you’ve just clocked out of work. Sadly, you’d made the mistake of stopping by your local supermarket that always stocks Michael’s favorite OJ.

You’re leaning on your kitchen island, sipping on a glass of store-bought orange juice, the phone receiver balanced between your shoulder and ear. Michael picked up on the first ring. “You’ll never believe how I got recognized at Ralph’s. I’m giving you three tries. Go.”

“Well, obviously from Thriller? A kid or teen?”

You gulp another mouthful of juice. “‘Obviously,’ huh? Humblebrag much? Nope. Try again.”

“The AMAs?”

You mimic an incorrect game-show buzzer. “Close, but no. One more for the million.”

“Girl, jus’ tell me.”

“Forfeiting… Wasn’t expecting that.” The tabloid paper crinkles as you fix it in your hold, clearing your throat. “Does ‘Michael tells Prince to beat it after the on-stage display’ give you any hints? No wrong answers, babe, I believe in y—”

The laugh on the other side of the line is gut-deep. “No way—!”

“Mhm. Fucking paps didn’t even get my good side.”

“Naw, that can’t be right. All you’ve got is good sides, baby.”

You bite your cheek, snorting. “Awe, tha—”

“Right, left, front… Ohhh, that back…”

Your smile falls, neck flushing. “Alright, now. Well, Bernice and her friend don’t seem to think so.”

“Who the hell’s Bernice and her friend?”

“Two old ladies with very strong opinions about my waistline and blowout. Yeah,” you snort when he howls on the other side, “a–apparently, apparently! I look like I haven’t slept since the bicentennial. Whole reason I stopped in the damn market was for your juice, too! Mikeee, stop laughi–iiing—!”)

3leni © 2026 — i do not consent to my work being republished on other platforms or put into ai. do not copy or plagiarize. all edits are by me as well!