“I Can Give You More Than A Hug” @goldenapplehead05 - Tumblr Blog

SUCK IT

f!reader (secret gf reader) / dangerous michael

(lowercase INTENDED!) & not proofread ! semi-nsfw (18+) if you really squint

preview: after begging you for days to be in his ‘in the closet’ mv, michael decides to use your secret relationship to his full advantage while he teases you the best he can on set. making you go entirely insane.

A/N: atp give me a blunt, 30 mins in silence, and my phone and suddenly ideas that have never come to me decides to display in my mind EXPEDITIOUSLY 😭😭 bc rn im lowkey eating these up waittt

“michael stop ittt” your glossy lips parting at a giggle escaping from you at michael’s fingers tickling the sides of your body. his smile big and mischievous as the director and crew mates watch in both ‘aw’ and confusion around you both on set.

first it was the secret glances.

michael giving you those lil stares he’d do when it would just be you two alone back at his place. then it was the soft touches to your skin between each dance move or set change. “hold her right there and just sway around him!” the director shouts as he covers himself more from the hot sun.

except michael never paid full attention to the directors words as the scene starts once again to only end in michael’s hands touching your hips, letting his palms glide over your skimpy white skirt. his hands a lil too low as he slightly cups the bottom of your cheek making a soft gasp to escape and michael’s low voice vibrating against you with a small sound of laughter.

the people around you both focusing on michael’s singing and not on the secret teasing act your lovely boyfriend did right in-front of their eyes. “stop. teasin’” your voice low with a smile to still act on camera.

“y’looking real good baby i can’t” that gleam in his eyes showing everything you needed to know.

michael was going to be trouble tonight. after begging you for days to appear in his new mv for ‘in the closet’ to only receive a respectful decline due to your relationship with him still being a secret, you finally caved in days prior to the actual shooting.

the only thing you responded back to him was “don’t play any game.” and oh did he not listen.

at all.

by the time the sun starts to slowly set, the humidity begins to grow even more. sweat starts to slowly drip down the side of your temple as michael catches on and wipes your sides with the pads of his thumbs gently.

“thank you baby.” you hush your voice more to prevent the others from listening at the sudden pet-name given to him. michael tugs the corner of his lip between his teeth as he looks at your lips and soon after your eyes.

you knew that look anywhere and any time. especially when michael desperately wanted to kiss you. and he wanted to kiss you so badly right now.

“michael you can’t—“ he kisses his teeth before rubbing his palms over his dark jeans. his eyes now scanning around the set as he watches attentively the crew scatter around for the last few scenes that needed to be shot.

at the glimpse of all of them looking at different locations, eyes not focused on both you and michael, he snaps towards you before quickly giving you a kiss on your lips. the plumpness of his over your own as the gloss smears over his mouth.

the strawberry taste engulfing him as you let out a sudden whimper at the loss of contact by how fast he pulls away from you. you watch as michael licks his lips tasting the gloss before puckering and smiling at you sheepishly. “see? easy.”

“you’re a pain.”

you roll your eyes as michael laughs attempting to grab your wrists in his hold. “and you love it ma.” before continuing to play with you.

once everyone begins to work again, the heat had intensified. you were simply so tired at how long the day has been while pretending at the same time that the man in-front of you wasn’t the love of your life.

as if he wasn’t the same man who sleeps with you at night or bickers over the smallest things.

right now he was just michael jackson.

but you wanted him so badly to just be michael right now.

as the director gives you more instructions for the next scene the music plays again through the loud bass speakers. as michael continues to dance and sing capturing a few solo shots, you follow the orders you were given to do.

your palms touching the sides of his body, placing perfectly over his ribs. michael watches as he continues singing his verse—still never letting his eyes remove from your body and your current act of touching him and lowering yourself slowly towards the ground.

as michael continues to prop himself up with the pole behind him, he lets his arms fall to both sides as he spreads them over the pole holding him back. your eyes are still on his as you continue to lower yourself to the ground, hands still gliding over his body sensually as you sway your hips to the rhythm of the song.

once you’re below, hands now holding michael’s knees while your face is near his almost growing bulge, he grins before letting one hand away from the pole and over your head. his hand now over your hair as you continue to watch him, never leaving your eye contact with him. you could hear faded cheers and compliments from the crew at the scene in-front of them for the video.

not knowing that it wasn’t an act anymore.

michael’s eyes darken as he lets his lip part with the tip of his tongue. wetting his bottom lip still at the sight of you practically on your knees for him. “suck it ma.”

your eyes snap wide at his murmured words as you let your hands tighten around his legs. “michael…” he grips your hair from the roots a bit as you still sway your hips to the music.

now slowly dancing and swaying your way back up to face michael completely, he lowers his grip from your roots to the bottom of your hair before leaning your head back and singing some more near the nape of your neck.

his body warm by the heat and the intensity between you two silently growing as he lowers his lips a bit near your ear. “should’ve sucked it while you were already down there pretty.”

a gasp follows along with a quiet whimper at his touch still on your body. michael, still calm and collected, as he continues to dirty talk your way around the prop. “looking real beautiful on your knees for me.”

your heart accelerating at his words as you now were unraveling slowly into a puddy like state. your mind hazy as your lips felt dry. you needed to feel him more than the little touches you were indicated to do for his shoot and you were completely losing it by now.

michael knew, and decided to take it to his fullest advantage. slowly letting his hand now place over the skimpy skirt material. layer so thin you swore you could feel his nails dig slightly over the material and into your ass cheek—making sure you felt his every touch.

the wetness of your panties making your legs wobble a bit at the sudden soaking feeling as michael realizes at the shut of your eyes and your knees brushing against his own heavily.

the director continues to praise grace as he shouts a cut for the next scene. your breath uneasy as everyone starts switching props and lighting for the last few scene takes. once your eyes are away from everyone, you grab michael’s hand before pulling him to a secluded area behind a wall.

“you’re out of your mind!” you exclaim seeing michael laugh as he dips his head to kiss behind your ear. your body instantly betraying you as you grip over his white top. his lean muscle defined even more by the harsh sun and the sweat shining over his skin.

“i wasn’t lying. should’ve sucked it baby.”

“michael!”

he shakes his head before letting the tip of his finger drag over your lip softly. “and sucked it real good like i know you always do mama”

at the continuous dirty talk you push his chest a bit before hearing his laughter fade at the sudden quickness of your body moving back to where the rest of the crew was at.

the entire evening still consisting of michael messing with you, letting you melt more by his secret touches, and secluded praises whispered in your ear between more takes.

buckysgirlll

♬ “—teach me how to scream!” ♬

ミ★ FEATURING: otw!michael x fem!reader

ꨄ SYNOPSIS: after the last time you and michael tried to be intimate it didn’t go quite well. now, you’re restless and want nothing more than to feel him inside of you.

sequel to ♬ “—everything real big” ♬

WARNINGS: 18+ MINORS DNI — unprotected p in v, oral (f receiving), michael is a certified eater btw, mating press, handjob, belly bulge, switch!michael if you squint really hard, reader is so loud that his brothers ended up overhearing oops

ღ WORD COUNT: 1.7k

ღ NOTES: yesssss guys part 2 is here!!! i actually never even planned to do another part but since its highly requested, i can’t leave my fellow moonwalkers high and dry ahaha

michael jackson masterlist ༻ navi

it’s late, already past midnight and you’ve been awake for hours. it’s been a couple days since you and michael attempted to have sexual intercourse and you haven’t been able to get it out of your head.

you can’t help but feel embarrassed.

michael doesn’t seem to care. he’s already shrugged it off and carried on like normal. giving you kisses every chance he gets, touching every single part of your body that he can reach but you can’t help the nagging feeling at the back of your mind.

you are so adamant about taking all of him and you want to… no you need to.

lullora

<𝟑 .ᐟ DATE NIGHT

۶ৎ pairing — michael x fem!reader

۶ৎ synopsis — you were michael’s girlfriend and you co-wrote billie jean. he brought brooke shields as his date to the grammys, so you put on a red dress and arrived with Prince out of spite, knowing michael would lose his mind.

۶ৎ themes — established relationship, mutual jealousy, possession, oral f!receiving, sexual content, angsty & hella tense

۶ৎ wc — 8.9k

۶ৎ note — i felt soooo messy writing this but it was so much fun, i needed to capture the essence of that michael & prince rivalry lmaoo hope y’all enjoy xoxo

You were standing in the kitchen, halfway through a glass of water, when Michael leaned against the doorframe with that particular expression he wore when he was about to say something he already knew would hurt you. Casual, almost rehearsed, like if he said it lightly enough, it wouldn't land as hard.

"I'm taking Brooke to the Grammys."

The water glass stopped halfway to your mouth, but you didn't put it down. You didn't react, not right away, because reacting was exactly what he expected and you refused to give him that. So you took a slow sip, set the glass on the counter with a deliberate click and looked at him.

"Brooke Shields." You repeated the name like you were tasting it, deciding whether it was bitter or just plain stupid.

"It's not what you think." He was already defensive, arms crossing over his chest, jaw tightening the way it always did when he felt cornered. "It's optics, baby. If I show up with you, people are gonna ask questions. Who is she, how long have they been together, why is she on his arm? And then they dig. They find out you wrote on the album and suddenly it's not about the music anymore, it's about us."

"So instead, you show up with a supermodel and the music stays pure? Got it."

"Oh c’mon that’s not fair." He responded.

"No." You set your hands flat on the counter, leaning forward just enough to close the distance between you. "What's not fair is that I helped write the music being celebrated and I can't even be next to you when they hand you the trophy."

He opened his mouth then closed it, shifting his weight. You knew that particular brand of silence, the one where he was running through every possible response and discarding them all because none of them were good enough. Michael was brilliant at performing, at being exactly who the world needed him to be at any given moment. But here, in your kitchen, with you looking at him like that, he had nothing.

"I'm protecting you baby." He said finally, quietly, like that was supposed to fix it.

You stared at him for a long moment before picking up your glass and walking past him out of the kitchen. He didn't follow, he never did when he knew he was wrong.

The night of the Grammys, you took your sweet time getting ready. Not because you needed it, but because you wanted him to suffer.

You stood in front of the full-length mirror in your bedroom, the one propped against the wall by the window where the late afternoon light hit just right and you studied yourself with the kind of critical, deliberate eye usually reserved for photo shoots. Hair curled, bouncy, falling past your shoulders in loose waves that caught the light when you turned your head. Red lipstick, the shade you knew was dangerous, the one that made your mouth look fuller and sharper like a weapon disguised as a colour choice. Your skin was glowing from the lotion you'd spent an extra ten minutes working into your arms and collarbones, the vanilla scent still faintly clinging.

The dress was hanging on the back of the bedroom door, waiting.

You'd found it two weeks ago at a boutique on Melrose, tucked between a sea of pastels and shoulder pads and you'd known immediately. Red. Not burgundy, not coral, not any of the safe shades women were supposed to reach for at events like this. A real, unapologetic red that did exactly what it was designed to do. The hemline perched just above your knees, fitted through the torso without being obscene, the neckline dipping low enough to suggest but never quite crossing the line into desperate. It was sexy, provocative and tasteful all at once. It was the dress equivalent of a well-aimed insult.

You slipped it on, tugging the fabric smooth over your hips, adjusting the way it hugged your curves. The zipper ran up the back and you had to twist, fingers fumbling slightly, before it sealed you in. You turned back to the mirror.

God.

You looked incredible. You knew it the way you knew a good melody when you heard it, instinctively, without arrogance. The red against your skin, the way the dress moved when you shifted your weight, the curls framing your face, the lipstick that could start a war. You looked like a woman who knew exactly what she was doing and had decided to do it anyway.

Michael was going to lose his mind and thought should have made you feel guilty, but it didn't.

You slipped into your heels, a simple pair of black pumps that elongated your legs without competing with the dress and grabbed your clutch from the dresser.

A horn sounded from the driveway, Prince was early. You took one last look at yourself in the mirror. The woman staring back at you looked steady, poised, untouchable, yet you weren't any of those things. You were furious and heartbroken, already composing the exact expression you'd wear when Michael saw you for the first time tonight, the one that would say I'm fine, I'm better than fine and you’re going to regret not bringing me.

Prince was waiting by the curb when you stepped outside, leaning against the open door of a black town car with his arms folded loosely, looking like he'd been cut out of a magazine and pasted into your driveway. A dark suit, fitted close to his frame, with a ruffled shirt underneath that should have looked ridiculous on anyone else but on him looked like the only possible choice. His hair was slicked back, the faintest curl escaping near his temple and he was watching you with that expression he always wore, amused, appraising, like he was solving a puzzle he already had the answer to.

Behind the wheel, a driver you didn't recognise sat motionless, eyes forward, the kind of professional who knew how to be invisible.

"Well…" Prince breathed, eyes tracking down the length of you and back up again, slow and unhurried. "Someone's trying to cause a scene."

"You're early." You ignored the comment, pulling your front door shut behind you, checking the lock twice because you always checked it twice.

"You're stunning." He said it easily, the way he said most things, like compliments were just facts he was generous enough to share out loud. He uncrossed his arms and reached behind him into the back seat, pulling something out. A white rose, long stemmed, the petals tight and perfect, still damp with a thin sheen of water. He held it out to you without ceremony, like it was nothing, like he hadn't thought about it at all.

You took it, the stem cool between your fingers. "What's this for?" You asked.

"Every queen needs a scepter." He offered and gestured toward the open door. "After you ma’am."

You slid into the back seat, tucking the rose carefully against your clutch so the petals wouldn't crush. The leather was warm, butter soft and the interior smelled like cologne, something faintly sweet and unmistakably expensive. Prince climbed in behind you, closing the door with a solid, satisfying click and the car pulled away from the curb, smooth and silent, like it was gliding.

The silence between you wasn't uncomfortable. Prince had a particular talent for being quiet without making it feel empty. He let you have your space, let you stare out the window as the streetlights streaked by, let you smooth the fabric of your red dress across your thighs for the third time because your hands needed something to do.

"You don't have to be nervous." He eventually spoke, his voice low and one arm draped across the back of the seat behind you, not touching, just there.

"I'm not nervous." You responded hastily, lying through your teeth.

"You're folding your clutch strap into a smaller and smaller loop, baby. You're going to snap it off."

You looked down and he was right. You set the clutch in your lap and pressed your palms flat against the leather seat instead.

"You wrote on that album." He continued, his voice a little quieter now. "Whatever happens tonight, you should be proud of that. They can't take that away from you."

"I know." You murmured, a slight exasperation evidenced in your tone.

"Do you?"

You glanced at him. He was watching you now, jaw set, eyes sharp and serious beneath the passing lights. It was the most serious he'd been all evening and something about it, the steadiness of him, the way he said it like it was obvious, like of course you should be proud, made something behind your ribs unclench just slightly.

"Yeah." You said. "I do."

He nodded once, satisfied and then the corner of his mouth twitched. "Good. Now fix your lipstick, it's smudged."

"My lipstick is not smudged!"

"Left side, just a little."

You pulled down the visor mirror and checked. It was perfect. You snapped the mirror shut and glared at him, but he was grinning.

"Asshole." You murmured, but you were smiling and that was the point. He'd gotten you to smile, Prince was annoyingly good at that.

The Auditorium was a circus.

That was the only word for it. Flashbulbs popping like a string of firecrackers, voices layered on top of voices, the air thick with perfume and hairspray along with the particular electric hum that only lived in places where famous people were crammed into the same room. You'd been to events before, you weren't naive, but there was something about the Grammys that felt different, more frantic, like the stakes were higher even though they were exactly the same.

The driver pulled up to the entrance and came around to open Prince's door. Prince stepped out first, straightening his jacket and then turned to offer you his hand. You took it, the white rose still tucked against your clutch in your other hand and as you rose from the back seat you felt it, the shift, the way the air changed the second you were both standing upright on the carpet. Cameras turned and lenses swung.

You were gripping the rose so tightly that the stem was bending and Prince noticed, of course he noticed.

"Hey." His hand found your waist, not inappropriate, just there, firm and warm through the fabric of your dress, steadying you the way you'd brace a door against a storm. He dipped his head slightly so his mouth was close to your ear. "Walk slowly, right next to me. Don't rush, you have nowhere to be except exactly where you are."

You shuddered slightly, the warmth of his breath grazing the delicate flesh of your neck.

"I mean it." He breathed, pulling back just enough to look at you. "Walk like you own the building. Can you do that for me?"

You nodded.

"Good." He straightened his posture before adjusting his cuffs and offered you his arm. "Then let's give them something to talk about."

You took his arm and stepped into the flood of lights together.

The flashbulbs got brighter. You felt it immediately, the way strangers eyes slid over you and lingered, not because they knew who you were but because you were on the arm of someone they recognised. You kept your chin up and your steps slow. You'd learned that from Michael, actually, the art of walking through a room like you belonged there even when every cell in your body was screaming that you didn't. But tonight, Prince was the one holding your waist and setting the pace, and his grip didn't falter, not once, not even when the flashbulbs got brighter and the crowd pressed closer and someone shouted his name from behind a barricade.

Prince navigated the crowd the way he navigated everything, effortlessly, with the quiet confidence of someone who knew exactly how much space he was allowed to take up and decided to take up a little more. He introduced you to people as you moved through the lobby, a producer here, an executive there, always the same way. She's a songwriter, co-wrote a track on Thriller. Every single time. No shorthand, no glossing over it. He said it like it was the most important thing in the room.

You loved him for it. Not romantically, not like that, but there was a particular kind of loyalty in the way Prince acknowledged your work, loudly and publicly, to people who needed to hear it and you would never forget that.

The crowd thickened near the entrance to the main hall and Prince pressed his hand firmer against the small of your back to guide you through a gap between a cluster of industry men and a woman in a sequined gown who was blocking the doorway while she searched her purse for something.

And then you saw him. Michael.

He was halfway across the lobby, standing in a loose circle of people you half-recognised. A publicist, someone from CBS, maybe Quincy's assistant and he had his arm around Brooke Shields.

She was beautiful, of course she was beautiful. Tall, brunette, luminous in a way that looked effortless even though nothing about a red carpet was effortless. She was laughing at something someone in the circle had said, her head tilted slightly and Michael was smiling beside her, aviators on even though they were indoors, his sequined glove catching the light every time he moved his hand.

You knew him well enough to see it. The way he held himself, the angle of his shoulders, the specific cadence of his laugh. He was performing. He was Michael Jackson right now and this was the version the world got. Polished, untouchable, perfect.

He hadn't seen you yet.

Your stomach tightened. Not in the dramatic, cinematic way, not like the movies where everything slows down and the soundtrack swells. It was quieter than that, a slow, creeping ache, like pressing on a sore bruise.

"You alright?" Prince murmured, close to your ear, his voice low enough that only you could hear. All you could do was nod in agreement and force a smile upon your lips.

"Hm." He didn't believe you but he didn't push it either. He just adjusted his hand at your waist, a fraction firmer and steered you toward the entrance of the main hall.

You didn't look back at Michael. You wanted to. God, you wanted to turn your head and see if he was watching, if he'd clocked the red dress, if his jaw had tightened the way it always did when something got under his skin, but you didn't give him that. You kept your eyes forward, your steps slow the way Prince had told you, your expression exactly the way Michael had taught you to wear it and you walked into the Grammys on someone else's arm.

The Shrine Auditorium was bigger from the inside.

You'd expected it to be impressive, you weren't naive, but there was something about sitting in a velvet seat in the fourth row of the Grammys with a white rose resting across your lap and a man who was not your boyfriend beside you that made the whole thing feel slightly surreal, like you'd wandered into someone else's life and they hadn't noticed yet.

Prince sat with his legs crossed, one arm resting on the armrest between you, relaxed in a way you envied. He was scanning the room the way he scanned every room, cataloguing, calculating, filing people away. You, on the other hand, were gripping the program so hard your knuckles had gone pale and the show hadn't even started yet.

Michael was three rows ahead of you to the left.

You could see the back of his head, just the back of it. The curls, dark and glossy, catching the overhead stage lights. He was leaning slightly toward Brooke, murmuring something and she was nodding, smiling, her brown curls falling over one shoulder in a way that looked effortless and intentional at the same time.

Your stomach turned. Not violently, just a slow, sick roll, like the floor had tilted a fraction of a degree and everything had shifted with it. Nausea, that was the word for it. A low, creeping nausea that had nothing to do with what you'd eaten and everything to do with the fact that the man three rows ahead of you was supposed to be yours and was currently leaning into someone else's shoulder like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Stop staring." Prince murmured beside you, not unkindly.

"I'm not staring."

"You've been looking at the back of his head for two full minutes, I counted."

You forced yourself to look at the stage. The lights were shifting and a voice you recognised from somewhere was doing the opening monologue. You didn't hear a word of it because your ears were ringing with something that wasn't sound, just the low hum of adrenaline, dread and the particular frequency of jealousy that made everything feel slightly too bright. And then the first category was announced, Michael's name was called, causing the room to erupt.

He stood up slowly, the way he did everything when people were watching. Brooke touched his arm as he rose, a small, proprietary gesture that you hated yourself for clocking and he adjusted his jacket, smoothed the front of it and walked toward the stage with that walk, you knew that walk. The glide, the controlled grace, the way his whole body moved like it was connected to some invisible wire that pulled him forward. He was beautiful. Fuck, he was beautiful. The curls bouncing slightly with each step, the military jacket structured across his shoulders, the sequined glove catching the light, the aviators hiding everything behind a dark, mirrored wall.

He looked like he'd been carved out of something more permanent than skin.

He eventually reached the podium. The applause was enormous, rolling through the arena like a wave and he stood there for a moment, letting it wash over him, head slightly bowed, one hand resting on the award someone had just placed in his gloved hand. Humble. He was performing humble and he was doing it so well you almost believed it, except you knew him, you knew the boy who rehearsed his acceptance speeches in the mirror and still got nervous. Somewhere underneath all that polish was someone who wanted this so badly it terrified him.

"Thank you." He breathed into the microphone, his voice quiet, almost fragile. "Thank you so much. I, uh... I don't even know what to say."

He laughed, a small, breathy sound and the audience loved it. They loved him. You could feel it in the air, the way the whole room leaned toward him like flowers toward light.

"I want to thank Quincy." He continued, gaining momentum as his voice steadied. "Quincy Jones, for believing in this album when nobody else would have taken the chance. I want to thank my family. My mother, my father, my brothers and sisters. I want to thank Diana..."

Diana. Of course. Diana Ross, who had been there from the beginning, who had held his hand when he was small and terrified, too young for the world he was about to enter. The list kept going. Engineers, producers, executives, people he'd mentioned in every interview, people whose names filled the air like confetti and yours wasn't among them.

It was never going to be, you knew that. You weren't stupid, you understood the politics of public gratitude, but knowing it didn't stop the way it felt. It didn't stop the quiet, devastating weight of sitting three rows behind him while he thanked the entire world and didn't even turn his head as he walked off stage. The applause followed him like a shadow yet he didn't look at you, not once.

The second time his name was called, you thought it would be easier. It wasn't.

He stood up again with that same walk, same bow, same breathy humility at the podium. You watched the curls, the way they brushed the collar of his jacket, how his lips moved around words you couldn't hear anymore because the ringing was back, that awful, high-pitched ringing that had no correlation with the volume of the applause but everything to do with the fact that your body was staging a rebellion against your brain.

The nausea was worse this time. Not sharp, just deep, spreading outward from your stomach like ink in water and you pressed your palm flat against your thigh under the program to keep your hands from shaking.

On the big screen overhead, the camera cut to the audience, to Brooke Shields.

She was smiling, applauding, her face lit up with genuine delight and she looked like she belonged there in that seat, in his life. The camera lingered on her for a moment too long and you felt it like a physical thing, a fist closing slowly around something soft inside your chest, forcing you to look away. Instead you glanced at your hands, at the white rose in your lap, at the program, the words blurring slightly because your eyes were doing something you refused to let them finish doing.

"You alright?" Prince asked, a hint of concern tethered to his words.

"Fine." You managed, despite your voice sounding strange to your own ears.

He didn't say anything for a moment but his hand found yours under the armrest and squeezed once, firm, brief and let go. He didn't look at you, instead he kept his eyes on the stage. It was the kindest thing anyone had done for you and you hated how much it made you want to crumble.

The third time. The fourth time. The fifth.

You stopped counting the categories. Best Pop Vocal. Best Engineered Album. Best Producer. The names and speeches blurred together along with the constant eruption of applause and every single time, the same thing happened. Michael's name, his walk, those stupid curls, yet worst of all, the list of thanks that never, ever included you.

On the sixth win, the camera found Brooke again and something inside you shifted. Not broke, not yet, but shifted and the nausea surged so suddenly you had to swallow hard and press your tongue against the roof of your mouth to keep everything down.

She was mouthing I'm so proud of you toward the stage. You could read her lips and you hated her for it, hated her with a ferocity that surprised you even though it wasn't her fault. She didn't know, she was just a girl sitting in a seat that had been offered to her by a man who was incapable of being honest about the things that mattered.

On the seventh win, Michael thanked God. He thanked Berry Gordy. He thanked the fans, and the arena screamed so loud the walls vibrated, but he still didn't look at you, not even a glance in your direction. You might as well have been in another building.

The eighth time his name was called, the arena was on its feet before he even stood up.

Eight. Eight Grammys. A record, a historic, staggering, once in a lifetime record and the whole room knew it, vibrating with it, the applause building on itself like something with its own heartbeat.

Michael stood up, slower this time. You could see it, even from behind, the slight hesitation, the way his hand pressed briefly against his thigh before he smoothed his jacket. He was overwhelmed. Underneath the aviators and the performance, he was overwhelmed and your chest ached with the recognition of it because you knew that man, you knew what this meant to him and you wanted to be the person he turned to right now more than you had ever wanted anything.

He walked to the stage and he was a vision, a monument, a walking piece of history and he was so beautiful it made you sick, genuinely, physically sick, the nausea climbing up your throat like something alive.

He reached the podium but the applause didn't stop. It just kept going relentlessly and he stood there with his head bowed, one hand on the podium, the other holding the award and he let it happen. He let them love him.

"Thank you." He whispered, the mic barely catching his voice. "Thank you."

The room quieted ever so slightly.

"I don't... I don't have the words for this." He breathed and his voice cracked a fraction, the audience gasping softly, collectively, the way a crowd does when something real breaks through the performance. "This album... this album almost didn't happen. There were so many times I thought... I thought maybe it wasn't good enough, maybe I wasn't good enough."

He paused and adjusted his aviators. You could see his jaw tighten behind them, it was undeniable.

"I want to thank Quincy, again, for the hundredth time. He's probably sick of hearing it." He chuckled dryly, siphoning a quiet laugh from the audience. "I also want to thank my family again… My mother, my father, my brothers and of course Diana, for always believing in me when I didn't believe in myself."

Diana. Again.

"I want to thank the fans. You guys... you guys are everything. Everything." He spoke as he lifted the award slightly, a gesture of offering and the arena screamed.

He never spoke your name, nor did he pass a single glance in your direction.

Michael walked off the stage for the eighth time and you sat there with the white rose in your lap, your nails digging into your own palm so hard you could feel the crescent marks forming. Prince shifted beside you and you could feel his gaze burning a hole into your skin, but you kept your eyes forward, jaw locked, because if you opened your mouth right now you would either scream or cry and neither of those was an option. "You ready?" He asked. You didn't know what he meant. Ready for what?

Prince won for Best Rock Vocal Performance, which surprised no one and everyone at the same time, because Prince existed in a space where surprise and inevitability were the same thing.

He stood, adjusting his cuffs, one at a time, unhurried, like time itself would wait for him if he asked it to. He smoothed the front of his jacket, rolled his shoulders once and leaned down to you, his mouth close enough to your ear that you could feel the warmth of his breath against your skin. "Save my seat." He murmured and then he was gone.

He walked up the aisle toward the stage and the whole room turned to watch him, because that was what Prince did, he moved through space like he owned every square inch of it, like the air rearranged itself to make room for him. He didn't rush and he sure as hell didn't acknowledge the cameras tracking him from every angle. He just walked with deliberation, the heels of his boots clicking against the arena floor in a rhythm that sounded almost choreographed and by the time he reached the stairs the applause had already started, a low, rolling thing that built as he climbed, as he reached the top of the steps, as he crossed the stage toward the podium with the kind of walk that made you understand why people compared him to Hendrix and every other pretty, dangerous thing that ever made a room hold its breath.

He reached the microphone. It was slightly too tall for him but somehow that made it better, because Prince could make anything look intentional. He rested one hand on the edge of the podium, allowing his gaze to sweep the crowd and waited. He let the applause roll over him like a wave he was choosing not to surf.

"Thank you." He began, his voice smooth and unhurried, like he was starting a conversation rather than accepting an award. "This is... this is nice. I appreciate it." He spoke, drawing a small laugh from the audience. "But I'm not gonna take all the credit tonight. I don't think that's fair."

He shifted his weight and something in his expression sharpened.

"See, there's someone in this room right now who helped build one of the biggest songs on one of the biggest albums ever made. A songwriter, a real one. The kind that doesn't get called up to stages like this, the kind that just... watches from the crowd while other people collect trophies for work she helped create."

The room shifted. You could feel it, the way the air tightened, the way thousands of people leaned forward a fraction of an inch. Prince let the silence sit and he was good at that because he let it do the work.

"I think she deserves to be up here more than I do tonight." He continued, his voice dropping just slightly, not quieter but more intimate, like he'd drawn the room closer without moving. "So if she'll allow me..." He turned, scanning the crowd and his eyes found you instantly, like he'd known exactly where you were the whole time, like he hadn't needed to look. "This beautiful lady right here. Baby, why don't you come up here?"

Your entire body seized up. Not dramatically, but long enough that the people around you turned their heads, that the silence became a living thing, pressing against you from all sides. Your body wouldn't move. Your legs had stopped working and your brain was sending signals that were getting lost somewhere between intention and action. For one terrible, suspended moment you were just a girl sitting in a velvet seat in the fourth row of the Grammys with ten thousand people staring at her.

Prince was watching you from the stage with a practiced patience. He didn't wave nor repeat himself, he simply stood there, one hand resting on the podium and waited with a quiet confidence in his expression that registered as I know you can do this, so do it.

You came to a stance and your legs felt like jelly, disconnected, as if they belonged to someone else, but they held you and you took a step into the aisle. The walk to the stage was the longest walk of your life. The lights were blinding from this angle, cutting down from the rigging above and you could feel every pair of eyes in the building on you, cataloguing you, trying to figure out who you were and what you had to do with Prince, but most of all why he'd just called you baby on live television.

The stairs were worse. Your heel caught on the second one, just slightly, a tiny stumble that felt enormous and you gripped the railing, continuing because stopping was not an option anymore, not with the whole world watching, not with Prince extending his hand toward you from the top of the steps. You took it, his fingers intertwining with yours, warm and steady. He pulled you up beside him onto the stage and the lights hit you full in the face, the arena so bright you couldn't see the audience anymore, just a vast, dark sea of faces with the stage lights cutting between you and them like a wall.

Prince didn't let go of your hand right away. He squeezed once and then released you before he turned back to the microphone.

"This lady right here." He began, gesturing to you with an open palm, "Is a songwriter, one of the best living. She co-wrote Billie Jean."

The name landed like a stone in water. The audience murmured, rippled and you could hear it, recognition, the particular sound of a room putting a face to a song which they all knew had changed the shape of pop music. "Biggest song on the biggest album in the world." Prince continued, his voice calculated, letting each word land before he gave them the next. "And I just think... I think it's a shame when the people who build these things don't get credit where it’s due. I suppose some folks in this industry have a habit of forgetting who was in the room when the magic happened."

He didn't look at Michael when he said it because he didn't need to. The room knew, or at least they felt it, the way you feel a shift in air pressure before a storm and somewhere in the third row, Michael's jaw tightened behind his aviators. His fingers curled slowly around the armrest of his seat until the knuckles went white, the skin stretched taut over bone, the kind of grip that left marks and ached for hours after he finally let go.

"Baby, you helped build something that's never been done before tonight, don't let anyone make you feel small."

Baby.

Michael heard it, the sound cutting through everything else like a blade through silk. Baby. His word. Not a word he used casually, not a word he tossed around in interviews or dropped into conversations with strangers. His word for you. The word he whispered into the curve of your neck in the dark, his breath hot against your skin with his hips pressed flush against yours and his body buried deep inside you while the sheets tangled around your legs, the only sound in the room being your name and that word, again and again, baby, baby, baby, murmured like a prayer against your collarbone, groaned against the hollow of your throat, gasped into your mouth when he was so close he couldn't think anymore. It was the only honest word he had left when his body was moving inside yours and the rest of the world had dissolved into nothing.

His word, in another man's mouth, on live television, in front of ten million people. Something in Michael's chest cracked and his knuckles remained white against the armrest.

Prince turned to you as his hand located your waist steadily and he leaned in. His lips pressed against your cheek and he lingered there for a moment, just a moment longer than he needed to. You could feel the subtle scratch of his stubble against your skin amalgamated with the faint scent of his cologne and the arena erupted. The applause was enormous, rushing over you like a wave and somewhere in it you heard whistles, someone screaming, the particular sound of a crowd that had just been given a moment to remember.

Michael twitched, but it wasn’t his hand this time, it was his whole body. A single, sharp recoil, like he'd been touched with something hot, his shoulders jerking forward a fraction of an inch before he caught himself and went still again. It was the kind of movement that would be invisible to anyone who wasn't looking and nobody was looking because the whole arena was looking at you, at the woman in the red dress standing under the lights she deserved with another man's lips on her cheek.

Brooke touched his arm, yet he didn't react. She said his name, softly, a question but he didn't reply. He was watching you walk across that stage on someone else's arm and something inside him was breaking so quietly that no one around him would have noticed.

He was furious at Prince, annoyed at the hand on your waist, seething at the word baby still ringing in his ears like tinnitus, mad at the kiss that lingered, angry at the way Prince smiled at you like he had every right to smile at you like that. But underneath the jealousy that was eating him alive in a room full of cameras, there was something worse. You were standing in that light, in that dress, with your hair curled and your lips red with your chin lifted even though your hands were shaking and you were the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his life all while standing next to another man.

He'd done that. He'd brought Brooke, hidden you, stood up on that stage eight times and never said your name and now he was facing the consequences of his own actions. The taste in his mouth was something he didn't have a name for yet, but it tasted like losing.

Prince pulled back. He was smiling at you, not his public smile, but the real one that crinkled the corners of his eyes and he squeezed your waist once before guiding you back down the steps.

You didn't look at Michael, but he was definitely looking at you and he wasn't going to stop.

The hallway backstage was chaos, the particular organised chaos of a major awards show winding down, people moving in every direction with headsets and glasses of champagne, the energy shifting from formal to frantic as the night tilted toward its own conclusion. You slipped through it like a ghost, keeping close to the wall, your heels clicking against the concrete floor, the white rose still in your hand though half its petals had fallen somewhere between the stage steps and the fire exit.

You needed a minute. Just one minute to stand somewhere quiet and breathe, to let your hands stop shaking, let the adrenaline drain out of your body like water from a tub, to allow the reality of what just happened settle over you without ten thousand people watching. Prince had squeezed your waist at the bottom of the steps, murmured I'll find you and then disappeared into the current of industry people pulling him in six directions at once. You’d let yourself be swept the other way, ducking into a corridor that smelled like the faintest trace of someone's cigarette and you pressed your back against the wall, closing your eyes as you attempted to recall how lungs were supposed to work.

You heard Michael before you saw him.

Those footsteps, quick and sharp, like each one was an argument with the floor. You knew that walk. You knew it the way you knew your own heartbeat, the way you knew the sound of his breathing in the dark and the particular rhythm of his stride when he was upset.

You opened your eyes as Michael rounded the corner and for a moment he didn't see you, he just kept walking, his jaw set, his shoulders tight under the jacket, his gloved hand curled at his side. He was looking at the floor with the demeanour of someone who had just won eight Grammys and felt nothing, which was impossible. It was the most Michael thing you'd ever seen. Then he clocked you.

He stopped mid-stride, one foot still slightly ahead of the other and the distance between you was maybe ten feet, maybe less, but it felt enormous, like the kind of distance you couldn't cross without a passport and a really good reason.

He stared at you behind those aviators and you couldn't see his eyes, but you could see his mouth, the way his lips pressed together and his jaw working like he was chewing on words he hadn't been able to fathom yet. He stared you up and down involuntarily, his gaze dragging from your hair to your lips to the red dress to the rose in your hand and something flickered across his expression, gone before you could even name it.

"Hey." He greeted, almost monotone, the voice of someone holding something back with both hands.

"Hey." You responded flatly.

Neither of you moved. The hallway hummed with the distant sound of the auditorium emptying, of voices and footsteps. Between you the silence was so thick you could have drowned in it.

Michael reached up and removed his aviators.

You'd seen his face a thousand times, ten thousand times, in every light, in every mood, but you weren't ready for this. His eyes were red. Not crying, but close, the kind of red that came from holding something back too hard, from pressing your emotions down so far they had nowhere to go but up. He looked wrecked, like someone who had just broken a record and couldn't feel it, who had stood on a stage eight times and said thank you to everyone except the one person who mattered, who had watched another man call you baby on live television and had sat there with his knuckles white and his jaw clenched.

He looked like he hated himself yet the only way he could cope with that was by taking it out on you.

"You looked beautiful up there.” He spoke, a lump solidifying in his throat. The words came out clipped, almost mechanical, like he was reading them off a card. "On stage, with him."

You blinked, eyebrows raising in confusion. Of all the things you'd expected him to say, that wasn't it and the flatness of his voice made it impossible to tell if it was a compliment or an accusation, so you just stood there with your mouth slightly open and your heart hammering against your ribs.

"Thank you." You managed.

"Yeah." He slipped the aviators into his jacket pocket and his bare eyes found yours, the weight of them staggering, like looking into something that had no bottom. "Prince really knows how to make an entrance, doesn't he?"

"Michael-"

"Eight times up on that stage," He faltered and his voice cracked on the number, a fracture he tried to cover by looking away, by running his tongue along his lower lip, by doing anything except standing still and letting you hear it. "Eight times and I couldn't even look at you. Do you get that? I physically could not look at you."

"Couldn't or wouldn't?" The words left your mouth before you could stop them, sharper than you intended and you watched them land, the way his face contorted, the hurt flashing behind his eyes before the anger covered it back up.

"That's not fair." He responded quietly, the kind of quiet that was worse than yelling.

"Fair?" You laughed and it came across bitter, the laugh of someone who was hurt and wanted to make sure everyone knew it. "You brought Brooke Shields, Michael. You walked that carpet with her on your arm like she was yours and I had to watch from the fourth row with another man because the man I actually wanted was too busy protecting his image."

"Brooke is a friend, you know that."

"A friend you've been photographed with a hundred times, a friend whose name the tabloids print next to yours while I get to be nobody."

"That's not-"

"And Diana." You were on a roll now, the hurt turning into something uglier and petty, but you couldn't stop it even if you wanted to. "Three times in three separate speeches, you said her name as if she was the one who wrote you the album.”

His jaw tightened. "Diana is-"

"What am I to you?" The question came out smaller than you wanted and you hated the way your voice wavered, the way his face changed when he heard it, the anger softening for just a second before he pulled it back. "Because from where I was sitting, it looked like I was the girl who helps write your songs while you go to after parties with models"

Michael stared at you, his chest rising and falling too fast. His hands opened and closed at his sides, you could see the war behind his eyes, the anger, the guilt and the love all fighting for the same space.

"You want to know why I didn't look at you?" His voice was different now, completely stripped down. "Because if I had, I would have stood up and walked over to you and every camera in that building would have been on you, then the next morning every newspaper in the country would have your face and your name. They would eat you alive because that’s what they do to everyone I..."

He stopped and glanced away, his jaw was so tense, you could see the muscles vibrating beneath his skin.

"Everyone you what?" You pressed, still sharp, not prepared to let him off the hook.

"Everyone I love.” He finished and the word hit you like a freight train. "I was protecting you."

"You were protecting yourself."

He flinched, physically flinched, like you'd struck him across the face and for a moment the hallway was so quiet you could hear your own breathing as well as his.

"Maybe." He admitted, his voice barely a whisper. "Maybe I was."

The white rose in your hand lost another petal, falling slowly, drifting to the concrete floor like a tiny surrender. You sighed, the way a person sighs when they’re finished with a conversation because it was going nowhere. You both simply couldn’t agree because you were both hurt for your own reasons and you had no fight left in you. Not after the nausea, the adrenaline and everything that had consumed you whole within the last three hours.

“I need to go find my date." You spoke abruptly before turning as you trailed off back towards the party.

You managed to make three steps toward the door, your heels clicking against the concrete with a finality that sounded like punctuation, like the end of a sentence you'd been trying to finish for months. Your hand located the door handle, your fingers curling around the cold metal. You were already thinking about the hallway, about finding Prince, about getting into his car and driving somewhere quiet enough to cry in private when Michael's hand suddenly closed around your wrist.

Not gently, completely unlike the way he usually touched you, all softness and reverence, the kind of care that made you feel like porcelain. This was something else entirely. Desperate. His fingers wrapped around the delicate bones of your wrist and pulled, jerking you backwards off-balance so your hand slipped from the handle, your body pivoting toward his. Before you could protest or do anything except gasp, he was moving, walking you backwards into the opposite wall. Except it wasn't a wall, it was a door. He kicked it open with the flat of his shoe and it led to a storage closet, something small and dark. Your back was supposed to hit the wall, but it didn't. There was a table and the backs of your thighs hit the edge of it, forcing you down hard, the table groaning beneath you. Michael was between your knees before you could catch your breath, his hands on either side of your hips and his chest heaved. His bare eyes burned into yours with something that looked less like desire and more like hunger, the kind that had been starved and was going to take what it wanted regardless of the consequences.

"Michael." You breathed, his name coming out wrong, almost soft, like the beginning of something instead of the end.

He didn't answer because whatever words he'd had were gone, burned away by the sight of you sitting on that table in your red dress with your curls falling around your face and your chest rising and falling too fast. His hands found your waist, his thumbs pressing into the curve just above your hipbones where the fabric dipped. He pulled you forward, just enough that your body tilted toward his, then his mouth found its way onto your neck.

He didn’t kiss you, not at first. His lips parted against the curve of your throat, just below your jaw, inhaling slow and deep, the way a drowning man breathes air, the way a man who has been denied something fundamental finally gets his hands on it. The sound he made was low and wrecked, somewhere between a groan and a sob, vibrating against your skin, your head falling back before you could stop it. Your body betrayed you the way it always did, the way it always would because this was Michael, this was the mouth that had memorised every inch of you and no amount of anger could make your nerve endings forget.

He kissed your throat, open-mouthed and wet, dragging his lips down the column of your neck to the hollow at the base where your pulse was hammering so hard he could feel it against his tongue. He pressed his mouth there, tasting your heartbeat. His hands slid up your waist, grazing your ribs, his thumbs tracing the underside of your breasts through the fabric, not touching, just promising, letting you feel the weight of his hands and the barely there graze of his thumbs where you wanted them.

His mouth descended down. The neckline of your dress was low, deliberately low, the kind of neckline you'd chosen because you knew exactly what it would do, because you'd stood in front of your mirror that morning and seen the way it framed the swell of your breasts and thought good, let him suffer. Now he was suffering. His mouth traced the line where your skin met the fabric, his lips dragging along the edge of your cleavage, his tongue dipping into the cleft between your breasts. He could taste the warmth there and the faintest trace of perfume you'd dabbed hours ago that had since faded into something that was just you. He groaned again, deeper this time, his forehead pressing against your sternum, his hands gripping your hips so hard you'd have bruises tomorrow, purple indentations molded like his fingers. You'd look at them in the mirror the next morning and feel sick with how much you wanted them.

You should have stopped him, pushed him away, told him that this wasn't okay, that you couldn't keep doing this, falling into his hands every time he touched you, but your hands weren't pushing. Your hands were in his hair, your fingers threading through the dark curls, not pulling him away, pulling him closer. A sound escaped your throat, small and inadvertent, a whimper you hated yourself for, one that you attempted to swallow but came out anyway.

Michael heard it like he always heard it. Every sound you made was a language he'd studied, a dialect he'd memorised and that tiny, helpless sound, hit him like a drug. His mouth opened wider against the curve of your breast, his tongue tracing the line of your cleavage like a man in worship.

His hands slid from your hips to your thighs, his palms warm against your bare skin where the hemline had ridden up, his thumbs pressing into the soft inner flesh. You let him. God, you let him as your legs parted slightly without your permission, your body opening for him the way it always did, the way it was designed to.

For a moment, you let yourself have it. You allowed yourself to feel the heat of his mouth, the weight of his hands, the desperate, consuming way he touched you, like you were the only real thing in a world full of illusions. Your eyes closed and your breath came in shallow, stuttering gasps. You could feel him, the hardness of his body against the inside of your thigh, how much he wanted you, how much he'd been holding back all night. All those speeches, all those times he'd trailed past your seat without looking, all that restraint pouring out of him now in the dark of a closet while the rest of the world moved on without you.

He pulled back, just enough to look at you with his lips swollen and wet, his eyes dragging over your face. Something shifted in his expression, a jagged darkness. His jaw tightened and his voice, when it came, was laced with something dangerously close to rage.

"He called you baby." Michael grunted.

Your eyes opened. His face was inches from yours and the look in his eyes was no longer worship, it was the look of a man who had heard another man say his word. The word he whispered into the curve of your neck at three in the morning, the word he groaned against your mouth when he was deep inside you and the world had narrowed to nothing but heat and friction with the slick, desperate rhythm of your bodies moving together.

"On that stage." Michael continued, his voice barely above a whisper, his thumbs pressing harder into your thighs like a possessive branding. "In front of the whole world, he called you baby, like he had the right." His tongue traced along his lower lip, a nervous gesture. "Like you're his."

"Michael-"

"You're not his." He murmured, his voice clear and purposeful, despite sounding as though he was trying to convince himself to believe it.

His hands moved before you could respond. They slid from your thighs to the backs of your knees, gripping, lifting and forcing your legs up onto the table so you were perched fully on it, your back against the wall with bent knees as your heels clunked against the table. His hands found your inner thighs, dividing them apart, spreading you and inhabiting the space he'd made between your legs with a kind of authority that made your stomach drop. The hemline of your dress rode up to the tops of your thighs, barely covering anything. The cool air hit your skin and you shivered, your nipples hardening as a result. Michael's eyes dropped, falling down your body, taking in the red fabric abundant around your hips and the obvious, undeniable fact that your body was responding to him even as your mind screamed something different.

"He doesn't get to call you that." Michael murmured, his voice thick, his hands sliding up the outside of your thighs, gathering the fabric higher, bunching it around your waist before he dropped to his knees.

The movement was sudden, graceful, his body folding down like something reflexive. Before you could process what was happening, his hands were hooked behind your knees, pulling you forward on the table until your hips balanced on the edge, until your thighs draped over his shoulders. His face was level with your stomach, his breath hot and fast against the thin lace of your underwear. The sound he made, guttural, vibrating against your inner thigh, was the sound of a starved man that had finally been given a plate.

"You smell like him." Michael breathed, his nose dragging along the crease where your thigh met your hip, inhaling. The jealousy in his voice was liquid molten, the kind of emotion that burned everything it touched. "His cologne on you. I can smell him on you."

His fingers hooked into the waistband of your underwear and he retracted. The lace crawled down your thighs, over your knees and fell somewhere on the floor of the closet. The air hit you, all of you, your hips jerking involuntarily. Michael's hands pressed down, holding you still as he pinned your thighs to the table with a firmness that was almost bruising.

"Michael." You whispered, not knowing if it was a protest or a plea. Your hands gripped the edge of the table behind you, knuckles turning white as your body caught between the part of you that wanted this, that had been aching for it since he'd walked past your seat without looking and the part of you that knew this was the same cycle, the same desperate avoidance wrapped in the language of desire.

His mouth pressed against your inner thigh, his tongue tracing a slow, deliberate path upward. Your breath caught and stuttered in your chest like a word you couldn’t fathom. Your hips lifted off the table, pressing toward his mouth with instinct. The whimper that escaped you this time was louder and completely unrestrained. Michael's hands tightened on your thighs, spreading you wider, his thumbs tracing the creases where your legs met your body and his lips were so close to where you needed them. Your head fell back against the wall, your eyes closed and for one suspended, breathless moment, the entire world was reduced to the heat of his mouth and the excruciating anticipation of his tongue.

He moved closer and his tongue graced you with one long, slow lick, flat and deliberate, from bottom to top. Your whole body arched off the table, your back bowing and your hands flew from the edge to his hair, fingers intertwining with his curls. The sound you made was something you didn't recognise, something desperate and completely beyond your control. Michael groaned against you, the vibration rolling through your core like a wave, his hands sliding under your hips, gripping your ass and pulling you closer to his mouth. He did it again, slower this time, more deliberate, the tip of his tongue circling and finding the exact spot that made your fingers twist in his hair so hard it had to hurt.

Then he pulled back.

His lips were wet and glistening, his eyes focused on yours, completely undone. He breathed shallowly. "Say my name."

You couldn't because your brain had stopped working. Everything had stopped working except the parts of your body that were screaming for his mouth to come back. You simply looked at him, chest heaving and thighs shaking, your dress bunched up around your waist, underwear strewn across the floor, unable to form a single word.

Michael leaned in, his mouth hovering, lips barely touching and you could feel him, feel the ghost of his tongue. Your hips bucked forward, chasing the pleasure but he pulled back, just out of reach and the whine that left your throat was humiliating.

"Say it." He breathed. "Tell me who you belong to."

Then something within you clicked. Your hand found the back of his head and pushed him. Not gently, you shoved his head away from your body and the suddenness of it startled him, made him rock back on his heels, his hands releasing your thighs. You squeezed your legs together before adjusting your dress and sliding off the back of the table onto legs that could’ve buckled any moment. The floor felt wrong, unstable, like the ground itself was shifting beneath you.

"No." You spoke bluntly.

He was still on his knees in front of you and the confusion on his face was almost enough to break you, almost enough to make you grab his hair and pull his face back between your legs, to forget everything except the way his tongue felt.

"Stop." You added flatly, your voice cracking on the word, but you held it, held it with everything you had. "Michael, get up. Stop."

He rose slowly, his hand finding his mouth as he dragged the back across his lips, wiping you away. The look on his face shifted from confusion to something worse, something that looked like the ground might open up beneath him. He reached for you, his hand extending, fingers reaching.

"Baby, just listen to me-"

"No, you listen." Your voice was shaking, but you held it together, because if you didn't say this now you were never going to say it. "This is what you do, every time. We fight, you grab me, you kiss me and you think that fixes it. Then you hold me and say you'll make it up to me and I really believe you, but we never actually talk about it. Nothing changes, you just..."

You trailed off because the fight was leaving you, draining out of you like something with its own weight. Suddenly you were just tired, tired of the cycle and loving someone who thought physical closeness was the same as emotional honesty.

"You think if you touch me enough it'll go away." You said, quieter now, almost gentle. "It doesn't go away, Michael."

The closet was too small and the walls were too close, claustrophobic even. The smell of bleach, his cologne and sex was making your eyes water or perhaps that was something else, something you weren't going to acknowledge, not while your underwear was on the floor and your thighs were still wet with his saliva.

You found your underwear and stepped into it, pulling it up until the elastic snapped against your hips. You smoothed your dress down with hands that wouldn't stop trembling.

"I need to go find my date." You finished, oblivious to how he may have perceived you calling Prince your date.

You didn't wait for him to respond. You swivelled, opening the door before taking a step into the hallway. The fluorescent lights hit you like a slap, too bright after the dark intensity of the closet.

"Wait, just wait, please-"

"Michael."

The voice came from the end of the hallway and you both froze. Quincy rounded the corner, his glasses catching the light and he took in the scene in a single glance. The two of you standing too close, Michael's aviators off, your lipstick smudged, the tension between you so thick you could cut it with a knife. To his credit he didn't react.

"There you are." Quincy uttered. "Michael, they need you. The press are waiting."

Michael didn't move. He was looking at you, bare eyes locked on yours and the expression on his face was the same one he'd had on stage, completely overwhelmed, except this time it wasn't the Grammys, it was you. It was the space between you that kept growing no matter how hard he tried to close it.

"Michael." Quincy repeated himself, firmer this time. "Now."

Something in Michael's face shuttered. The vulnerability disappeared behind the polished surface, the wall rebuilding itself brick by brick. He straightened his jacket and rolled his shoulders.

"Coming.” He responded with a sudden composure, a stark contrast to the desperate man he’d just presented to you a few minutes earlier. He walked past you without touching you, without looking at you, without another word. Quincy put a hand on his shoulder, guiding him down the hallway toward the lights and the cameras.

You stood there in the empty hallway. The closet door was still open behind you and you could smell him on your skin, on your thighs, could still feel the press of his mouth against the most intimate part of you, still hear the wrecked, hungry sound he'd made with his tongue buried inside you.

You fixed your lipstick up with your thumb and adjusted your dress back into its original state before strolling off with a slight crumple in your step.

Prince was leaning against a wall at the end of a corridor, one ankle crossed over the other, his arms folded. He noticed you coming, watching you approach with those dark, knowing eyes that saw everything and said very little.

You stopped in front of him. He studied your face, spotting that smudged lipstick and the way your hands were shaking. He didn't ask, he just unfolded his arms and straightened up his posture before extending his elbow, the gesture formal and old-fashioned yet somehow exactly what you needed.

"Ready to go?" He asked, like it was the simplest question in the world.

You took his arm.

Behind you, somewhere in the maze of hallways and holding rooms, Michael was answering questions about his record breaking night, smiling for cameras, shaking hands and saying thank you to strangers. Maybe he was fine, perhaps the performance was holding.

You walked out with Prince into the night, into the waiting car, into whatever came next. You didn't look back but you wanted to, you so badly wanted to.

doleuia

⋮ ⌗ SHOWER SEX┆

⋮ ⌗ synopsis┆shower sex w michael after ending the victory tour.

⋮ ⌗ 🏷️┆unprotected sex, creampie, cursing, rough mike if u squint (pinching, biting, squeezing), mentions of evil ass joe, proofread.

⋮ ⌗ doleuia┆enjoy! ima post more i swearrr

the steam filled the bathroom like a heavy veil, water pouring hot and steady over both you and michael who stood with his back to you, muscles tight under your soapy hands as you washed him slowly.

"that victory tour drained me completely," he started, his voice sounding low and rough from everything he had been carrying. "the performances, the traveling, the constant pressure, and joseph on the ride back… he just wouldn't stop yelling at me, telling me i was 'ruining everything', that i owed the family more control. his words cut deep, mama. i took all of it until i couldnt anymore."

you kept your hands moving, palms gliding firmly over his shoulders and down the long line of his back, listening to him vent. the hot spray beat against your skin, making everything slippery and warm. you listened closely, letting the silence stretch between his words while you rinsed the soap away, feeling the way his body gradually relaxed under your touch.

he let out a long breath after a pause. "i'm done talking about joseph and the rest of that mess now."

"well i'm proud of you, i'm proud you stood your ground," you leaned in, pressing a kiss to his shoulder before adding on, "and i missed you oh so much these past months."

he turned around to face you, eyes dark with emotion and rising hunger. his hands took the soap and guided you to turn, his touch warm and sure as he began washing your back. his palms slid down your spine, over the curve of your waist and hips, lingering with slow strokes that sent heat pooling low in your belly.

"i missed you more baby," he murmured against your neck, voice deepening. "i missed this skin, i missed how you smell, i missed everything about my girl.

michael's hands lingered long over your hips, pulling you back against him, he reached around with one hand to turn your head gently, capturing your mouth in a kiss that started passionately slow, his lips incredibly soft and full against yours, moving with a tender, aching pressure as the water streamed down both of you.

you felt him hardening against the curve of your ass, his fingers traced your sides, teasing the undersides of your breasts.

you reached back blindly, your fingers wrapping around his length, stroking him slowly as he grew fully hard and heavy in your grip.

his tongue pushed past your lips to tangle with yours, he kissed you like he was absolutely starving for you, sucking on your tongue and nipping lightly at your bottom lip before his mouth trailed down to your neck, kissing and sucking at the sensitive skin there, teeth grazing lightly while one hand reached around to grope your breast, squeezing the soft flesh and pinching the nipple until you moaned into him as you kept stroking his cock, your thumb swirling over the tip, feeling it throb in your hand.

"put it in, baby," he breathed against your ear, his voice completely broken with need.

you guided michael, pressing the thick head of his cock to your entrance. “aw fuck,” you gasped as he pushed forward slowly, stretching you open inch by inch until he was buried to the hilt. both of you groaned at the tight, slick fit.

the hot water continued to cascade over your joined bodies as he started to move, pulling out almost all the way before sliding back in with a deep, deliberate thrust. you pushed back to meet him, taking every inch.

his hips rocked against you in a steady rhythm, pounding into you from behind with increasing intensity. each thrust sending pleasure sparking through your core, his cock dragging against that perfect spot inside you. you pushed back harder to meet him, the wet slap of skin on skin echoing under the spray. one of his hands stayed on your hip, gripping firmly, while the other slipped between your legs, fingers finding your clit and rubbing firm circles that made your thighs tremble.

"mmm, you feel me baby?" he asked, thrusting sloppier now, his chest pressed tight to your back.

"yesss, right there, michael," you cried out, your internal walls clenching tight around him as the pleasure became too intense to bear. the steam made everything hotter, sweat and water mixing seamlessly on your skin as you moved together. he continued rubbing your clit with perfect strokes, his fingers moving faster and more insistent while his cock filled you over and over, stretching and claiming you completely.

"i'm s–so close," you panted, meeting every powerful thrust with desperate, rolling tilts of your hips. your walls clenched tighter and tighter around his cock as the orgasm finally crashed through you, pulsing hard and drawing loud, uninhibited moans from your throat.

the sensation of your release pushed him right over the edge. the pacing slowed to an absolute crawl as the friction changed, turning thick and heavy. with a deep, guttural groan, he buried himself as deep as he could go, pinning your hips forward as his body took over. his heart hammering violently against your spine while his hips began to stutter and jerk in tight, desperate mini thrusts.

inside you, the sensation shifted entirely. you felt the distinct, sudden heat of his first pulsing burst as he lets go, spilling thick ropes of cum against your tight, warm walls. filling you up instantly with intense, pooling warmth that contrasts with the fresh water cascading down your skin. he stays deep, his muscles twitching as his length throbs inside your grip, sending wave after wave of his release deep into your pussy.

every pulse of his climax triggers another tight contraction from you. your walls instinctively milk him, squeezing around him as he continued to pulse, drawing out every last drop. the heavy, cream thick cum flooding you from the inside out until it starts to overflow, a slick mix of his warmth and your own wetness leaking out around the base of his shaft and dripping down the inside of your thighs.

he gasps into the hollow of your neck, his breath hitched and shaky as he keeps his weight heavy against you.

"i love you so much, y/n."

angelfacediary

obsessed! How you write subby Michael it’s too good! Therefore could you do otw!michael or thriller!michael x f!reader on a library date, but as Michael casually reads his book, reader decides to give him a hand job and the entire time Michael is just wrapped around her finger desperately tries to keep quiet. LOVE YOUR WORK🫶

݁ ˖Ი𐑼⋆ Shhh ! • Otw!Michael x reader

⤷ ゛Synopsis ˎˊ˗ in which your wholesome library date turns something just a bit more...

𑣲⋆ Contains : Subby mike. Public sex. Handjob.

A/n: lets ignore that this took me so long to do... Anyways !

If there was one thing Michael loved, it was a library date.

The quiet atmosphere and few people that came in and out. Hushed whispers that could be heard through the knife-like silence. As the two of you picked out a book, you sat comfortably in your chairs in the corner. The spot became more familiar as the two of you visited more often.

Sure, you usually read, but today? You were beyond distracted.

kalulapplehead

canvas of a ghost

pairing: bad era michael jackson x fem!reader

summary: months of preparation for your solo gallery exhibition are shattered when your fiancé, michael, fails to show up—arriving only as the lights dim with diana ross by his side. the humiliation turns you into a ghost in your own apartment, punishing him with weeks of icy silence. but silence has its limits. when michael finally breaks down, weeping under the weight of his guilt, the night dissolves into a tempest of rough, intense longing sex, it becomes a desperate collision of tears, continuous whimpers, and raw possession from a man terrified of losing you forever.

warning: smut! 18+, mdni, angst, mention of diana ross, rough sex, make up sex, reader is an artist, fight in relationship, mention of hitting, silent treatment, yearning

────୨ৎ────────୨ৎ────────

you yawned as you felt the glimmer of sunlight slipping through the bedroom curtains you both shared. a smile curled onto your lips when you turned your head over your shoulder. michael was softly snoring against your shoulder, his arm wrapped gently around your waist, while his right leg rested between yours.

you lifted your thumb to stroke his chin. he looked like an angel from heaven, so handsome and beautiful, his long curls spilling across his right cheek. michael let out a quiet hum at the touch of your fingers before slowly opening his eyes, blinking several times as he adjusted to the sudden light filling his orbs.

you were now fully facing michael, your smile growing even wider, utterly charmed by the sleepy expression on his face as he tried to process waking up.

"good morning, applehead."

"mmm," was the only sound he made before stretching his body from side to side, letting out a sleepy groan. he exhaled and looked at you.

"good morning, princess. how was your sleep?" he asked in the raspy voice that always came with just waking up. his bare chest brushed against your arms, which were folded in front of your chest.

you pressed a quick kiss to his forehead before sitting up on the edge of the bed and getting to your feet. you pulled open the curtains of the apartment bedroom the two of you had been living in together for the past two years, ever since michael proposed to you and decided to buy an apartment for the two of you to share. the morning was especially bright. you smiled widely and looked at michael with sparkling excitement.

"michael! it's the day! my gallery day. i feel so excited and wonderful."

michael looked slightly dazed, making you furrow your brows.

"you didn't forget, did you, honey?"

"n—no, of course i remember, sweetheart. i just have a practice today, but it won't take long. i'll be there as soon as i can, baby," michael replied before quickly climbing out of bed. he walked straight over to you and wrapped both arms around your waist. his eyes drifted down your body, dressed in nothing but a pair of maroon lace underwear.

"how can someone look like this right after waking up?" michael pulled you closer, placing several quick kisses along the right side of your neck, making you squeal with laughter. you tried to gently push against his shoulders, completely overwhelmed by the endless ticklish kisses that now covered your entire neck from one side to the other. laughing, you gripped his bare shoulders.

"mikey! enough!"

"alright, alright..." michael chuckled before softly kissing your lips. you wrapped both arms around his neck, deepening the kiss. michael smiled against your lips as he gently sucked on your lower lip. his right hand lightly gripped your waist while his left cupped your jaw, searching for the perfect angle as his tongue slipped deeper into the kiss.

you pulled away and placed a kiss against the right side of his jaw.

"i'm going to take a shower first. it's going to be a big important day for me!" you lightly patted his chest before walking past him toward the bathroom. "you can't be late, mike. you know that, right?" you said as you glanced back over your shoulder, finding michael smiling with teeth as white as pearls.

"yes, ma'am."

────୨ৎ────────୨ৎ────────

you drove your white sedan at a moderate speed. you looked beautiful today, wearing a bright butter yellow knee-length dress. you quietly hummed cheerful tunes to yourself. bruce—your bodyguard hired by michael—sat in the passenger seat beside you today. you had insisted on driving yourself. you felt full of energy, like you could do anything. today would be filled with important people, including michael's connections whom the two of you had personally invited to attend the opening of your art gallery.

you opened your car door once it was neatly parked behind the gallery building. the voices of the staff greeted you the moment your feet touched the marble floor. the scent of lilies mixed faintly with oil paint in the air. your chest warmed.

this was it.

the day that had kept you awake almost every night for the past several months.

every painting hanging on these white gallery walls was a piece of yourself. some were painted when you fell in love. some were painted when you cried alone. some were painted while michael sat quietly on the apartment sofa for hours, simply keeping you company while you painted.

"this is really happening..."

"it is, miss," bruce said, standing directly behind you with a proud smile, equally proud of everything you had achieved.

after spending nearly an hour walking through the gallery, making sure everything was absolutely perfect, your gallery officially opened. guests slowly began arriving.

your legs felt like jelly. you were terrified.

"bruce?"

"yes, miss?"

you cleared your throat, your eyes scanning the entire gallery as you searched for the person you loved most.

"is he done with the rehearsal?"

"i'm sorry, but mr. jackson didn't answer any of my calls, miss."

you let out an uneasy sigh. you really needed michael beside you right now. you needed him standing with you. you needed his warm hand holding your cold, nervous one. you needed to hear his loving words whispering in your ear, telling you everything would be alright and that you had already done your very best. you needed him now.

you nodded at bruce and forced a smile. "he'll come."

bruce smiled but said nothing.

"he will come. right, bruce?" you asked, your voice growing hoarse.

"i'm sure he will, miss."

you smiled brightly when a famous art collector stopped for quite a while in front of one of your paintings.

it was your favorite piece.

the painting michael had helped name three months ago.

"golden silence."

you still remembered that night vividly.

oil paint covered both of your hands. michael sat cross-legged on the studio floor, his chin resting on his knee as he watched you finish the final brushstroke. he tucked his curly hair behind his ear, smiling softly as he watched you completely focused on the canvas before you.

"what are you gonna call it?" michael asked as he stood up and walked over to you.

"i don't know yet," you answered without looking away from your work. you mixed several colors together on your palette, trying to find the perfect shade.

"golden silence."

you turned around and found michael already sitting cross-legged behind you, your shoulders now resting directly in front of his chest.

"what?"

"because that's what it feels like."

then he smiled.

that small smile that always made your heart stop for a moment.

"it feels like peace." michael wrapped his arms around you from behind, resting his chin on your shoulder. you giggled at how clingy he was. unable to resist how adorable he looked, you turned toward him and placed two quick kisses right on the tip of his nose.

"mikey, i'm not finished yet," you said with a pleading voice.

michael pouted dramatically. "you've ignored me for three whole hours, pretty. at least let me stay like this for a little while."

"mikey, i promise i'll make it up to you once i'm done, okay?"

michael let out an exaggerated sigh before getting back to his feet. his left hand gently stroked your head with affection. “you better be."

"baby, do you want me to turn on the patio lights so you'll have better lighting? i don't want your eyes to hurt because the lighting isn't good enough." michael gently poked your shoulder from behind, trying to get your attention.

before answering, you smiled at his words. michael always made you feel so deeply loved.

"yes. can you do that for me, applehead?"

michael chuckled at your pet name and blushed.

"anything for my princess. now i'm gonna turn the lights on and grab some food for ya." he placed a quick kiss on your forehead before jogging out of the studio.

hours pass. the anxiety that had been eating away at you slowly fades as you’re pulled into conversations with the endless stream of guests arriving at your gallery. you talk to dozens of people, smiling until your cheeks ache.

then, you hear a familiar man’s voice call your name. you turn around to find lionel richie walking toward you with his signature warm smile.

“hey, congratulations. this is amazing.” he wraps you in a friendly hug before giving your back a light pat.

you grin. “thank you so much for coming, richie. let’s get you a drink, shall we?” you lead him toward the champagne table, handing him a glass.

the older man murmurs a quiet thank you before taking a sip, his eyes wandering around the gallery. “where’s michael? i didn’t see him anywhere.”

you force a small smile. “ah… he’s gonna be a little late. he’s still at rehearsal.”

a little late?

he’s already been hours late. your gallery will be closing in another hour.

“but isn’t the gallery gonna close in about an hour?”

you freeze, unable to answer, you simply raise your glass and take another slow sip, hoping it hides the disappointment written all over your face.

now everyone’s gone. after spending the entire day surrounded by people, talking nonstop, every ounce of your energy has been drained. your feet throb painfully after wearing heels all day. only a few staff members remain, cleaning up the gallery. you sit alone on a bench in the center hall, staring at the entrance, you slip off one of your heels. your eyes begin to sting as tears threaten to spill.

it hurts, you don’t know where michael is. you don’t know what excuse he’ll come up with this time.

“jerk,” you mutter under your breath, wiping your eyes with the back of your hand.

“miss, mr. jackson is here.”

bruce approaches you carefully, you immediately shake your head. “tell him i don’t want to see him.”

“are you su—”

“i’m a hundred percent sure, bruce. i don’t wanna see him.”

you stand and begin walking toward your office, only for a voice to stop you in your tracks.

“baby… baby, please let me in.”

you slowly turn toward the glass entrance.

there he is.

michael stands outside, staring at you through the glass with pleading eyes. he’s holding an enormous bouquet of flowers against his chest. gently, he knocks on the glass door.

“just go away, michael.”

your voice comes out cold as you stare at him for a long moment. he looks exhausted, his shoulders have slumped, and guilt is written all over his face. you let out a shaky breath. despite how angry you are, despite how much he hurt you, your love for him wins in the end.

you walk toward the door and unlock it.

the moment he steps inside, he offers you the oversized bouquet of baby pink roses. “baby, i’m so sorry. i don’t know what i should do to make it right, but i—”

“hi, congratulations on your gallery opening.”

you frown.

your attention shifts to the woman’s voice coming from behind michael. she steps forward with a bright smile, wearing a long silver dress.

diana ross.

“…what the fuck?”

it’s the only thing you’re capable of saying.

“baby—”

your lips part in disbelief as you struggle to process what’s happening. “what is she doing here?”

“why are you so surprised?” diana says, looking almost offended. “i’m here to congratulate you.”

she casually slips her arm through michael’s left arm. meanwhile, his right hand is still holding the bouquet of flowers you haven’t accepted.

“exactly. i don’t need you congratulating me—not on my special day, and not on any ordinary day.” your voice trembles, “so… michael, you missed the most important day of my life because you were with her?”

the disappointment burns through your chest. you fight as hard as you can to keep the tears from falling.

“answer me., michael.” your voice comes out quieter this time and that somehow hurts more as michael immediately shakes his head.

“no, baby, it’s not what you think.”

“isn’t it?” your eyes dart toward diana’s arm still looped around his.

“because from where i’m standing, it looks exactly like what i think.” your eyes never leave michael’s.

michael swallows hard with eyes filled with guilt. “baby… please.”

“don’t.” you take a step back before he can reach for you.

“don’t call me that right now.”

his hand freezes midair, his chest tighten because you’ve never done that before, you never pulled away from him, never looked at him like he was a complete stranger.

“i waited for you, michael. do you even know how many times people asked me where you were?" your voice cracks despite your best effort.

he lowers his head. “…i know.”

“no.”

you shake your head.

“you don’t.”

“lionel came.”

“everyone came.”

“everyone except you.”

every word lands like another knife.

“i kept making excuses for you.”

“‘he’s rehearsing.’”

“‘he’ll be here soon.’”

“‘he’s just running a little late.’”

you laugh bitterly. “hours, michael. you were hours late.”

his eyes glisten. “i know, and i’m so sorry.”

“stop saying you’re sorry, for god's sake!" you snap as your chest rises and falls in uneven breaths, every inhale burning, every exhale trembling with everything you've kept buried. your throat aches from holding back tears that refuse to stay hidden.

michael doesn't speak, he just stands there, frozen, as if your words have rooted him to the floor. you shake your head, a humorless laugh slipping past your lips.

"sorry doesn't change what happened. it doesn't erase the way everyone looked at me." you swallow hard. "it doesn't erase how humiliating it was to keep defending someone who never showed up."

his lips part, but nothing comes out because there isn't anything left to say. not this time.

“i tried, baby.” michael finally speak. “there was traffic, and then—”

“stop.” you shake your head again.

“i don’t want another explanation.”

“i don’t care.”

“because if this day had mattered to you as much as it mattered to me…” you inhale shakily. “…you would’ve been early.”

that sentence completely breaks him, his shoulders slump.

his lips part, but nothing comes out because he knows you’re right.

your voice becomes almost inaudible. “i’ve spent months planning this gallery. and all i wanted was for you to be there when those doors opened.”

another tear slips free before you can stop it, tracing slowly down your cheek. the moment he sees it, michael's composure breaks.

his feet move on instinct, closing the distance between you before he even realizes it. one trembling hand lifts halfway, wanting to wipe the tear away, wanting to hold your face, wanting to do something—but he lets it fall back to his side.

"please..."

his voice barely exists.

"don't cry."

a hollow laugh escapes you, shaking with disbelief. you drag the back of your hand across your cheek, smearing away the tears with more frustration than tenderness before looking up at him.

"now you're asking me not to cry?"

your voice quivers despite every attempt to steady it.

"after making me spend the happiest day of my life wondering if i mattered to you?"

the words hit him like a physical blow.

michael's face crumples. his lips part, but no sound comes for a heartbeat. his eyes search yours desperately, as though he's trying to find the version of you that always softened for him.

"you matter more than anything, baby..."

his voice is ragged.

"really?"

your chin lifts just enough to look past him you don't even have to say her name, a small tilt of your head toward diana is enough.

"then why did you bring her here?"

michael turns so quickly it almost looks panicked. "diana insisted on coming. i thought maybe—"

"why are you being so dramatic?" diana interrupts before he can finish. she lets out a small scoff, one hand settling lazily against her hip. "haven't you two been together long enough? you should know michael better than anyone by now." she shakes her head, looking at you with thinly veiled judgment. "because if you can't understand him... then clearly someone has to."

your gaze slowly shifts to her as you wipe another tear from your cheek with the heel of your palm, blinking away the sting before letting out a quiet, incredulous laugh.

"excuse me?"

diana rolls her eyes. "come on. you're acting like he cheated on you."

michael's head snaps toward her.

"diana."

she ignores him.

"he was late. yes, it was awful. but this?" she gestures vaguely between the two of you with both hands. "this is a little over the top, don't you think?"

your fingers curl into your palms so tightly your nails bite into your skin. "he missed my wedding. he apologized. hours later."

diana sighs dramatically, shaking her head as though your answer has exhausted her. "people make mistakes." she takes two slow steps toward michael until she's standing close enough that their shoulders nearly brush.

"you're making him feel like a monster."

without asking, she reaches out and smooths a nonexistent wrinkle from the sleeve of his jacket before letting her hand linger against his upper arm.

"you've punished yourself enough."

michael immediately stiffens, his eyes flick down to where her hand rests on him, then back to her face, visibly confused.

"diana..."

his voice is quiet and uncertain.

"don't."

she barely acknowledges him, giving his arm a reassuring squeeze instead. "stop blaming yourself."

he carefully slips his arm from beneath her touch, taking half a step away without even realizing he's doing it. his brows pull together, his breathing uneven, caught somewhere between guilt, confusion, and disbelief that this conversation has spiraled so badly.

you watch the entire exchange every second of it then a hollow laugh escapes you.

your voice is almost frighteningly calm.

"you don't bring the woman people have spent decades linking you with... to your devastated fiancé." the sentence hangs in the air and diana's expression finally falters. the confidence drains from her face, replaced by an uncomfortable silence.

michael presses the heel of his hand against his forehead before dragging it down over his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment.

when he opens them again, they're already glassy.

"i messed up."

"yes."

"i know."

his voice cracks.

"i messed up so badly."

"yes."

his shoulders cave inward like he's finally carrying the full weight of what he's done.

"i hate myself for this."

"good." the word leaves your lips before you can catch it.

silence.

thick.

absolute.

your own stomach twists.

because you don't actually want him to hate himself.

you just wanted him...

to choose you.

for once without making you wonder if you were asking for too much.

no one says another word after that, the bouquet is left behind on the gallery floor. bruce quietly escorts diana outside after michael asks him to. she leaves without apologizing and without looking back. the drive home is painfully silent. for the first time in years, you don’t get into michael’s car.

“i’ll drive myself.” your voice is flat.

bruce immediately steps forward. “miss, would you like me to accompany you?”

you shake your head. “no.”

“i’ll be fine.”

he hesitates and his eyes flicker toward michael, silently asking for permission. michael can’t even look at either of you. “…let her.”

it’s barely above a whisper, and bill opens the rear door for michael like he always does. normally, you’d slide in beside him. normally, your hand would find his before the car even pulled away.

tonight… the seat beside him stays empty. bill glances at the vacant space through the rearview mirror. he’s driven the two of you for years.

he’s never seen it empty.

you arrive at the apartment first, you don’t wait. you don’t ask where michael is. you shower longer than usual. not because you need to but because standing beneath the hot water is easier than thinking.

when you finally step out, the apartment is quiet and the only sound is the faint hum of the air conditioner.

you pull on an oversized t-shirt.

your hair is still damp.

you walk into the hallway and head straight for the linen closet.

one pillow.

one blanket.

that’s all.

you’re halfway to the studio when you hear footsteps behind you.

“…baby.”

you don’t answer.

“please.”

still nothing.

his footsteps grow quicker before you can reach the studio door, his hand catches your wrist. it’s barely a touch. careful like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he holds on too tightly, you slowly look down at where he’s holding you and he lets go immediately.

“…sorry.”

his voice breaks on the word as you continue walking.

another step.

another.

then—“please don’t sleep in there.”

you stop because something in his voice doesn’t sound like michael anymore. you turn and see him standing in the middle of the hallway. his suit jacket is gone with tie hangs loose around his neck and his eyes are swollen. the rims of his nose are bright red.

he looks like someone who’s been trying not to cry for hours and finally lost. he takes one hesitant step toward you. “i know you don’t want to look at me.”

another step.

“i know i don’t deserve to ask you for anything.”

another.

“but please…” his voice cracks.

“…don’t leave me alone tonight.”

you stare at him expressionless but he reaches for your hand again this time, he doesn’t try to pull you closer. he simply holds it between both of his, trembling.

his forehead lowers until it rests lightly against your knuckles.

michael's shoulders shake, and his tears fall onto your skin. “i’ve replayed tonight a thousand times already and every single version ends with me hurting you.”

he lets out a broken laugh. “i kept thinking if i called sooner… if i told diana no…”

another sob interrupts him, shaking. “if i had just chosen you first…”

his grip tightens for only a second before loosening again.

“i should’ve left rehearsal early.”

“i should’ve ignored everyone.”

“i should’ve ignored her.”

“i should’ve been standing beside you when those doors opened.”

his breathing turns uneven. “when lionel asked where i was… it should’ve been me greeting him.”

“when everyone congratulated you…”

“…i should’ve been the first.”

he shakes his head violently.

“instead…”

“…you had to lie for me.”

his eyes finally meet yours, filled with guilt, filled with terror.

“do you know what kills me?” his voice is barely audible.

“you never once asked me to choose between my career and you.”

“never.”

“all you asked… was one day.” michael wipes at his face with his hand.

“one day, and i still failed you.”

you remain silent and the silence hurts michael more than shouting ever could. he gives a small, hopeless nod, “you’re right. i don’t deserve forgiveness tonight.”

“…maybe not tomorrow either.” he swallows.

“i just…”

michael's voice disappears for a moment. "i need you to know there wasn’t a single second today where i loved her.”

“not one.”

“i love you.”

“i’ve only ever loved you.”

another tear slips down his face. “and somehow…”

michael lets out a bitter laugh, a sound laced with sorrow, as tears slip silently down his cheeks. slowly, he sinks to his knees before you, his trembling hands reaching for your ankles, as if they are the only tether to reality. he wraps his fingers around them, a desperate grip, grounding himself in your presence. then, with a broken exhale, he lowers his forehead against your bare skin, seeking solace.

you feel the warmth of his tears soaking into you, each drop a testament to his heart's turmoil. his shoulders shake with silent sobs, the weight of guilt pressing down on him, before he presses the softest kiss to the top of your foot, a tender act laden with unspoken longing.

“…i still managed to make you feel like you came second.”

“get up, michael.”

your voice is cold, a stark contrast to the warmth of the moment. you give his shaking shoulder a gentle pat, feeling every quiet sob that wracks through his body beneath your hand, a rhythm of sorrow that resonates deeply within you.

he shakes his head harder, as if denying the reality before him. “no… please, baby…”

his grip around your legs tightens—not enough to hurt, just enough to plead. his voice is hoarse, trembling apart with every word, a melody of desperation that tugs at your heart.

you let out a slow, exhausted sigh, the weight of the moment pressing down upon you.

“let me go.”

he doesn’t budge.

after a few lingering seconds, you gently push against his shoulder until his hands slowly loosen their hold around your legs. the moment you are free, you bend down to retrieve the blanket and pillow that had fallen to the floor, each movement deliberate, a quiet defiance against the storm swirling within.

without another word, you turn your back to him and begin to walk toward the studio, each step heavy with unspoken words and unfulfilled desires.

“please… baby…”

his voice is barely a whisper, a ghost of a plea.

you don’t look back.

“look at me once.”

silence envelops the space, thick and suffocating.

“you don’t have to forgive me…”

his breathing grows uneven behind you, each inhale a struggle against the tide of regret.

“just don’t shut me out.”

another shaky breath escapes him, a fragile sound.

“yell at me.”

“throw something at me.”

“tell me you hate me.”

his voice finally shatters, breaking like glass under pressure.

“anything is better than you pretending i’m not here.” the yearning in his words hangs in the air, a bittersweet reminder of the love that lingers despite the pain.

the apartment grows quieter after that. not because the sharp, jagged edges of the pain have faded, but because the grief has expanded so entirely that it has nowhere left to go. it settles into the floorboards, anchors itself to the corners of the ceiling, and swallows the ambient noise of their shared life until every room feels vacuum-sealed.

weeks pass in a blur of agonizing, hollow routine. michael stops knocking on the heavy oak door of your studio only after the skin over his knuckles splits, leaving small, dark rusty smudges on the white paint. at first, he tries everything with the frantic, desperate energy of a man trying to catch smoke with his bare hands. fresh flowers arrive every morning like clockwork, each bouquet more understated and muted than the last—as though he finally understands that grand, sweeping gestures won't fix what your sudden, devastating absence broke. they pile up by the front door in an awkward, beautiful heap, entirely untouched until the vibrant petals begin to curl, brown, and rot into the floorboards.

then come the handwritten notes. they aren't long, sprawling letters of explanation or defense; they are just small, torn pieces of lined paper tucked gently beneath your studio door, sliding across the hardwood with a soft rustle.

i made your favorite soup.

please remember to eat.

your exhibition was beautiful.

i'm still proud of you.

good morning.

good night.

none of them receive an answer. none of them are even moved from where they land.

he calls you. once. twice. then he stops counting because the digital ledger of his own desperation becomes too heavy to look at. your robotic, pre-recorded voicemail greeting becomes far more familiar to him than the actual cadence of your voice. bill quietly pulls him aside in the hallway one afternoon, placing a heavy hand on his shoulder, telling him to just give you some space. elizabeth tells him, with a soft, pitying look, that healing can't be rushed, that pain has its own timeline. even quincy, after watching michael stare blankly at the untouched, cooling dinner sitting in front of him for forty minutes, speaks up. "if she needs silence, son... let her have it," he says, his voice gravelly and tired.

he tries. god, he tries so hard it makes his chest ache. he sleeps exclusively on the lumpy living room couch because your side of the mattress still smells faintly of your vanilla shampoo, and the olfactory ghost of you is enough to tear him apart by midnight. he wanders into your studio only after he hears the front door click shut when you leave for work, careful not to disturb a single speck of dust. sometimes he just stands perfectly still in the center of the room, hands buried deep in the pockets of his oversized sweatpants, staring at your unfinished, chaotic canvases until his eyes sting and blur.

once, in a moment of overwhelming weakness, he catches himself reaching out for one of your favorite paintbrushes resting on the easel. his fingers hover over the dried blue paint on the handle. he pulls his hand back immediately, as if the wood had burned him.

"don't," he whispers into the empty room, his voice cracking in the quiet. "that's hers."

slowly, the house begins to feel less like a home and more like a museum dedicated to a tragedy. everything reminds him of you. nothing belongs to him anymore.

you, meanwhile, become a ghost haunting the periphery of his vision. you leave the apartment before the sun even breaches the horizon, sliding through the shadows, and you come home long after midnight when the city has gone cold. when michael catches you in the hallway and mutters a fragile "good morning," you simply nod without making eye contact. when he asks if you've eaten, his voice laced with a terrifying amount of hope, you answer with a quiet, monotone "yes."

nothing more. there is no explosive anger. no cathartic tears. no bitter accusations thrown across the kitchen island. just... a vast, suffocating absence. michael quickly learns that this dead silence is infinitely crueler than screaming. because screaming means there is still fire left. screaming means there's still something worth fighting for, some thread of connection left to pull. this... this feels like mourning someone who is still breathing in the next room.

the breaking point comes on a bleak, rainy thursday evening. michael returns home early from work, hoping—foolishly, childishly—that maybe tonight will be the night you'll finally sit down and eat dinner with him.

instead, the house is completely dark, hollowed out. your keys aren't on the entryway table. your heavy winter coat is gone from its hook. bill looks up from the kitchen counter, his expression tight with a reluctant discomfort.

"she said she'd be out," bill says softly.

michael freezes, his hand still resting on the doorknob. "with who?"

bill hesitates, looking down at his hands, wishing he didn't have to be the one to deliver the blow. "a friend."

michael stills completely, his posture going rigid. "...what friend, bill?"

"aaron."

the name lands heavily in the small space between them, vibrating with history. your oldest friend. the one who knew the architecture of your mind long before michael ever entered the picture. the one you used to laugh with until your stomach hurt and tears streamed down your face. the one who had always known exactly how to pull you out of the dark, labyrinthine corners of your own head.

michael nods once. it is too calm, too practiced.

"i see," he says quietly. he turns away, walking toward the dark living room before bill can notice the terrifying way his jaw locks or the way his hands begin to tremble.

it is nearly eleven o'clock when the front door finally clicks open. you step inside quietly, slipping your shoes off, expecting the heavy darkness of an asleep apartment.

instead—michael is sitting upright in the living room. every single light in the place is turned off except the harsh, amber glow of the small lamp right beside him, casting long, dramatic shadows across his face. he hasn't even changed out of his work clothes; his button-down shirt is wrinkled, the collar undone. his elbows rest heavily on his knees, and his hands are clasped together so tightly in front of his mouth that his knuckles have turned a stark, bloodless white. he looks utterly exhausted, hollowed out from the inside.

when he hears the latch click shut, he slowly, deliberately lifts his head. his bloodshot eyes find yours immediately through the gloom. for a long, agonizing moment... railway silence stretches between you. neither of you speaks. the air is thick with things unsaid.

exhausted and unwilling to engage, you move to walk right past him toward the hallway.

"did you have fun?"

his voice is calm. too calm. it's a terrifying, flat line of sound.

you pause in your tracks, your back still turned to him. "...we talked."

"for six hours?" he asks, the calm facade beginning to chip at the edges, revealing something sharp and bleeding underneath.

you don't answer. your silence is the final catalyst.

something inside michael snaps completely. he stands up so abruptly, with such violent force, that his knees slam against the coffee table, rattling the empty glass mugs sitting on top of it.

"what does he have that i don't?"

the question echoes fiercely through the high ceilings of the room, vibrating with weeks of suppressed agony. you finally turn your body around to look at him.

he lets out a short, bitter, ugly laugh that sounds like choking. he drags both of his hands through his dark curls, pulling at the roots until they stand unevenly around his face in wild disarray.

"i've spent weeks begging you to just look at me," he says, his voice shaking violently despite his best efforts to hold it together. he takes a heavy step toward you. "i've slept outside your studio door like a dog. i've written letters until my hands cramped. i've cooked every single meal hoping against hope that you'd just sit down across from me for five minutes."

his eyes glisten, catching the amber lamplight as tears finally well up over his lids.

"i've watched flowers die on the porch because you wouldn't even bring them inside," he takes another step, closing the distance between you, his breathing growing ragged, shallow, and uneven. "i've apologized until i don't even recognize the sound of my own voice anymore. i have stripped myself of every ounce of pride i possess for you."

he swallows hard, a single tear cutting a clean path through the shadow of stubble on his cheek. "and you..." his voice drops to a broken whisper. "you gave six hours to someone else."

his bitter laugh breaks apart, transforming into something painfully, devastatingly close to a sob.

"six hours..." his wet, desperate eyes search your blank face, looking for any sign of the person he loves, any flicker of warmth or anger or recognition. "do you know what i'd give for six minutes?"

the heavy, suffocating silence stretches until it feels like it might crack the walls. michael is still trembling, his chest heaving as he waits for something—anything—from you. a scream, an insult, a door slammed in his face.

instead, looking at his bloodshot eyes and the raw, unraveled state of his clothes, the icy shield you’ve built around yourself for weeks finally begins to fracture. the numbness that felt so safe, so protective, suddenly feels like a prison.

you take a slow step forward. then another.

"michael," you whisper. your voice is raspy, unused, breaking on the two syllables of his name.

that’s all it takes. the sound of his name on your lips breaks whatever tiny thread of composure he had left. he collapses back onto the couch, burying his face in his stained, white-knuckled hands, and he just breaks.

it’s a violent, gut-wrenching kind of crying—the kind that comes from the very bottom of a person's chest. his shoulders shake uncontrollably, his breath hitching into ragged, pathetic gasps as weeks of terror, grief, and desperate loneliness pour out of him all at once. he looks so incredibly small, stripped of all pride, completely bare before you.

"i'm sorry," he chokes out between heavy, wet sobs, his voice muffled by his palms. "i'm so sorry. please don't leave me. please don't look at me like i'm a stranger. i can't do this anymore. i'm losing my mind."

your knees feel weak. seeing him like this—this strong, careful man reduced to sobbing on a couch in the dark—melts the last of your resistance. you cross the small distance between you and drop to your knees on the floor right in front of him.

you reach out, your hands hesitant at first, before firmly grasping his wrists and gently pulling his damp hands away from his face. his cheeks are flushed, wet with hot tears, his nose red, his eyes completely swollen.

"look at me," you murmur, your own eyes finally filling with tears that you've held back for a month. "michael, look at me."

he opens his eyes, his gaze frantic and desperate, looking at you like a drowning man looks at a lifeline.

"i'm not going anywhere," you say, a tear finally slipping down your cheek, your lowercase words soft against the quiet room. "i was just... i was so numb. i didn't know how to come back to you without bringing all the mess with me. i'm sorry i punished you for my silence."

"i don't care about the mess," he cries openly, leaning forward until his forehead rests heavily against yours, his hot, tear-stained breath mingling with your own. "bring the mess. scream at me. break things. just don't lock me out. please, god, don't lock me out."

he wraps his arms around your waist, pulling you tightly against him, burying his face into the crook of your neck. his tears soak into your skin, warm and grounding. you wrap your arms around his broad shoulders, holding him back just as fiercely, rocking him slightly as the heavy sobs slowly begin to taper off into shallow, shaky breaths.

the shift between you happens rapidly, the sheer emotional exhaustion morphing into a sudden, consuming need to physically re-anchor yourselves to one another. the dynamic pivots—michael is still unraveled, tears still leaking from his eyes, but a quiet, trembling authority takes over him. his deep, agonizing yearning manifests as a soft but absolute dominance.

he stands up, pulling you up by your waist effortlessly, his large hands gripping your hips with a quiet, undeniable strength. he doesn't ask. he commands you with a shaky, broken whisper.

"walk with me," he murmurs, his eyes burning into yours. "we’re going to the window. i want to see you. i want to look at what's mine."

you wrap your legs around his waist, and he carries you across the hardwood floor toward the massive, floor-to-ceiling glass window overlooking the rainy city below. he presses your back gently against the cool pane, the sudden chill making you gasp as his burning body pins you in place.

he strips your shirt over your head, his hot palms sweeping down your ribs, before fumbling with your jeans, pushing them and his own clothes down into a discarded heap until there is nothing left between you but raw skin and weeks of starvation.

as he stands between your thighs, the guilt inside him seems to boil over. he looks down at you, his chest heaving, new tears spilling over his eyelashes. he takes your right hand, his fingers trembling, and presses your palm flat against his own wet cheek.

"hit me," he whispers, his voice breaking into a quiet sob. his eyes search yours with an intense, agonizing vulnerability. "slap me, baby. punish me for whatever i did to make you shut down. hurt me, please, if it means you'll feel something for me again. don't just give me silence."

"no," you cry out softy, your heart breaking as your fingers instead curve around his jaw, wiping away his tears with your thumb. "michael, no. i don't want to hurt you. i just want you, i missed you so much."

a choked, ragged sound escapes his throat at your words—a mix of intense relief and overwhelming yearning. his soft dominance returns, possessive and desperate. he hooks his hands firmly under your thighs, lifting you higher against the glass.

"then hold on to me," he commands, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly line that leaves no room for argument. "wrap your arms around me. don't let go. not for a second."

you obey instantly, tangling your fingers into his dark, messy curls. michael guides himself against you, his breathing shallow and uneven, before he drives into you with one slow, deep, possessive push.

a loud, uninhibited cry escapes your lips, echoing off the high ceilings. your body stretches to accommodate the sheer, sudden fullness of him. michael lets out a low, gut-wrenching groan into the crook of your neck, his whole frame shaking as he takes a moment to absorb the feeling of being inside you again.

"you're mine," he mutters against your wet skin, a soft but fierce claim. "say it, angel. tell me you're mine."

"i'm yours, michael," you gasp, your head tossing back against the glass pane. "i'm yours."

he begins to move, setting a heavy, agonizingly deep pace. it is soft in its tenderness but completely dominant in its execution—he controls every movement, every shift of your weight against the window, claiming every inch of your body with a desperate, crying hunger. each time his hips lock against yours, your back slides against the cool glass, the freezing sensation keeping you tethered while your core burns with an escalating, liquid heat.

"open your eyes," he commands gently, his rough breath warm in your ear. "look at me while i take you back."

you open them, your vision blurred by tears, looking directly into his bloodshot, weeping eyes. he is crying openly as he moves inside you, the sheer weight of his love and the terror of almost losing you spilling over. he drives deeper, faster, his hands gripping your waist so tightly his knuckles turn white, hitting the exact spot that makes your mind go entirely blank.

the friction builds to a fever pitch. you are loud now, your breath coming in short, needy pants as the pleasure coils tight and sharp in your stomach. michael is trembling violently beneath your hands, his chest heaving as he pours every ounce of his weeks-old grief into the surrender of your body.

"i love you," he breaks out, the words ripped from his chest like a sob as his pace becomes frantic, uncontrolled. "i love you so much, please, don't ever leave me again—"

"i—i love you more... mikey, i'm gonna—ah!" the final coil snaps. your climax hits you like a sudden wave, your internal muscles clamping down around him in tight, rhythmic waves of pure release. you throw your arms around his neck, sobbing softly into his shoulder as the pleasure completely tears through you.

hearing your undone cries is the final catalyst for him. michael lets out a deep, guttural shout against your skin, his body turning rigid as he drives into you one last time, spilling himself inside you in a long, shuddering release that leaves him completely spent, his head burying into your neck as he weeps softly from sheer relief.

the first release isn't enough to exorcise the weeks of agonizing starvation building inside his chest. the desperation doesn't leave him; it mutters against your skin, turning darker, thicker, and deeply insatiable. his yearning is an endless, hollow pit that a single climax can't possibly fill, a burning hunger that has been compounding over days of dead silence and cold, untouched bouquets.

instead of letting your legs slide down from his waist, michael’s grip tightens into your skin, his fingers pressing so hard into the flesh of your thighs that it leaves white, bloodless marks before flushing a dark, bruised red. his breathing is a series of harsh, shuddering gasps in your ear, his chest heaving violently against your back as he downshifts from the soft, crying tenderness into something feral, unhinged, and desperately rough.

"i'm not done," he chokes out, his voice a raw, broken whisper full of tears and absolute possession, vibrating straight through your collarbone. "i can't... i can't let you go yet. i need more. i need to know you're real."

he doesn't wait for a response. before your mind can even process the lingering, buzzing waves of your first climax, michael shifts your weight with a quiet, dominant strength that leaves you completely breathless. he turns you around completely, forcing your body to face the massive, freezing pane of glass, cutting off your view of the apartment and replacing it with the dark, wet expanse of the city outside.

he pushes your upper body down, forcing your hips to high-arch back toward him, tilting your pelvis up at an angle that leaves you entirely exposed to his gaze. with a firm, unyielding pressure of his palm against the back of your head, he presses the side of your face and your forehead flat against the cold window. the contrast is dizzying, a violent shock to your system—the freezing glass sticking to your sweaty skin, and the blinding, terrifying heat of his body looming directly behind you, pressing his hard chest flat against your shoulder blades.

"look at what you do to me," he commands with a trembling, ragged sob, his fingers digging mercilessly into your hips, pinning your pelvic bone against the glass frame until you can feel the cold metal of the track beneath your toes. "look at how much i need you. look at me, please."

he re-enters you in one sharp, brutal, uncompromising thrust.

a loud, shattered scream escapes your throat, fogging up a wide patch of the glass in front of your mouth, turning instantly into a high-pitched, pathetic whimper as your cheek slides slightly against the cold, wet condensation. he doesn't ease you into it this time; there is no tentative testing of the waters. the pace he sets is relentless, heavy, and devastatingly rough. each time his hips slam into yours, the force ripples through your entire body, rattling the massive glass window beneath your flattened hands and forehead, the deep thud of his pelvis against you echoing like thunder in the empty room.

the apartment is no longer quiet; it is filled with the explicit, wet friction of your bodies, the heavy, desperate thud of his chest against your back, and a chaotic symphony of vocal surrender. you are moaning entirely out of control, the sound broken up by constant, breathless whimpers as he hits the deepest parts of you over and over again, his angle so precise and unyielding it makes your brain turn to liquid.

michael is still crying behind you, completely unraveled by his own intensity. you can feel his hot, heavy tears dropping onto your bare shoulder blades, trailing down your spine to mix with the sweat pooling at the small of your back. his ragged sobs hitch every time he drives into you with that insatiable, aching yearning, his hands moving from your hips to grip your hair, pulling your head back just enough to expose the long line of your throat before pressing you right back down against the glass. he is sex-mad, entirely consumed by the terror of the past weeks, using his body to violently stake a claim on your soul, making sure you feel every single ounce of his pain, his loneliness, his desperate love.

"please," you sob into the glass, your eyes wide and unseeing as the blinking lights of the city blur into long, neon streaks through the rain. your voice is cracking, your knees beginning to shake violently under the sheer, unmitigated weight of his assault. "michael... michael, please—"

"no," he whimpers back, a dark, desperate command as his hand flies to your throat, not to choke, but to hold you firmly in place, forcing your face back against the window, anchoring you to his rhythm. "don't ask me to stop. don't do that to me. tell me you feel me. tell me you're here."

"i feel you—ah!—michael, i'm here, i'm yours," you wail, your eyes rolling back into your head as the pleasure becomes too sharp, too intense, too overwhelming to bear.

the friction is blinding, an absolute sensory overload. you are overstimulated, your senses completely short-circuiting between the freezing glass against your face, the tight, bruising grip of his hands on your hips, and the punishing, rhythmic depth of his length inside you. a heavy, liquid heat coils so tight in your lower stomach that your head begins to spin, the blood rushing to your ears until his ragged breathing sounds like it's coming from miles away. your vision blurs entirely, the dark city rain streaking down the outside of the pane matching the frantic, wet sliding of your bodies against each other.

you are right on the edge of passing out from sheer, unadulterated ecstasy. your mind feels completely hollowed out, your muscles trembling so hard you can barely keep your feet planted on the hardwood floor. your moans degenerate into tiny, breathless whimpers of pure exhaustion, your chin slick with saliva against the glass, your body completely at the mercy of his dominant, weeping rhythm.

he pulls back all the way, almost entirely leaving you, before slamming back in with a force that makes you cry out a sound that isn't even human, your fingers clawing uselessly at the smooth glass, leaving long, smeared streaks in the condensation.

"michael... i'm... i'm going to—" you choke out, your voice fading into a dizzy, breathless whisper as your strength completely gives out, your eyelids fluttering rapidly as darkness edges into your peripheral vision.

just as your knees buckle and your upper body begins to slide down the glass, your second climax rips through you with a violent, paralyzing force. it is so intense it leaves you gasping for air, your lungs locking up as your internal muscles clamp down around him in tight, frantic, desperate spasms of pure release. your head swims in a black, blissful vacuum of pure sensation, your consciousness slipping away for a fraction of a second into total oblivion.

feeling your undone body shuddering and collapsing around him, michael lets out a broken, guttural cry—a sound of pure, agonizing surrender that has been trapped in his throat for weeks. "i love.. ah! i love you so much. oh!" he drives into your seizing body three more times, fast, deep, and clumsy with desperation, before his frame goes completely rigid against your back. he spills himself inside you with a heavy, shuddering force that echoes through his entire skeleton, his chest collapsing flat against your spine as he weeps openly into the nape of your neck, his fingers still tangled tightly in your hair, completely spent, completely unraveled, and finally quieted.

slowly, carefully, he slides out of you and lets your feet touch the cold floorboards, but he doesn't let go. he wraps his arms entirely around you from behind, pulling your back flush against his chest, his chin resting heavily on your shoulder as you both stare out at the blurred, foggy glass.

his hand comes up to gently wipe the dried tears from your cheeks, his thumb soft against your skin.

"don't disappear again," he whispers into the quiet darkness of the room, his voice tired but finally whole.

you lean your head back against his chest, listening to the steady, comforting beat of his heart. "i won't, angel face. i'm home."

angelcrescent

𓈒❤︎︎࣪˖ what happens in the bedroom doesn't always stay in the bedroom!

intro ✴︎⸝꙳.˖𖥔݁˖⋆˚𝜗𝜚˚⋆ ( 5.2k ) childhoodbsf!popstar!reader x bad!michael jackson ╱ after a long night of passion between husband and wife, michael mindlessly rips open his shirt onstage, forgetting entirely about the previous night’s evidence sprawled all over his back… now, that’s something for the public to talk about!

notes… 𝟏𝟖+ established relationship. husband n wife of 8 years. begins with transcribed excerpt from an interview together. reader’s transcribed dialogue is signalled by heart symbol. ;; softdom!michael as always. makin’ sweet love til the break of dawn! mikey is shy in the streets n sexy in the sheets. . . light dirty talk. being overheard in the bedroom. hot n passionate sex. he talks u through it. zero protection. creampie. multiple orgasms. overstimulation. kinda babymaking. allusions to pregnancy. aftercare. sleeping while cockwarming. markin’ up ur sweetheart. . .

urbanfunkchild

Hi babe. So I need a breeding kink fic when reader is looking so delicious he can’t resist.

Cuz this man literally has Leo venus ans taurus mars!!! It’s just HAS to be truthful

ohhhh ur so good for requestin this

.✦── achin' for you

wc: 2.5k

̩͙ ⠳⠀⠀ .⠀⏜ pairing: dangerous era!michael x fem! reader ̩͙

tags: smut, breeding kink, creampie, body worship, emotional smut, ovulation kink, mike is down BAD - trust, overly horny mike,

A/N: this was written in like 2 hrs in a Starbucks the tense is all over the joint so … be gentle w me

18+ mdni... or ill getcha

the tour bus sways slightly as the driver merges across the highway lanes. the tinny sound of the metal hauling over asphalt was a strange but soothing sound.

miles of dark highway blurred past the windows; swallowing the roar of the stadium crowd still ringing in your bones. the air on the bus was close and smelled of stale coffee, leather, a faint hint of hairspray.

alohaluz

michael is your best friend, but he's also the person you dream about kissing, holding, and touching. when the two of you finally cross that line, you're convinced that what happened meant something, you confess your feelings—only for michael to admit he isn't sure he feels the same way. heartbroken, you move on. somehow, you're able to. michael isn't. ᴍᴀsᴛᴇʀʟɪsᴛ

tags: angst, best friends to lovers, unrequited love, friends to strangers, slow burn, mutual pining, emotional hurt, hurt/no comfort, first kiss, rejection, friendship breakup, yearning, longing, michael jackson x reader, bittersweet ending

1984, los angeles, encino

the night breeze is gentle, it caresses your face and your bare arms. you should have brought a sweater. encino is never really cold. but today it seems different. you didn't knock at the studio door yet. you're thinking about going back home.

kaiomii

𑣲 WHATEVER HAPPENS

( ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈)ഒ '♥︎ 𝒘𝗁𝖺𝗍𝖾𝗏𝖾𝗋 𝗁𝖺𝗉𝗉𝖾𝗇𝗌 𝖽𝗈𝗇'𝗍 𝗅𝖾𝗍 𝗀𝗈 𝗈𝖿 𝗆𝗒 𝗁𝖺𝗇𝖽, 𝖸𝗈𝗎 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝗆𝗂𝖼𝗁𝖺𝖾𝗅 𝗁𝖺𝖽 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗉𝗋𝗈𝗆𝗂𝗌𝖾𝖽... 𝖻𝗎𝗍 𝗒𝗈𝗎 𝖽𝗈𝗇'𝗍 𝗄𝗇𝗈𝗐 𝗂𝖿 𝗒𝗈𝗎 𝗅𝗈𝗇𝗀𝖾𝗋 𝖼𝖺𝗇. ⊹ ࣪ ˖ ໒꒱

⊹ ࣪ ˖ 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘀: smut , fingering , smut with plot , soft (subby) dom!mike , secretly engaged , unprotected (don't ever.) Michael basically makes you pregnant

⊹ ࣪ ˖ 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺𝗲𝘀: heavy angsty themes, unplanned pregnancy , cameo of j*e Jackson , forbidden love , fem!reader. secret engaged. both scared for their life's.

ap-ple-head

too much, not enough

pairing: otw era!mike x reader

summary: edging. that’s it. that’s the plot.

word count: 1500

content warning: mdni. this one is dirty. edging, begging like so much begging, overstim, unprotected p-in-v, michael being the softest soft dom in the world, praise kink times one thousand then double it, maybe the slightest hint at a breeding kink if you squint and i mean really squint and get out your magnifying glass

author’s note: rahhhh this request had alllll my favorite things. i fucking love you anon. kiss your brain and then kiss it again. ♡

ps. i can’t proofread smut it gives me the ick so if you catch a mistake here no you don’t

pps. i hate to repeat a word but i typed the word “good” about 600 times while writing this. got it down to 9 in the end. that’s the best i can do.

cloudsofbooksandpages

• R I V A L S •

summary:

It’s the MTV awards, and tonight is the first time you’ll perform your newest single, from your much anticipated 2nd studio album. You’re all set to give the performance of your life, except, some information arrives at the last minute, SECONDS before you’re about to go on stage.

Your long term rival, Michael Jackson, has been seated in the front row...

background/context: there is no official timeline for this story other than it's based in the early 90s. Michael's bad album has come out, and he's post tour / 29 years old. Other than that, there is no time-specific content. This is not a historically accurate fic, either. Most, if not all, things mentioned I have made up for the sake of entertainment. Please don’t take it too seriously.

content warnings: steam. cheating (fmc & Michael, on third party). Alcohol and drug use suggested. Manipulative/dominant MJ, if you’re sensitive to that, please don’t read.

am3sss

invincible!michael x single mother! reader

summary: zain finally meets michael again and build an extra special connection with him and his mama - PART 3

read part 1 and part 2 before this!

long awaited but finally here

you and michael had finally established a day for him to meet zain again after multiple back and forths - his 5th birthday.

“okay, baby. which outfit do you want to wear? this white shirt or the blue one? remember you’re wearing shorts as well”

you held two shirts on hangers whilst being crouched in front of him. his index finger tapped gently on his chin whilst his lips twisted in thought.

“this one”

zain grabbed the white t-shirt in his hands, pulling it off of the hanger and placed it on the bed with his black jorts.

“are you excited for today? i know mikey has told you about some of the rides.. and the animals!”

you guided his pyjamas off of him and replaced them with his clean clothes.

“i know, mama! i can’t wait to see the gifaffes and the elephants, and go on the big rides!”

you giggled, “giraffes, darling”

he began to slightly jump up and down at the thought of the fun day.

“well, looks like someone is about to have the best birthday ever!”

michael had told you that he had sent a car to pick you up so you had a few minutes until it was meant to pull up.

zain was sat in the living room watching spongebob on the nickelodeon channel, very invested as his little feet swung on the sofa. so whilst he was distracted, you took a little time to ready yourself.

applying the pink to your lips and adding an extra spritz of the expensive perfume you had treated yourself too, fluffing your hair a little bit and popping your hip as you admired your reflection.

“mama! i think the cars here”

the car ride there was quite calm. zain had been telling you about the show he was watching and about the dream he had last night, the chauffeur smiling at him in the rear view mirror.

by the time you had arrived, zain was buzzing with excitement, unable to contain it. the door was pulled open on your side, allowing you to get out and help zain out.

the house before you both was unable to describe. it looked like something straight out of a disney movie and it matched michael perfectly.

michael had come bounding out of the house with a huge smile painted over his face, his hand waving ecstatically at your arrival.

“welcome to neverland, zain!”

zain had let out an excited squeal and ran towards michael where they had met in the middle of the path, michael picked him up and span him around, hugging him tightly to his chest.

“hi y/n.. how are you doing?”

“very well, thank you. you have a gorgeous home”, you hugged him, squishing zain between you and michael.

“thank you! it’s name is inspired by peter pan. you know that book, don’t you?”

“duh! it’s one of zain’s favourites as well!”

michael guided you both towards the rides, the huge ferris wheel catching your eye, as you audibly gasped and pointed it out to zain who let out a cute “wow!”

the sunlight beat its hot rays on you, zain’s hair shining from the strawberry scented curl cream which was ran through his hair earlier this morning.

it was sure to be messed up after the day he would have on the rides, however it was worth seeing the smile he had on his face throughout the day.

all day, zain had been on the go. jumping from ride to ride in hand with michael, and going to the animal exhibition to see all of his exotic animals.

at one point, michael had even managed to drag you onto one of the fastest rides there. he had handed zain over to one of his trusted workers to take to get slushies and ran to the opposite side of the neverland ranch.

he held your hand the entire way, even when it felt like it was breaking, he didn’t let go. when the ride took a dip, you quickly buried your head into his shoulder and he had placed his hand on the back of your head, steadying you round the sharp corners.

he whispered in your ear after you screamed, “it’s okay, mama. it’s nearly finished now”

by the end of the day, zain appeared to have had the best birthday of his lifetime. his eyes drooped and he had began to cling onto you more, but he could not miss any of the action as he refused to sleep.

“why don’t you just stay here? he looks like he’s about have the best sleep of his life.”

michael gently stroked zain’s head, looking between his sleepy face and your matching eyes.

“no, no.. we’ve already been here long enough, i don’t want to push it” you said, smiling at him sleepily.

“please. please stay here. i have the best room for him to sleep in with a night light and books and a bathroom”

you deliberated in your head, a line forming between your eyebrows which he wanted to smooth out with his thumb but held back.

“fine.. i guess we can if he’s so exhausted”

he jumped to his feet, a huge grin on his face and waiting to show you to your room.

“great! follow me”

he led you to zain’s bedroom, being extra quiet as to not disturb him sleeping on your shoulder.

“i think this room is maybe my favourite room in neverland, it’s so childlike and magical”

“i think zain will love this when he sees it”, giggling and gesturing to zain completely passed out on your shoulder.

after you had given zain a bath and placed him in the spare shorts and shirt you had brought in case of emergencies, he was comfortably asleep with a smile on his face.

you left the room and kept the door ajar so you would hear if zain woke up and found michael waiting for you in the hallway.

you crept towards him, his back facing you and it was obvious he hadn’t heard you leave.

“BOO!”

he shrieked loudly, his hands pressing against his chest and staring at you in bewilderment as you broke down laughing.

“what on earth!”

“i’m so sorry, it was too much of a good opportunity not to take”

he shook his head and began to walk away and lead you to your room.

“woah..”

the room was probably as big as your living room and kitchen combined and you truly felt like you were living the rich life.

“this room is huge”

michael stayed at the door, watching your amazed expression with a small smile as you walked around the room.

“i’ll let you rest, it’s been a long night”

you turned, nodding at him and grinning.

“yeah.. well, you rest too, you must be exhausted as well”

he scrunched his face up at the thought of the tiresome day he had and turned to walk out.

“michael!”

he stopped in his step, turning around to face you. watching you glance around nervously before walking towards him.

wrapping him up in a hug and pressing your face against his shoulder, and he reciprocated it after a few seconds of shock.

“thank you for giving zain the best birthday ever. i don’t know how i’d ever repay you but please, if you need anything, please ask”

“stay with me” he whispered quietly, so quiet that you couldn’t pick it up.

“huh?”

“oh.. i-uh.. don’t worry about it, i love zain with my whole heart and he deserves an amazing day dedicated to him”

you finally let go of him, taking a few steps back with your hands in the back of your jean pockets.

“goodnight”

later that night, michael lay in bed, his thoughts stopping him from falling asleep.

he had never felt this amount of love for anyone, and he had felt an overwhelming need to protect zain from any harm that would come his way.

and from the many phone calls you and him had had, he knew about how hard it was to bring zain up with the lack of money and struggle to find a stable job. he felt you deserved a lavish life and to be spoilt after raising zain to become an intelligent young boy, even through struggles.

eventually his eyes closed, his dreams filled with images of you and him raising zain as a family.

the next morning, he was awoken by a little hand tapping his arm. once his eyes opened, zain’s wild curls filled his vision.

“mikey..”

his arms clutched a teddy bear you had placed in his hands when he slept, his eyes wide and teary.

michaels shot up, mind still fogged with sleep and eyes droopy, moving to pull zain to sit on the bed beside him.

“what’s wrong, applehead?”

“i just got scared ‘cause when i woke up, i wasn’t at home and i couldn’t find my mama”

he leaned against michael’s chest as he looked around the room, one hand near his quivering lips.

“hey, hey.. its alright, mamas just down the hall”

zain began to lay down next to him and michael stroked his curls as he gradually fell asleep.

michael was meaning to get up and wake you up to check on zain, but the warmth of his bed caused him to fall asleep instead.

the next morning, he awoke and zain wasn’t beside him. he began to wonder if he had dreamt of last night.

the clanking of something hitting his kitchen counter made him perk up and leave his room to check if he was downstairs.

he saw zain sitting at the kitchen counter, his legs swinging on the high seat whilst eating cereal. your back was turned to him whilst you prepared your own breakfast.

“good morning” michael said, walking to sit beside zain on the seat.

“g’morning, mikey!”

zain smiled at him with a large grin, his words slightly muffled due to the cereal in his mouth.

“zain! don’t speak with your mouth full. morning, michael, zain told me about last night”

his eyes widened, wondering if you were angry at him.

“i’m so sorry, i was meaning to come and get you but i fell asleep instead and-”

“it’s okay! it’s no worries, really. i’m just glad zain had you to go to when he was upset.. we should probably get going soon though, i need to get zain’s things ready for school tomorrow”

“ah, okay. i’ll get a car ready for you”

for once, the large kitchen felt like it was full of life. zain’s loud giggles and slightly mispronounced words filled the silence, and you would occasionally wipe away the milk from the corner of his mouth with the napkin. michael had never laughed so much, and he realised that his heart wasn’t yearning for that familial love but felt fulfilled instead.

after breakfast, you had collected all of your belongings and readied yourself to leave.

michael knelt down, arms open and waiting for zain to hug him.

zain ran into his arms, arms tangling around his neck.

“m’gonna miss you, mikey”

“don’t worry, i’ll see you again soon! and neverland is always here for you to come and enjoy again”

michael looked up and saw you staring at the scene with a slightly glazed over look.

he stood up, zain still in his arms and walked over to you. he brought you in for a hug as well as you leant your head in his shoulder.

“thank you for having us and letting us stay over”

“as i said, i loved having you here, please feel free to come back”

once you had gotten in the car, michael felt his heart sink, that familiar loneliness creeping back in.

inside the car, zain had felt the same.

“mama.. i already miss him”

you pulled him to your chest, allowing him to express his sadness about leaving his new friend.

“i know, baby. me too”

i’m sorry this is lwk chopped but i’ve been struggling to find motivation to write this. probably gonna need 2 more parts. yikes💔

doemj

⠀⠀ ⠀⠀ BREAK A SWEAT

michael arrives home from a demanding music video filming day and enters absolutely fatigued, wanting nothing but to kiss you all over, however, placing you on his lap as he did so affected him more than he thought.

⠀⠀ ⠀⠀⠀ ⠀⠀⠀ 18+ mdni

7.3k　 ﹒ 　thriller michael ᱒ 𝒻.rea CONTAINS　 ﹒ 　( smut w little plot )　softdom!mj, established relationship, oral ( m&f ) munch mikey >⁄ ⁄ < crying, dry humping, riding, spit as lube, stomach bulge, insecurities, no use of y/n, unprotected (wrap your willy! dont be silly!) creampie, aftercare

dear-mono

ONGEORHKSBEKMOGMOMGOMG THIS IS LITERATURE. THIS FIC NEEDS TO STAND WITH THE CLASSIC LITERATURE BOOKS. ITS SO GOOD, SO BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN HOLY MOLY… THIS WAS SO HOT.

luvingkiku

couple you please write a fic where michael like forgets an anniversary cause of practice and we like give him the silent treatment for 2 days while he’s like yearning ?

7:00

synopsis — 𓍼ོ.☘︎ ݁˖༘⋆ : michael misses your third anniversary dinner and you wait alone at the restaurant. when he finds out, he’s overwhelmed with guilt and tries to fix what went wrong.

themes — 𓍼ོ.☘︎ ݁˖༘⋆ : fem reader, missed love, guilt, regret, angst, fluff

wc — 𓍼ོ.☘︎ ݁˖༘⋆ : 3,067

wanna see more? here’s my masterlist! ݁ ˖Ი𐑼ֶָ֢

request = open 𐔌՞ ܸ.ˬ.ܸ՞𐦯 𓍼ོ.☘︎ ݁˖༘⋆

the reservation sat at the edge of the table. the warm light spilled across the table, two untouched glasses of water, napkins folded too neatly. the restaurant carried that mix of garlic and melted wax, soft music played somewhere overhead, blending into the low hum of conversation and the occasional clink of cutlery. everything around you kept moving forward.

your table didn’t.

every time the front door opened, you looked up too fast, every single time.

your heart jumped before you could stop it, sharp and hopeful, and then it sank just as quickly when it wasn’t him. strangers came and went, laughing, brushing snow off their coats, shaking off the cold, and each time your body betrayed you the same way. shoulders tightening, breath catching. that small, stupid flicker of hope you told yourself you wouldn’t let happen again. but it kept happening anyway. you kept looking for michael.

the waiter came by with a careful kind of politeness, hands folded behind his back.

“do you need a little more time?”

you nodded before he finished the sentence.

“yeah. just… a bit longer.”

he left you with two menus you hadn’t opened and a bouquet of white lilies sitting across from you like a reminder you didn’t want to read. your phone was face-down beside your plate. you turned it over anyway.

nothing. no missed calls. no new messages. your reflection stared back from the black screen, eyes a little too wide, expression held together by habit. your thumb hovered over his name. didn’t press. hovered again. you knew what would happen if you called.

you could already hear it—his voice on the other end, warm, rushed, apologetic.

“baby, i’m sorry—rehearsal ran over.”

or worse—

“just give me twenty minutes.”

twenty minutes that would stretch into an hour. then two. then nothing you could count anymore.

your throat tightened as you locked the phone again.

if he remembered, he would come. you didn’t want to be the one who had to make him remember.

7:30 p.m.

couples around you were finishing dessert, chairs scraping softly against the floor as people left one by one, their laughter fading into the distance. the restaurant slowly emptied itself out, like the night was moving on without asking if you were ready. your table stayed the same.

you checked your phone again. then again.

your thumb lingered over his contact longer this time, almost pressing—then pulling away at the last second. your breath wavered.

just call him.

just once.

but even as the thought came, you already knew how it would sound. you already knew the apology before it arrived. you already knew how easily it would soften you, how quickly you’d fold it back into hope again.

so you didn’t.

you put the phone down like it weighed too much to hold.

8:15 p.m.

the candle had burned low enough now that the flame looked uncertain. the restaurant had gone quiet in a different way—less busy, more final. like the end of something that had already happened.

the waiter returned, slower this time.

he didn’t ask if you needed more time.

he just looked at the table, then at you, with something softer in his expression.

“would you like me to box up the dessert?”

you frowned slightly. “dessert?”

a pause.

“your reservation noted it was an anniversary.”

the words didn’t feel loud, but they hit hard anyway.

for a moment, you couldn’t quite process them. your hands tightened around the edge of the table as if it could steady you. the candle hissed softly. somewhere behind you, someone laughed, and it felt too normal for the way your chest had just gone tight.

“oh,” you said finally.

small. flat. empty.

you reached across the table and picked up the lilies. they were colder than you expected, petals brushing against your wrist as you pulled them into your lap.

“thank you,” you said quietly, forcing something close to a smile. “sorry about all this.”

the waiter shook his head.

“no need to apologize.”

he hesitated, like he wanted to say more, then didn’t.

“i hope your night gets better.”

you nodded like that was something you could agree with.

outside, the air hit you harder than you expected.

the warmth of the restaurant disappeared instantly behind you, replaced by wind that cut through your coat and pulled at your hair. the street were alive in the way cities are at night. someone crossed the street holding hands, leaning into each other like it was the most natural thing in the world. no hesitation. no waiting. you looked down at the lilies in your arms. after a moment, you set them down on a nearby bench.

carefully.

like if you were gentle enough, it wouldn’t feel like leaving.

it was your third anniversary.

and he didn’t show.

the house was silent when michael walked through the front door just after midnight. his rehearsal bag slipped from his shoulder with a dull thud against the floor. he barely noticed, and his muscles ached from hours of dancing, his calves tight, his voice hoarse from singing through the same songs again and again.

despite the exhaustion written across his face, he couldn’t help smiling to himself.

today had been productive. they’d finally nailed the routine he’d been struggling with all week, and his director had actually nodded in approval instead of asking for one more take. the relief of that had carried him through the last hour of rehearsal, even when the studio lights had turned hot and blinding, even when sweat had soaked through the back of his shirt and his shoes had started to stick to the floor. the music was still ringing in his ears, the beat still lodged in his chest. absentmindedly, he hummed the melody as he kicked off his shoes near the door.

“mama?”

his voice echoed through the house.

“you awake?”

nothing.

he frowned. usually you’d answer immediately. even if it was just a sleepy “in here.” even if you were half buried under blankets or curled up on the couch with a book you’d long since stopped reading. usually there was some sign of you—soft footsteps, the glow of a lamp, the sound of your voice drifting from another room.

instead, silence.

michael wandered farther inside.

“you asleep already mama?”

still nothing. his eyes drifted toward the kitchen. then, they landed on the calendar hanging beside the refrigerator.

november 2nd, circled carefully in red ink. a tiny heart drawn beside it, our anniversary.

everything inside him stopped. the smile vanished, his stomach dropped, cold and sudden. his mouth went dry.

“no.”

the word came out broken. the house, warm a second ago, now felt airless. the candle scent in the room turned sour in his throat. slowly his gaze lowered, the reservation card. still sitting exactly where you’d left it that morning.

7:00 p.m.

your favorite restaurant.

he remembered you smiling while placing it on the counter before he’d rushed out the door. you’d been dressed for the day already, hair done, eyes bright, looking at him with that hopeful expression he knew so well.

“don’t work too hard today.”

you’d laughed when you said it, light and teasing, like you were trying to make the warning sound casual even though you both knew what tonight meant.

he’d kissed your forehead without thinking.

“i won’t.”

his knees nearly gave out. the card blurred for a second, then sharpened again, each printed line suddenly cruel in its simplicity. his chest tightened so hard it hurt to breathe.

“oh god…”

his whisper cracked. his breathing turned uneven as realization crashed over him all at once. you’d waited, you’d gotten dressed, you’d gone. alone.

while he’d been under bright rehearsal lights, counting steps and harmonies and cues, while he’d been laughing with the cast and chasing perfection and telling himself he’d check his phone after just one more run-through, you’d been sitting in a restaurant with flowers and candles and a table meant for two.

he dragged both hands down his face, fingers trembling.

the house suddenly felt too small, too quiet. his chest tightened painfully as he stared at the reservation card, at the neat handwriting.

he stared at the reservation card, at the red circle around the date, and the truth hit him with the force of a slammed door.

he left you alone on our anniversary, and somewhere in that restaurant the candle at your table had burned down to a trembling little stump beside the untouched dessert, lighting the empty chair where i should have been.

he checked the bedroom first, empty. the bathroom, empty.

“mama?”

his voice scraped through the apartment and came back thin and wrong, swallowed by the hush.

he pulled his phone from his pocket and called you. it rang once, then dropped into voicemail. he tried again. voicemail.

“…please.”

his eyes snagged on the front door. the space where your overnight bag usually sat was bare. so were your slippers, tucked nowhere by the wall, no soft scuff of them on the tile, no sign you’d only stepped out for a minute.

his chest tightened hard enough to hurt. you hadn’t gone for a walk, you’d left.

he braced himself against the kitchen counter, fingers slipping on the cool laminate, one trembling hand covering his mouth as he stared at the floor and tried to breathe through the panic clawing up his throat.

the house felt wrong the next morning. your coffee mug was still in the cabinet. your side of the bed was smooth and cold, untouched, the sheets pulled tight where no body had warmed them.

he kept looking toward the bedroom, every few seconds jerking his head up at the smallest sound, expecting to hear your footsteps, the familiar creak of the floorboards, your voice calling back to him.

instead, nothing.

rehearsal blurred at the edges. he missed counts, came in late on cues, forgot choreography he’d drilled into his muscles for weeks. sweat cooled on the back of his neck. his hands felt clumsy and unfamiliar, his stomach knotted so tightly he could barely swallow.

when it finally ended, he drove home too fast, knuckles white around the wheel, hope and dread twisting together in his chest until he could hardly tell them apart. he unlocked the front door with shaking fingers.

“mama?” silence.

his shoulders sagged all at once. he stood there for a long moment, listening to the refrigerator hum and the blood rush in his ears, before quietly setting his keys on the counter.

“i’m sorry.” the words fell flat and vanished into the empty apartment.

late on the second night, the scrape of keys in the lock dragged him out of sleep. he shot upright on the couch, heart slamming so hard it made him dizzy.

the front door opened slowly. you stepped inside with your overnight bag resting against your shoulder. for a second, he could only stare, frozen in place, his breath caught painfully in his chest. then his eyes burned. tears came fast, blurring you at the edges.

“mama…” his voice cracked open on the word.

“you came home.”

you stood there quietly, your arms folded loosely across your chest as you watched him. his eyes never left yours. they were red, swollen, and wet with tears that kept spilling no matter how hard he tried to blink them back.

“say something.”

his voice cracked on the words, barely louder than a breath.

“please.”

you didn’t. not right away.

the silence between you was unbearable. it pressed down on him until his breathing turned ragged and uneven. he looked down, dragging in a shaky breath before slowly sinking to his knees in front of you. not because he thought it would fix anything, but because he was desperate enough to try anything at all.

his hands were trembling so badly he could barely hold them still.

“i’m sorry,” he whispered, and then the words broke apart into a sob. “i’m so so so so sorry.”

his fingers reached for yours, then stopped halfway, hovering there as if he was afraid he didn’t deserve to touch you.

“please,” he choked out. “please let me hold your hands. please.” you didn’t answer.

after a moment, he lowered his head and let out a broken, shaking breath before gently taking your hands into his own. his grip was careful, almost reverent, like he was terrified you’d pull away and leave him with nothing.

“i love you.” he said, and the tears came harder now, sliding down his cheeks in helpless streams. “i love you so much.”

his thumb brushed over your knuckles, trembling. “and i ruined it.”

his voice cracked completely.

“i ruined our anniversary.”

the words seemed to tear out of him. he bowed his head, pressing your hands against his forehead as his shoulders started to shake.

“i know,” he whispered through another sob. “i know i hurt you. i know i made you wait. i know i made you feel forgotten on the one night that was supposed to be about us.”

his breath hitched violently.

“i hate myself for that.” another tear dropped onto your fingers.

“i hate that i made you cry. i hate that i made you sit there and wonder if i even cared enough to remember.”

his voice broke again, raw and pleading.

“i did remember. i did. and that’s what makes this worse, because i still let everything else come first and i still made you feel like you didn’t matter.”

he shook his head, crying openly now, the sound of it thin and wrecked.

“please forgive me.”

the words came out desperate, almost frantic.

“please. i’m begging you.”he lifted his head just enough to look at you, his face wet and ruined with tears, his eyes searching yours like he could find mercy there if he looked hard enough.

“i’ll do anything,” he said, his voice trembling so badly it nearly fell apart. “i’ll cancel every meeting, leave rehearsals early, set alarms, write it on every wall in this house if i have to. i’ll never let another date slip past me again. i swear to you, i won’t.”

he let out a broken laugh that turned into another sob.

“i don’t care how pathetic i sound.”

his grip tightened around your hands, not enough to hurt, only enough to hold on.

“i just can’t stand knowing i made you feel like you came second on our anniversary.”

his face crumpled.

“you never do,” he whispered fiercely. “you never have. you never will.”

he bent forward again, pressing your hands to his forehead as his whole body shook with quiet, helpless sobs.

“please don’t shut me out,” he begged. “please don’t make me lose you over this. i can’t—” his voice broke, and he swallowed hard, trying again through tears. “i can’t bear the thought that i made you feel unloved on a day that was supposed to prove the opposite.”

he was crying openly now, shoulders trembling, breath stuttering between each broken apology.

“please.” he whispered again, smaller this time, like the word itself was all he had left. “please forgive me.”

you stared at him for what felt like forever. at the way his hands shook around yours, at the tears he wasn’t even trying to hide anymore, at the guilt carved into every line of his face.

slowly, you slipped one hand free. for a second, his expression shattered completely, and he looked like he might fall apart right there on the floor. his fingers loosened at once, convinced you were pulling away for good.

instead, your hand found his cheek. your thumb brushed away one of the tears sliding down his skin.

“look at me.”

he obeyed instantly, lifting his face with a shaky breath.

“i was hurt.” you said softly.

his eyes squeezed shut for a moment, and another tear slipped free.

“i know.” he whispered. “i know. i’m sorry. i’m so sorry.” your own eyes glistened. “not because you forgot a date.” his face twisted with fresh guilt.

“because for one night…”

you swallowed, then met his gaze again.

“i felt like i wasn’t the first person on your mind.”

his mouth trembled. he looked like he might cry harder at the sound of your voice alone.

“you were,” he said immediately, broken and frantic. “you are. you always are. i just—i failed you. i failed us. i failed our anniversary and i failed you.”

another sob tore through him.

“please believe me when i say i never meant to make you feel small.”

you held his gaze for a long moment, then you nodded once.

“i believe you’re sorry.”

he blinked, stunned, tears still clinging to his lashes. relief hit him so hard it looked almost painful. another tear slipped down his cheek, but this one carried something softer with it.

“but if this ever happens again…” the faintest hint of a smile touched your lips.

“i’m making you plan the entire anniversary alone.”

for a second, he just stared at you, still crying, still trying to catch his breath. then a shaky laugh escaped him through the tears.

“that’s fair.” he whispered, then he nodded quickly, almost frantically.

“that’s more than fair.”

you exhaled softly.

“come here.” he hesitated, eyes searching yours one last time.

“are you sure?”

instead of answering, you opened your arms. that was all it took. he moved into you immediately, wrapping his arms around you with heartbreaking care, holding you like he was afraid you might disappear if he breathed too hard. his face buried itself in the crook of your neck, and the tears he’d been holding back finally came all at once, hot and shaking against your skin.

“thank you,” he whispered, voice muffled and wrecked. “thank you for forgiving me. thank you for not giving up on me.”

you rested your hand against the back of his head, smoothing his hair gently.

“don’t waste it.”

he shook his head against you at once.

“i won’t.”

his arms tightened around you just a little more.

for the first time in two days, the house no longer felt unbearably quiet. it felt warm again, filled with the sound of his breathing against your shoulder and the steady beat of his heart beneath your palm, like the lights had finally come back on after a long lonely night.

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kalulapplehead

The Anatomy of a Breakdown

pairing: bad era michael x fem!reader

summary: you had given up. the exhaustion of being the 'balancer' for michael who couldn't be firm forced you to walk away, even though it shattered your own heart. a month passed in agonizing silence, until michael having lost all control and sanity when he broke into your office, the anger he’d suppressed for a month spilled over into an intoxicating obsession.

warnings: angst, make up sex, MDNI, 18+, kinda toxic relationship idk lol, intense love, jealousy, mention of brooke shields.

wc: 11.8k (i know its long)

i pour my whole heart into every story i write, and i truly hope you'll enjoy reading them as much as i loved creating them🤍

the world knew you were michael’s girlfriend, and for the first few months, it felt like a dream. you were elegant, sharp, and held your own in his chaotic world. when you walked down the street, cameras clicked, and headlines hailed you as the woman who finally captured the heart of the most famous man on the planet. but the sweetness was laced with a slow-acting poison.

the air in the living room was thick with the scent of sandalwood and old records. the year was 1988, and the world outside was a whirlwind of flashing bulbs and rumors, but in here, time seemed to stand still.

you were sitting on the plush rug, leaning against the sofa, while michael sprawled out behind you. he was uncharacteristically restless, his fingers constantly brushing against your shoulders, playing with the gold chain around your neck, or tracing the line of your collarbone. he was needy, a stark contrast to the magnetic powerhouse the world saw on stage. he needed the physical anchor of you to feel real.

you were reading a thick manuscript for work, your mind sharp and analytical, trying to balance your career ambitions with the gravity of his presence. you were the grounded one—the one who understood that fame was a cage, while he was the bird who kept forgetting he could be caught.

"you're frowning," he whispered, his chin resting on your shoulder. he kissed the side of your neck, his lips lingering against your skin. "is the story that bad?"

"it's good, michael. i'm just thinking about the deadlines," you said calmly, reaching back to stroke his hair. your touch was steady, maternal yet romantic—a balm to his fraying nerves. he groaned, pulling you tighter against him, burying his face in your hair. "forget the deadlines. just stay here. don't go back to the office until tomorrow."

"i have to," you said, turning your head slightly to look at him. he looked so young in the dim light, so impossibly soft. "it’s a feature piece on the industry. it pays the bills, and i like being good at what i do."

michael reached for a glossy magazine spread lying on the coffee table. it was the latest issue, featuring a high-profile photoshoot of him and brooke. they looked timeless, captured in a moment of candid laughter that the photographer had dubbed 'the friendship of the century.'

"look at this," he said, holding the page up with a boyish grin, completely oblivious to the way your heart tightened. "brooke sent this over this morning. she said the photographer told us we looked like we were in our own little world."

you took the magazine, studying the photo. in it, brooke’s hand was resting possessively on his forearm, her eyes locked onto his with a familiarity that you knew you couldn't replicate—a history you didn't share.

"it's a beautiful shot," you said, your voice devoid of the edge you were currently feeling. you were too mature to let the jealousy show just yet; you preferred to process it, to hold it in your palm like a hot coal until you knew exactly where to drop it.

"she's wonderful, isn't she?" he added, his thumb mindlessly tracing your arm, his eyes reflecting a genuine, uncomplicated fondness. "it's just so easy with her. no pressure. we just... exist together."

you felt a tiny, sharp crack in your composure. easy.

you turned back to your manuscript, your grip tightening on the pages. you had given up so much for this—the privacy of your life, the quiet anonymity you used to cherish—all to stand by a man who didn't understand the difference between 'easy' and 'essential.'

"yeah," you murmured, keeping your gaze fixed on the words that suddenly stopped making sense. "i'm sure she is." michael didn't notice the way your shoulder stiffened under his touch. he just pulled you closer, kissing your temple, still floating in his own bubble, unaware that the foundation you had built together was starting to show its first hairline fracture.

the next morning, the sun was already bleaching the city in harsh, unforgiving light. the apartment was a contrast of soft velvet and scattered rhythm, with michael humming an unfinished melody while he dressed for rehearsals. he was everywhere—tossing a sweatshirt aside, finding his sunglasses, his energy frantic yet focused—while you moved with a deliberate, cool precision, gathering your notes and your camera bag.

you looked like you had stepped out of a sepia-toned fever dream: a crisp white oversized button-down tucked into a charcoal skirt, your hair pulled back into a messy, effortless knot that screamed of old-money confidence. you were the woman who didn't try too hard because you didn't have to.

michael stopped by the door, his eyes dark and hungry. he crowded your space, his hands finding your waist immediately, pulling you into his chest. he was wearing his rehearsing gear—the black hat, the tight t-shirt—and he smelled like ozone and expensive cologne.

"don't go yet," he murmured, his forehead pressing against yours. he was touch-starved, his fingers kneading the small of your back, desperate for a tether before he stepped into the chaotic world of the studio. "come to rehearsals with me, lady. just watch."

"i have a feature to edit, michael. you know this," you said, your voice steady, grounded, and unimpeachably calm. you adjusted his collar, your touch light and firm. "i'll see you tonight, baby. don't lose your focus."

he sighed, a pout forming on his lips—that boyish, heartbreaking expression that made the rest of the world swoon—but you didn't budge. you kissed him, once, deeply and firmly, then pulled away. you were the anchor, and you knew that if you stayed, you’d just be another part of his entourage. you refused to be that.

"i don't want to be separated from that pretty mouth of yours," michael said, his breath coming in a little gasp. he kissed your wet lips several times. "okay then, i'll see you tonight, baby."

as you stepped out into the hallway, james—your driver, was already there, his presence a silent, imposing buffer against the world. the moment the elevator doors opened at the lobby, the noise started.

the paparazzi were a swarm of locusts. the flashbulbs erupted in a blinding strobe of white, a chaotic assault on your senses. you didn't flinch. you didn't shield your face. you adjusted the collar of your coat, your chin lifted, walking with that quiet, piercing poise that made the cameras scramble even harder. you were the mystery they couldn't solve, the woman who walked beside him but never quite surrendered to the spectacle.

"any comment on the rumors about you and the studio tensions?" "is it true brooke is meeting him for lunch, any thoughts on that?"

the name hung in the air, sharp and persistent. your jaw tightened, just for a fraction of a second, before you slid into the back of the mercedes. the heavy door thudded shut, sealing you into the relative quiet of the car. you leaned back against the leather seat, closing your eyes. outside, the city blurred into streaks of grey and gold. you reached for your notebook, trying to force your mind back to the editorial deadline in front of you, but the image of that magazine spread—the way brooke looked at him, the way he looked back—began to itch at the back of your brain.

it was going to be a long day, and the pressure was rising, slowly and invisibly, behind the calm mask you were forced to wear.

the office was a hive of frantic energy, a stark contrast to the sanctuary of the apartment. you walked past rows of desks, the scent of stale coffee and ink hitting you immediately. as an editor, you were respected, but you could feel the whispers tracking your every move. everyone knew whose bed you left that morning, and in this industry, that made you a target.

you sat at your desk, the editorial layout for the next issue spread out before you. it was a piece on "celebrity intimacy," and there, in the center of the spread, was another photo of michael and brooke—this time, laughing at a charity event, their heads tilted toward each other in a private joke. you stared at it, the nib of your pen tapping rhythmically against the mahogany desk. thud. thud. thud. you were trying to fix a paragraph about human connection, but all you could focus on was how easily he slipped into that "easy" space with her, while with you, it always felt like he was holding his breath, waiting for the world to catch up.

meanwhile, in the dim, echoing expanse of the rehearsal studio, michael was drenched in sweat. the air was thick with the smell of floor polish and exertion. he was lost in the rhythm, his feet carving patterns into the wood, his body language sharp and precise. when the music cut out, he collapsed onto a bench, breathing heavily, grabbing a towel.

he was expecting silence. he was expecting to think about you—about the way you looked when you were focused, the way you were the only person who didn't look at him like he was a god, but like he was just a man.

the heavy steel door creaked open, and the light from the hallway spilled in, silhouetting a figure. brooke. she didn't look like she was interrupting; she looked like she belonged there. she was wearing a simple trench coat and oversized glasses, carrying a paper bag that smelled faintly of a deli nearby.

"i knew you'd be overworking yourself," she said, her voice light and familiar. she didn't wait for an invitation; she walked straight over and sat beside him on the bench. she didn't crowd him, she just existed in his space with a casual grace that felt dangerous.

michael wiped his face with a towel, offering her a tired but genuine smile. "i have to get the steps right for the tour. you know how it is."

"i know how you are," she corrected him softly. she reached out, her hand resting on his forearm—the same spot she’d touched in the photo you were currently editing—and she didn't pull away. "come on. take a break. let's eat something, everything is on me. i told the press we were meeting, they’re probably already waiting by the side exit. it’ll be a nice, quiet distraction for you."

michael glanced at his reflection in the studio mirror, then back at brooke. he felt that familiar pull—the comfort of a long-standing history, the ease of not having to explain himself. and he certainly didn't see the way it would shatter your composure when you eventually found out. he just saw a friend.

"you’re a lifesaver," he said, standing up and reaching for his jacket. "let's go."

back at your desk, you picked up your phone to call the studio, just to check on his schedule, a small smile playing on your lips as you prepared to suggest a dinner spot. you didn't know yet that the line would ring and ring, and that the only thing waiting for you at the end of the line was the realization that your seat at his table had already been filled for the afternoon.

the office was almost empty, the harsh fluorescent lights humming in the silence. you sat at your desk, the phone receiver cold against your ear. you had been staring at the layout of the magazine for three hours, the photos of them mocking you from the page. you dialed his number, your fingers steady, though your heart was performing a frantic, irregular rhythm in your chest. one ring. two. three.

"hello?" his voice was distant, accompanied by the background murmur of a busy restaurant—the clinking of silverware, the low hum of conversation.

"michael," you said, your voice calm, carefully modulated. "i thought we were having dinner tonight. the reservations are for seven." there was a pause on the other end, just long enough for you to hear the sound of a woman’s laugh—a light, familiar sound that made your blood run cold.

"oh, baby," he said, his tone instantly softening into that affectionate, breathy lilt you usually loved. "i'm so sorry. i'm tied up right now. rehearsal went over, and then brooke stopped by, and we’re just... we're just grabbing a quick bite at that place on the corner. it’s just a casual thing friends do, you know? i’ll be home soon."

the words hit you like a physical weight. just a casual thing. he said it so easily, so naturally, as if he hadn't promised you the entire evening.

"i see," you replied, your voice staying perfectly level, though your hand gripped the phone cord until your knuckles turned white. "a quick bite."

"don't be like that," he cooed, oblivious to the storm brewing at the other end of the line. "you know how she is, she just needed to talk about some stuff, and i didn't want to be rude. i’ll make it up to you, okay? i love you."

i love you.

he said it like a punctuation mark, as if it solved everything, as if it erased the fact that you were sitting alone in a dark office while he was laughing with her. you didn't argue. you didn't scream. you were too mature, too grounded, and frankly, too proud to beg for his time.

"okay, michael," you said softly. "have a good dinner."

you hung up the phone with a slow, deliberate click. you sat there in the dark for a long time, watching the city lights flicker through the office window. you weren't crying. you were just calculating. you were counting the ways you had bent yourself into a pretzel to fit into his life, and you realized, with a quiet, sickening clarity, that no matter how much you gave, you would always be the one waiting, and she would always be the one he chose for 'casual' moments. you packed your bag, left your desk perfectly organized, and drove home. you didn't rush. you didn't speed. you just drove, letting the cold air from the open window blow against your face, hardening your resolve with every mile until you reached his apartment.

the apartment was shrouded in the kind of suffocating silence that only comes after a massive explosion of unspoken tension. you were sitting on the edge of the velvet armchair, the room cast in the bruised purple hue of the city skyline through the balcony door. your hair, usually pulled into that polished, effortless knot, was a chaotic mess of tangles—strands falling over your face, damp with the humidity of the evening.

a thin plume of smoke curled up from your fingertips. you weren't a regular smoker, but the stress of the last few months had turned it into your only jagged release. you took a long, slow drag, your eyes fixed on the empty glass on the coffee table, watching the cherry of the cigarette glow in the dark like a warning light.

the front door clicked open. the heavy thud of his boots against the floorboards signaled his arrival. michael walked into the living room, his energy frantic, his eyes immediately locking onto you. he stopped dead when he saw the cigarette. he hated it when you smoked—it was the one habit you picked up that he felt he couldn't control.

"what the hell are you doing?" he demanded, his voice echoing off the high ceilings. he strode toward you, his chest heaving, his face pale under the dim light.

you didn't even flinch. you inhaled, the smoke filling your lungs, and let it out in a slow, defiant stream. "i'm thinking, michael. or maybe i'm just trying to burn away the last six hours."

"put it out," he roared, his voice cracking with a mix of fury and panic. he crossed the room in two strides, snatching the cigarette from your fingers and crushing it into the crystal ashtray with a violence that made the glass rattle. he grabbed your wrists, pulling you up from the chair until you were pressed against his chest. "are you trying to kill yourself? is that what this is? a show to punish me?"

"the only thing being punished here is me!" you screamed back, your voice raw, the words tearing out of your throat. you shoved against his chest, but he didn't budge. "i waited for you! i sat in that office, i went to the restaurant, and then i waited here while you were playing house with her! don't you dare act like you care about my health when you've been breaking my heart for weeks!"

"i didn't cancel because i wanted to be with her!" he yelled, his voice vibrating with a desperate, frantic intensity. he grabbed your jaw, his fingers digging into your skin, his thumb pressing hard against the corner of your mouth, forcing you to meet his eyes. his pupils were blown wide, his breathing ragged.

he pulled you down until your foreheads were pressed together, his face hovering mere millimeters from yours. he didn't kiss you—he just stared into your eyes, his voice dropping to a low, jagged whisper that sent a shiver straight to your core.

"you think i want to be anywhere else? you think she even sees me? she sees a memory. you see me," he hissed, his touch turning from punishing to agonizingly possessive. "you are the only one who knows the mess i am inside, and i am so sorry i left you alone. i am so, so sorry."

your breath hitched, your eyes welling up as you looked at him. you were still so angry, your heart aching with the weight of the betrayal, but the sheer, raw intensity of his gaze—the way he looked at you like you were his salvation—shattered your resolve. a tear tracked through your makeup, leaving a faint, dark smudge on your cheek.

"i hate you," you whispered, but your hand came up to grip the lapel of his jacket, your fingers trembling.

"i know," he breathed, his voice breaking. "i'm sorry, baby."

he didn't give you another second to breathe. he hauled you up, his mouth crashing onto yours with a desperate, bruising hunger. he swept you into his arms, carrying you toward the bedroom, his kisses tasting of apology and an obsession that felt like it might burn the world down around you.

he swept you off your feet, his arms tight around you as if he were afraid you might vanish if he let go for even a second. his strides were long carrying you straight into the dim, cool air of the bedroom. he didn't bother with the lights; the moonlight spilling through the curtains was enough to catch the glitter in his eyes as he kicked the door shut behind him with a resonant thud. he dropped you onto the center of the bed, the mattress sinking under your combined weight.

he claimed the space with a possessive, grounding weight, his knees pressing firmly into the mattress on either side of your hips. he looked at you—really looked at you—as if he were trying to drown out the memory of anyone else, his expression a fractured mix of guilt, adoration, and raw, unfiltered need.

when his face finally descended, it was with a hunger that bordered on spiritual. he parted your pussy with his thumbs, his touch hot and electric, and the first touch of his tongue against your core sent a jolt of pure lightning through your spine. it wasn't a tentative exploration; it was an arrival. he began to lick with long, slow, purposeful strokes that climbed from the very bottom to the top, his tongue tracing every sensitive fold as if he were trying to rewrite your skin with his presence.

you gasped, your fingers tangling into the mess of his hair, pulling him closer even as your hips bucked uncontrollably against him. he didn't stop; he only deepened his rhythm, his mouth opening wide to suck—a suction so powerful it felt like he was trying to pull the very soul out of you. every time you let out a ragged, high-pitched moan, he hummed a vibration against your skin, a low, guttural sound of triumph and apology.

"michael," you choked out, your voice breaking, your back arching until you were almost breathless.

he didn't stop to look up, his hunger only mounting. he began to circle his tongue in tiny, frantic loops, focusing on the sensitive nub that made your vision blur. his hands came up to grip your thighs, his fingers digging into your flesh, leaving faint, phantom marks as he anchored himself to your body. he was relentless. he kept his pace steady, a punishing, rhythmic friction that felt like it was carving you open.

the sounds you were making—loud, uninhibited, and desperate—seemed to feed him. every sob and moan was a fuel for his devotion. he moved his mouth down, licking the wet, sensitive skin of your inner thighs, then surged back up to suck, his movements becoming more frantic, more desperate. you could feel the heat of his breath, the wet warmth of his mouth, and the sheer, overwhelming intensity of a man who was terrified of losing his anchor.

"i'm sorry," he mumbled, his voice muffled against your heat, his tongue flicking rapidly, teasing you right to the edge. "i'm so, so sorry, baby."

he didn't give you time to answer, his tongue diving deeper, his suction turning into a strong, rhythmic pull that had you thrashing against the sheets. he was worshiping you with a fervor that bordered on religious, trying to purge the distance he’d created with the sheer of his body against yours.

when the waves began to hit—a crashing, uncontrollable tide of sensation—you cried out his name again, your voice echoing off the walls, raw and broken. he didn't pull away; he held you there, catching every moan, every shudder, his mouth working harder, faster, his hunger showing no sign of waning. he was feeding on your release, his own breaths coming in sharp, shallow gasps, his entire body trembling against yours as he refused to let you descend until he had tasted every single drop of your devotion. he held you until the last shiver subsided, his lips lingering against you, wet and possessive, in a silent vow that he was never going to let you go again.

the vanity mirror was a halo of warm, incandescent light, casting a glow that should have made you feel radiant. instead, the reflection staring back at you felt like a stranger—a woman in a black silk gown that clung to her frame with lethal elegance, her eyeliner winged to a razor-sharp edge, her expression meticulously frozen into an air of untouchable poise. you were the quintessential partner, the one who handled the public gaze without a tremor. but beneath the expensive fabric and the practiced calm, you were brittle, held together by sheer willpower.

tucked deep inside your clutch was the magazine interview, the paper folded so tightly it felt like a razor blade against your palm. you had read her words until they were burned into your retinas, “michael feels most at home with me.” the ink felt like poison, seeping into your skin every time you thought of it.

the bedroom door creaked open, and michael stepped in. he looked breathtaking—the tuxedo tailored to his slim frame, his dark hair slicked back with precise care. he looked every bit the icon, but his eyes were focused entirely on you. he didn't look at the room, or the mirrors; he moved toward you like a man drawn to a sanctuary. he stopped directly behind you, his presence filling the space. he placed his hands on your shoulders, his touch deliberate and worshipful. his thumbs began to trace the delicate hollows of your collarbone, moving with a rhythm so tender it almost undid you. he leaned down, his chin resting against your shoulder as he pressed a soft, lingering kiss to the side of your neck, his breath warm against your skin.

"you look incredible," he whispered, his voice dropping into that low, breathy register that always made your heart stutter despite yourself. "the world isn't ready for you tonight. i don't even know if i'm ready to share you with them."

as he spoke, he turned your body slightly, his eyes searching yours in the mirror. he caught your gaze, and for a fleeting second, the genuine adoration in his expression was so unfiltered, so sweet, that you felt a treacherous warmth bloom in your chest. he looked at you with a quiet, private intensity that suggested you were the only thing in the room that mattered. your lips parted, and you couldn't help it—a small, involuntary smile touched your face, born of pure, instinctive attraction utterly captivated by the way he looked at you, the way his fingers gently tucked a stray lock of hair behind your ear. it was so easy to forget the noise when he was looking at you like that.

but then, his thumb brushed your cheek, and the memory of that interview rushed back, cold and sharp. your smile withered. the reality of the situation crashed down, and the warmth evaporated.

you didn't lean into his touch. you remained perfectly still, your posture rigid. "the world is already talking about us, michael," you said, your voice barely above a whisper, laced with a jagged edge. "or should i say, about you and her."

his hands stilled instantly. his brow furrowed, that familiar shadow of confusion crossing his face as he searched your eyes in the mirror for the woman he had just been looking at. "not this again," he sighed, the hurt evident in his tone. "we talked about that. it's just noise. please, baby, don't let them win. tonight is about us. just us."

you stood up abruptly, the silk of your dress whispering against the chair. you turned to face him, the distance between you suddenly feeling like an ocean. he looked truly pained then, his hands reaching out to cup your face, his touch desperate. "you're my life," he pleaded, his eyes searching yours for a crumb of the affection you had felt seconds ago. "why can't you see that?"

the arrival at the gala was a choreographed dance you had mastered long ago. as the car pulled up to the curb, the velvet rope parted, and the chaos of the press erupted—a wall of blinding white light and shouting voices. michael stepped out first, his hand extending back to you with a practiced grace. as you placed your hand in his, the flashing bulbs turned into a strobe effect, cold and clinical.

"stay close," he murmured, his voice low, his fingers interlacing firmly with yours. he steered you toward the entrance with the protective instincts of a man guarding his most precious possession.

inside, the ballroom was a cavern of opulence—chandeliers dripping with crystal, the clinking of champagne flutes, and the low, constant hum of the industry’s elite. every eye in the room seemed to flick toward the two of you as you crossed the floor. michael was charming, greeting producers and directors with a polished smile, his arm never leaving your waist. he was attentive, whispering little observations into your ear, trying to pull you into the humor of the evening.

after an hour of the stifling pleasantries, the weight of the evening began to press down on you. the perfume in the room was too heavy, the lights too artificial. you felt like a doll on a shelf, perfectly posed but entirely hollow.

"i'm going to find the ladies' lounge," you said, tilting your head toward the quieter corridor. "i need to fix my lipstick and get away from the crowd for a minute."

michael’s hand tightened on your waist for a split second, a flicker of hesitation crossing his face. he was so dependent on your presence to ground him in this room full of sharks. "don't be long," he said, his eyes searching yours with that familiar, intense sweetness. "the ceremony starts soon, and i want you right next to me when they call my name."

you nodded, smiling softly at him. "i'll be back before you even miss me."

you turned and walked away, your silk gown trailing behind you like a ghost. the deeper you moved into the corridor, the quieter it became. the sound of the orchestra faded into a dull throb against the walls. you reached the lounge, but you didn't go in. instead, you leaned against the cool marble of the hallway, closing your eyes, trying to exhale the tension that had been coiled in your stomach since you left the apartment.

you weren't looking for him. you didn't even know he had followed you—or perhaps, that he had been intercepted by someone else the moment you were out of sight. you just wanted a moment of solitude, a single breath where you didn't have to be 'the woman by his side.'

but then, the soft murmur of voices drifted from around the corner, near the dimly lit service hallway. it wasn't the laughter of the gala; it was hushed, jagged, and unmistakably heavy. you froze, your hand halfway to your throat, as you recognized the fragile, trembling tone of a woman who wasn't used to hearing the word 'no.'

the air in the narrow hallway felt thin, charged with a suffocating, static tension. from where you stood, hidden in the shadows of the marble pillar, the sight was a jagged blade to your chest.

brooke wasn't just touching him; she was claiming him. she surged upward, her hands gripping the lapels of his tuxedo as if she were trying to anchor herself to him, her fingers digging into the fabric until her knuckles turned white. she crashed her lips against his, a hungry, desperate motion that lacked any semblance of grace. she was kissing him with the force of a woman who felt she had a right to his soul, her head tilted at an angle that made the contact deep and agonizingly intimate.

"michael, please.. i can't pretend any longer. i want us to be real." she cried.

michael stood there, paralyzed. he didn't pull away, but he didn't lean in either. his hands remained stiffly at his sides, his shoulders locked in a state of utter shock. his eyes were wide open, staring past her, fixated on the dim glow of a sconce on the opposite wall. his face was devoid of desire, painted only with a haunting, frantic confusion—a man caught in a storm he didn't know how to navigate.

brooke’s movements were frantic, her lips trailing wetly against his, trying to force a response, trying to pull a flicker of recognition from his stillness. she even made a small, soft sound against his mouth, a whimper of pure longing that echoed off the cold, hard walls.

michael remained rigid, his breath hitching in his chest, his jaw clenched tight enough to ache. he looked like a statue, a monument to a man who was too kind, too decent, and too emotionally trapped to push a weeping woman away, even as she violated the boundary of their relationship with every second that passed. he was physically there, being consumed by her, yet he was hauntingly, chillingly absent.

it was the most pathetic, heartbreaking thing you had ever witnessed. it wasn't a moment of passion; it was a moment of surrender to someone else’s brokenness, and for you, watching it felt like watching your own heart being dismantled in real time. you didn't need to see him kiss her back to know that in that moment, he was failing you—not out of malice, but out of a paralyzing inability to be the villain in someone else’s story, even at the cost of your own.

the apartment was a hollow shell of the life you had shared. the silence was so heavy it felt physical, broken only by the sharp, rhythmic click-clack of your suitcase wheels as you moved from the bedroom to the foyer. you hadn't turned on the lights; you didn't want to see the remnants of "us"—the framed photos on the shelf, the books he’d left behind, the lingering scent of his cologne.

you were halfway to the door when it exploded open.

michael didn't just walk in; he fell into the room, his tuxedo jacket gone, his tie hanging loose around his neck like a noose. he looked unhinged—his hair was a wreck, his eyes were bloodshot, and his chest was heaving with the force of someone who had spent the last six hours scouring every corner of the city for you.

"where the hell have you been?" his voice wasn't just loud; it was a jagged, raw roar that tore through the quiet. he slammed the door shut behind him, the impact rattling the walls. "i've been losing my mind! you weren't at home, i checked everywhere—where have you been? i had everyone looking for you, checking hospitals and footage... do you have any idea what you've done to me?"

you didn't flinch. you gripped the handle of your suitcase, your knuckles white. "i wasn't lost, michael. i was leaving."

he crossed the distance between you in two strides, grabbing your arm—not to hurt you, but to anchor you. "you’re leaving? like this? without a word? you saw her kissed me didn't you? you just walk out because you saw something you didn't like?"

"i didn't just see something, michael! i saw exactly what i’ve been trying to ignore for months!" you screamed, finally letting the dam break. the cold, detached calm you’d worn all night shattered. "i saw you letting her consume you! i saw you standing there, letting her take what belongs to me because you’re too damn polite to break her heart!"

"i didn't kiss her back!" he shouted, his face twisting in genuine, agonizing fury. he paced the small hallway, his hands running through his hair in a frantic, desperate motion. "do you know how sick i felt? do you know how much i wanted to push her away? but she was breaking, and i didn't know how to handle it without causing a scene—without making a mess of everything!"

"you were already making a mess of us!" you shoved his chest, a desperate, sobbing hit. "every time you apologize for her, every time you let her hover, you are choosing her comfort over my sanity! i am not your emotional safety net, michael! i am your partner, and tonight, you proved that i’m the one you’re willing to sacrifice the second things get inconvenient."

"i never sacrificed you! you’re the only thing that matters!" he roared, grabbing your shoulders and pinning you against the wall. he was breathing so hard he sounded like he was drowning. "i am trying to balance a life that wants to tear me apart, and you’re supposed to be on my side! instead, you just bolt? you just give up on me the second i’m in a tight spot?"

"because you put me in that spot!" you cried, your voice breaking into a jagged sob. you pushed at his chest, his shirt damp with his own frantic sweat. "i am tired, michael. i am so, so tired of being the mature one, the quiet one, the one who hides in the shadows so your 'legacy' stays clean. i don't want to be the woman you hide. i don't want to be the woman who has to compete with a ghost who refuses to leave!"

he looked at you, his eyes shimmering with a mixture of raw, ugly rage and devastating, broken love. he was trembling—a deep, full-body tremor that shook the very air between you.

"you are not a secret, you know that, baby..." he hissed, his voice dropping to a dangerous, vibrating whisper as he pressed his forehead against yours. "but you’re leaving me. you’re actually doing it. you’re walking out, and you’re going to leave me in this empty house, and you’re going to make me realize that i destroyed the only thing that actually made me happy."

"then maybe you should have thought about that before you stood there and let her kiss you," you whispered, your voice final and hollow.

the silence that followed your words was heavy, suffocating. michael’s chest heaved, his eyes darting frantically across your face as if searching for any sign of hesitation. but you were stone. you were finished. he lunged forward, closing the space in a heartbeat, his hands slamming against the wall on either side of your head, effectively caging you in. he was vibrating with a terrifying, desperate energy.

"i'm not letting you go," he snarled, his voice low, guttural, and stripped of all his usual gentleness. "you don't get to do this. you don't get to decide my life is over just because of one night, one mistake. i am not that person, and you know it."

you didn't look away, even as his face hovered inches from yours, his heat radiating against your skin. "you are exactly that person, michael. the man who can't say no. the man who values 'being nice' more than he values me."

"i'm not letting you walk out that door," he repeated, his fingers tightening on the wall until the wood creaked. his eyes scanned your face, searching for a crack in your resolve, a shred of the woman who used to forgive him. he leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a jagged, threatening whisper. "stay. sit down, put the bags away, and let's talk about this like adults. i'm not losing you over a kiss i didn't even want."

"it’s not about the kiss," you breathed, your voice eerily steady. "it’s about the fact that you think you can just command me to stay. that you think your fear of being alone justifies holding me hostage in this life."

he grew quiet, but it was the silence of a cornered animal. he didn't move; he stayed pressed against you, his breathing ragged. he wanted to keep you—he wanted to keep you so badly he was willing to be the villain—but as he looked into your eyes, he saw the mirror of his own reflection: someone who had finally realized that this dynamic was a cage. the shift happened in his eyes. the desperation curdled into a cold, jagged pride. he realized that if he forced you to stay, he would be admitting that he was the coward you said he was. he realized that the image of him, the "good, humble michael," couldn't survive if he became the man who trapped a woman in his apartment.

his hands dropped from the wall, his posture slumping. the fire in his eyes died, replaced by a dull, hollow ache.

"you think so little of me," he whispered, his voice cracking. "you think i'm just a coward who needs to be managed."

"i think you're a man who loves his comfort more than he loves the truth," you said, reaching past him to grab the handle of your suitcase.

he stood still as you pulled the bag away, but as you moved toward the door, his ego finally took over. he didn't stop you, but he didn't help you, either. he retreated, his shoulders drawing back, his jaw tightening into a mask of cold, defensive armor. "fine," he called out, his voice echoing in the empty, hollow room. "if you really think i'm that pathetic... if you really think this is all i am... then maybe you were never really here for me anyway."

he turned his back to you, walking toward the balcony, his silhouette framed against the harsh city lights. he was protecting the last remnants of his pride, choosing the bitter comfort of being "right" over the agony of begging you to stay. you reached the door, your hand hovering over the handle. you looked back once, seeing his broad back, his stiff posture—the man who would rather let you leave than admit he was the reason you were breaking.

"goodbye, michael," you whispered.

he didn't turn around. he just took a slow, sharp breath and stared out at the city, his silence the final, devastating confirmation that his ego had won the war. the door clicked shut behind you, and for the first time in months, the air didn't feel like it was running out.

one month.

in those four weeks, you had built a new life in a small, quiet apartment that didn't smell like his cologne or his old vinyl records. it was peaceful. there was no pressure to maintain an image, no looming presence of brooke, no need to perform the role of the 'supportive partner.' but the peace was a thin veil over an agonizing, dull ache that resided in your chest. you missed him with a physical intensity that made your hands shake; you missed the way he hummed when he was cooking, the way he looked at you when he thought no one else was watching, the way he was your safe harbor—before he became your storm.

your office at the magazine was a chaotic sprawl of cigarette smoke, clacking typewriters, and stacks of glossy proofs. for the past month, it had also become a shrine to his desperation. he had turned your life into a ritual of obsession. your office was constantly bombarded with bouquets of white lilies—your favorite—so many that your desk looked like a funeral parlor for a relationship that refused to die. every bouquet came with a handwritten note, the ink smeared as if he’d been crying while he wrote them.

“we’re not really over, right? i’m nothing without you. please, tell me where you are. i miss you so much it feels like i’m drowning.”

“please come back, baby. i’ll change the management, i’ll fire them all, i’ll tell the truth to the world. just give me one more chance. i can’t breathe in this apartment without you.”

he called your office incessantly, leaving voicemails where he didn't even speak—he just breathed, long, shaky exhales that told you exactly how much he was hurting.

“i’m waiting outside the lobby, just like we used to. please, just a minute? i’m not asking for forever, just a minute.”

you had instructed the front desk staff, with a cold, hollow resolve, that he was never to be allowed past the glass doors. three times in the last week, michael had managed to slip past the security guard, his trench coat collar turned up, his hair messy, looking like a man who hadn’t slept since the night of the gala. each time, the security guard would come to your desk, looking apologetic, while you hid in the breakroom, your heart hammering against your ribs like a trapped bird. you would listen to his voice—that familiar, melodic, desperate tone—pleading with the receptionist to just let him see you, to let him explain.

every time you heard his voice, your resolve felt like it was melting into hot lead. you wanted to run out there, to throw your arms around his gaunt frame and tell him it was okay. but you remembered the way he had stood there at the gala, frozen, and the way his ego had kept him from turning around when you left. you couldn't go back to being the 'calm' in his chaotic world.

back at his apartment, the scene was far more harrowing. bill—a man who had known michael since he was a boy and treated him with the fierce, protective love of a father—was at his wits' end. he sat in the corner of the living room, a glass of scotch in his hand, watching michael.

michael was a ghost of himself. he had pushed all the furniture against the walls, creating a wide, hollow space in the center of the room. he was dancing again, the record player spinning a scratchy, repetitive jazz track. he wasn't dancing for a crowd or a stage; he was dancing with a violent, obsessive intensity, his boots scuffing the hardwood, his eyes closed, his shirt soaked through with sweat. he was trying to exorcise the silence of the apartment through movement.

"son, for the love of god, stop," bill said, his voice thick with a mixture of anger and raw, paternal concern. "you're going to break your body. you haven't eaten a solid meal in days. she isn't coming back if you're dead on the floor."

michael stopped mid-spin, his chest heaving, his dark hair plastered to his forehead. he looked at bill, his eyes wide and glassy, reflecting a profound, shattered loneliness.

"she has to call, bill," michael whispered, his voice cracking. "she hasn't even called the office line. i’ve been sitting by the phone for six hours. maybe the line is dead? maybe she doesn't know i'm calling?"

"the line isn't dead, son," bill said softly, standing up to steady him. "she knows. she's just... she's holding her ground."

michael grabbed the desk phone, his fingers trembling as he dialed your office number for what must have been the twentieth time that day. he held the receiver to his ear, his knuckles white, waiting for the ring—that sharp, mechanical sound that was the only thing keeping him tethered to reality.

in your office, the phone on your desk began to trill. it was a sharp, persistent sound that made everyone in the room turn and look at you. you stared at the black plastic device, your hand hovering over the receiver. you could feel his presence through the wire, miles away, reaching out across the city. you knew it was him. you knew he was holding his breath on the other end, waiting for you to pick up, waiting for you to tell him you were still there.

you didn't move. you let it ring, and ring, and ring, until your coworker finally reached over and lifted the receiver, saying, "she's not available right now, please stop calling."

you stared at your typewriter, your eyes burning, the silence that followed the hanging up of the phone feeling louder than any scream.

the transition back to a "normal" life was supposed to be healing, but it felt more like learning to walk with a broken leg. after weeks of hiding in the breakroom to avoid michael, you started taking lunch breaks outside the office just to breathe. that was where you met daniel.

daniel was everything michael wasn't: calculated, polished, and terrifyingly young. he was twenty-four, the son of the publishing tycoon who owned the very magazine where you worked. he had an easy, entitled confidence that cut through your defenses, and he was persistent in a way that felt like a distraction you desperately needed. he would show up at your desk with coffee, lean against your workspace, and talk about everything except your past.

it was a cool, rainy afternoon when he finally convinced you to join him for dinner at an exclusive lounge. the atmosphere was thick with jazz and expensive cologne, a world away from the emotional wreckage you had left behind.

"you're always so guarded," daniel murmured, his eyes tracking you with a predatory, youthful intensity. he reached across the table, his hand covering yours. his skin felt warm, but it lacked the specific, electric jolt you were used to. "let me take care of you..."

you smiled, a thin, rehearsed thing, but before you could answer, the heavy doors of the lounge swung open. the room shifted. people stopped talking. the staff at the entrance looked frantic, but you didn't see who had walked in. you were too busy looking at daniel, trying to convince yourself that this was the "new beginning" everyone told you to seek.

miles away, in the quiet, dust-moted air of his living room, michael was sitting on the floor. he hadn't moved for hours. bill had brought him a copy of the latest industry rag—a tabloid that thrived on misery—thinking it might distract him with some industry news. michael’s long, slender fingers trailed over the glossy cover. he was tired, his mind looping in that same, agonizing rhythm. then, his eyes caught the bold, aggressive font of the headline: “is it true? pop icon back on the market? sources say his woman has moved on to the son of VANTAGE Magazine's owner.”

there was a photo, grainy and taken from a distance, but unmistakable. it was you. you were sitting at a table, leaning toward a man who looked younger, sharper, and dangerously composed. the air left michael’s lungs in a violent, sharp hiss. he didn't throw the magazine; he just gripped it, his knuckles turning porcelain-white, the paper crumpling under his frantic, sudden movement.

"bill," he whispered, his voice sounding like dry leaves skittering on pavement.

bill stepped into the room, his face hardening as he saw what michael was holding. "michael, put it down. it’s gossip. it’s not real."

"look at her face," michael said, his eyes scanning your features in the grainy photo with the intensity of a surgeon. "she’s not looking at him like that... she never looks at anyone like that. she looks... she looks like she’s trying to learn how to exist without me."

"michael—"

"she’s in my city, in my world, and she’s with him?" michael stood up, the movement jerky and uncoordinated. he was shivering, a deep, bone-rattling cold taking hold of him. he didn't care about the ego that had kept him away for a month. he didn't care about the pride that had made him stand on the balcony and watch you leave.

the thought of you with someone else—someone who didn't know your favorite flowers, someone who didn't know how you took your tea, someone who hadn't seen you cry... was a physical assault.

"get the car," michael commanded, his voice suddenly sharp, devoid of his usual hesitation. he didn't look like the man who had been dancing in the dark; he looked like a man on a mission. "i’m going to her office. i don't care if the guards stop me. i don't care if i have to burn the building down to find where she is. i’m not losing her to a boy who owns a press release."

bill sighed, knowing there was no stopping this storm. he reached for the car keys, watching as michael grabbed his coat, his eyes burning with a mixture of terror and lethal, focused possessiveness.

the city at night was a blur of rain and neon, but the office of vantage was deathly quiet, lit only by the low hum of desk lamps. you were the last one left, nursing a lukewarm coffee and staring at the magazine in your hands—the very one with your own face buried in the gossip pages. you were exhausted, the kind of tired that settles deep in the bones.

you didn't hear the commotion at the lobby until it reached the executive floor.

"i told you, he's not allowed in!" the security guard’s voice was strained, followed by a heavy thud.

you stood up, your heart hammering a frantic rhythm against your ribs, and looked toward the glass doors. michael was there. he looked shattered—his coat was drenched from the rain, his hair was clinging to his forehead, and his eyes were dark, burning orbs of desperation. bill, looking aged and frantic, was holding onto michael’s arm, whispering apologies to the guards while simultaneously ushering michael forward.

"just five minutes," bill pleaded with the receptionist, his voice cracking. "please, she's the only one who can stop this. he's not himself. please."

you saw them. michael’s eyes locked onto yours, and the rest of the world just… vanished. he pushed past bill, his movements clumsy but relentless. he crossed the office in three long, frantic strides, his breathing jagged.

he reached behind him without breaking eye contact, his hand fumbling for the door handle, and with one swift, violent kick, he slammed the glass doors shut. the heavy lock clicked into place, muffling the shouts of the confused security guards and bill’s urgent, hushed protests outside.

"go away!" michael barked toward the door, his voice hoarse. then, he turned back to you, his entire frame trembling.

bill’s voice faded as he likely ushered the guards away, understanding that the hurricane had finally landed and there was no sense in standing in its path. you were left in the suffocating silence of your office, the only light coming from the streetlamps outside filtering through the blinds.

"is it true?" he demanded, his voice a low, broken rasp. he didn't care about the guard, or the office, or the fact that you were stunned into silence. he pointed a trembling finger at the magazine on your desk. "you’re with him? you’re letting him take you to places i used to take you? you’re letting him touch you?"

you stood your ground, though your hands were shaking so hard you had to grip the edge of your desk. "get out, michael. you have no right to come here."

"i have every right!" he roared, slamming his hand onto the desk, his ring clattering against the glass. "you left me! you left me to die in that apartment, and now i see you playing house with a boy who wouldn't know how to love you in a thousand lifetimes! tell me it's a lie. tell me you're not his."

"i am not yours to claim anymore!" you screamed, grabbing a stack of files and throwing them toward him. "you didn't choose me when it mattered, michael! you chose your image, you chose your 'kindness' to her, and now you want to come here and act like you own me?"

"i never stopped loving you!" he lunged forward, not to hurt you, but to pull you into his orbit. he grabbed your waist, his grip so fierce it bruised. "i have been breathing you for thirty days! every breath is for you! i don't care about the image, i don't care about the press, i don't care about anything but the fact that you aren't in my bed!"

michael gripped your waist, his hands digging into your silk skirt. he was panting, his forehead pressed against yours, his eyes searching yours with such raw, unmasked vulnerability that it made your breath hitch. the anger that had been fueling you just moments ago began to drain away, replaced by an overwhelming, agonizing ache. he hovered there, inches from your lips, his hands shaking where they held you. he seemed to realize, in that fraction of a second, that his ego and his demands meant nothing if your heart wasn't there to meet him halfway. the possessiveness in his gaze softened into something far more dangerous: a plea.

"do you still love me?" he whispered, his voice cracking, barely audible. "please, do you still love me? even after i let myself break us? tell me the truth. please..."

you looked at him—really looked at him. you saw the dark circles under his eyes, the hollows of his cheeks, the man who had been dancing in the dark just to feel something that wasn't the void you left behind. you saw the boy who didn't know how to be anything but kind, and the man who was finally, painfully, learning how to be selfish for the right reasons. your chest tightened, a sob catching in your throat. you tried to speak, to form a coherent sentence, but it wouldn't come out. your eyes began to sting, the tears overflowing and spilling down your cheeks, hot and unstoppable. you let out a broken, jagged sound—a sob that had been building for a month.

he pulled you against him, his touch desperate and starving. he buried his face in your neck, his breath hot and ragged against your skin, and the dam inside you—the one you’d built with such agonizing effort—broke completely. you grabbed the lapels of his wet coat, sobbing, the anger and the longing mixing into something volatile.

he didn't wait. he grabbed you by the thighs, his hands strong and possessive, and he hoisted you up. with a violent, reckless sweep of his arm, he shoved the piles of magazines, your coffee mug, and your notes off the desk. they clattered to the floor in a chaotic heap. he pulled you onto the desk, your legs wrapping around his waist, and he kissed you with a desperation that tasted like salt and rain. it wasn't a gentle kiss; it was a hungry, punishing, needy collision of two people who were dying without each other. he pushed your hair back, his hands framing your face, his eyes searching yours with a terrifying intensity.

the breath left his lungs in a ragged, shuddering gasp as your lips met his, and the fortress he had built around his pride finally collapsed. as you pulled back to shower his face with kisses, you felt the hot, stinging wetness of his tears against your own skin. he wasn't just crying; he was weeping, his body shaking with the heavy, silent sobs of a man who had been starving for his own heart. you traced the path of his tears with your lips, tasting the salt of his misery, your own tears blending with his. every kiss you pressed to his eyelids, his cheeks, and the bridge of his nose was a silent promise. he clung to you, his hands clutching the silk of your blouse as if he were afraid you might dissolve into mist if he loosened his grip for even a second.

"don't you ever," he whispered against your lips, his voice thick, breaking under the weight of his own desperation. his breath was shaky, a wild mix of lingering fury at the thought of daniel and a suffocating, bottomless adoration. "let him touch you again. you are mine. you hear me? you are mine, baby... and i am never letting you walk out that door again."

you cupped his face in your hands, his skin damp and feverish. you felt his forehead tremble against yours, his dark eyes searching your soul, looking for a way to undo the last month of agony.

you looked at him, your own vision blurred by your tears, and you whispered, your voice a tender, broken ache. "i’m not his, michael. i was never his."

you leaned in, resting your forehead against his, your breathing syncing with the frantic rhythm of his heart. "i’ve been trying so hard to kill this part of me that belongs to you, but i couldn't. i tried to sleep in a quiet room, and all i heard was your voice. i tried to wake up to a new life, i just can't stop missing you."

you kissed his temple, feeling his shuddering intake of breath.

"i'm so tired of being strong without you," you sobbed softly, your hands tracing the line of his jaw. "you broke me, michael. you really, truly broke me. but don't you dare think for one second that i could ever be anyone else's. i’m not letting you go again, either—but you have to promise me, you have to promise me you'll stop being a martyr for everyone else. i need you to choose me. not just when it’s easy, not just when you’re desperate. i need you to choose me every single day."

he let out a jagged, broken sound—half-laugh, half-sob—and pulled you tighter, his forehead burying into the crook of your neck. he smelled like rain, cedar, and the familiar, intoxicating scent of the only home you had ever known. "i choose you," he choked out, his voice a vow against your skin. "i choose you. i choose you. i’m yours—i was always yours. just tell me how to be the man you deserve, and i'll be it. i'll be whatever you need. just don't ever make me live a day without you again."

"come home with me," he pleaded, his voice a raw, shattered vibration against your throat. "please. let me take you back to the apartment, let me hold you until the sun comes up, let me fix everything. i can't stand another second in this empty space."

you shook your head, your fingers tangling into his hair, pulling him closer. "not yet," you whispered, the ache of the past month surging into a fever. "michael, i’ve waited too long."

you looked at him, your eyes dark with a hunger that matched his own. "i’m just as desperate as you are, michael. i don't want to wait for the apartment. i want you right here, right now. i want you to ruin me so i don't have to think about how much i've missed you."

his eyes darkened, a flash of primal, hungry desperation overriding his sadness. he didn't need any more convincing. he hauled you up higher onto the expanse of your desk, sending the last of the vantage files scattering to the floor in a flurry of white.

his movements were frantic, almost uncoordinated in his urgency. his hands shook as he unbuckled his trousers, pushing them down with a heavy, impatient shove. he reached for the buttons of your blouse, his fingers fumbling, tearing the fabric slightly in his haste to get to you. he didn't wait for grace; he pulled the silk away, his mouth immediately finding the sensitive skin of your breast. his suction was hard and hungry, a desperate claim that made you gasp and throw your head back, your hips instinctively arching off the desk to meet him.

you were wearing short, tight shorts, and you reached down yourself, your hands trembling as you worked the fastenings, your own need a pulsing, aching demand. he growled, a low, guttural sound, as he shoved your shorts down to your ankles, his hands sliding firmly between your thighs, finding you already wet and throbbing for him. he didn't give you a moment to breathe; he pushed inside you, a deep, heavy thrust that had you crying out against his mouth.

he kissed you with the same violence, his tongue invading yours, tasting every bit of your longing. he gripped your hips, his thumbs digging into your skin, leaving marks as he set a punishing, frantic pace. he was inside you fully, every stroke a testament to the thirty days of silence you had both endured.

"look at me," he gasped, his eyes wild and dilated, his face a mask of beautiful, tortured need. "i want you to see me. tell me you want this—tell me you want to be ruined."

"i want it," you sobbed, your voice thick and hitching. "i want you to destroy me, michael. fill me up, don't stop, just don't ever stop..."

he hoisted you forward, flipping you around until you were braced against the edge of the desk, your chest pressed down into the scattered papers. he stepped in behind you, his hands coming up to grip your hair, holding your head firmly, forcing you to endure the absolute intensity of his rhythm.

the sounds of the office—the creaking of the desk, the wet, rhythmic slap of skin against skin, the devastating, guttural moans tearing from michael's throat—filled the room. he wasn't just having sex with you; he was marking you, claiming every inch of your body with a desperate, feverish fervor. he was trembling, his movements becoming more frantic, more reckless, as he drove into you, his grunts of pleasure turning into raw, broken whimpers of adoration.

you were falling apart, your nails digging deep into the mahogany of the desk as he drove into you with a relentless, punishing rhythm. every time he pulled back, you felt the sheer size of him, his thick length stretching you to your limit, and every time he thrust forward, he hit a spot so deep and so intimate that it made your entire body shudder uncontrollably.

"ungh... michael... oh, god... right there," you gasped, your voice breaking as he struck that sweet, aching nerve. "ah... yes... deeper, please... don't stop!"

he was a force of nature, a man possessed by the need to hold his home, his hands bruising your hips as he dominated you from behind. he groaned, a low, primal sound that rumbled against your back, his breath ragged and hot against your neck. "you're so tight... oh, baby, you're so tight," he rasped, his voice thick with need. "i've been dreaming about this... about being inside you like this every single second..."

you were a mess of friction and heat, the rhythmic, wet sounds of your bodies colliding filling the quiet office. every thrust was heavy and deep, his impressive length filling you completely, making you feel full and frantic at the same time.

"ah! oh! michael, yes... just like that!" you whimpered, your head falling back against his shoulder, your moans becoming sharp and desperate. "ungh... i need you... i need you so much!"

michael was straining, his own control fraying with every stroke. he let out a series of ragged, desperate moans—"ungh... ah... oh, god..."—that sounded like a mix of worship and pure, animalistic hunger. he reached around, his hand moving to your chest to knead and squeeze you, his fingers teasing your nipples while he continued to hammer into you.

"you're mine," he growled, his voice deep and vibrating. "you're mine, and i’m never... ah, fuck... i’m never going to let you go."

he picked up the pace, his thrusts becoming faster, deeper, and more forceful. the desk rattled under the strain, the sound of his skin slapping against yours becoming frantic and loud in the small room. you were sobbing now, your body jerking with every wave of pleasure, your voice rising in a continuous, high-pitched "michael... please, i’m coming!"

he heard your plea and pushed himself even harder, his own moans turning into deep, guttural grunts of ecstasy. "i’m right there with you... ah... baby... look at you..."

he gripped your hair tighter, his own breath hitching as he approached the edge. as you both reached that shattering, final peak, his body went rigid against yours. he let out a long, jagged, agonized sound of pure release—a cry that echoed off the office walls—as he emptied himself into you, his hips bucking one last time before he collapsed against your back, his entire body shuddering with the force of his climax. you both hung there in the silence, gasping, broken, and finally, undeniably, together.

the aftermath was a quiet, heavy stillness. the only sound in the office was the frantic, uneven rhythm of your breathing as the adrenaline slowly ebbed away. michael didn't move; he stayed pressed against your back, his arms wrapped securely around your waist, his head resting heavily on your shoulder. he was shivering, not from cold, but from the raw exposure of finally letting the wall between you crumble.

you slowly sat up, your legs feeling like lead, and turned in his arms. he looked at you with eyes that were soft, glassy, and completely naked of all the defenses he’d worn for that last agonizing month. he looked tired—deeply, soul-wearily tired—but for the first time in weeks, the haunted, frantic light was gone. he reached out, his long fingers trembling as he tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear. his touch was so gentle, so reverent, it made your heart ache all over again.

"i'm never going back to that empty house," he whispered, his voice low and firm. "not without you."

you leaned into his hand, closing your eyes and savoring the warmth of his skin. "we’re going home, michael," you promised, your voice barely a breath. "together."

he pulled you into his chest, burying his face in the crook of your neck. he held you there for a long time, just rocking you slightly, as if he were trying to weld you to him so you could never be separated again. when he finally pulled back, he didn't try to hide his tears; he wiped them away with his thumb, then kissed your forehead, your cheeks, and finally, your lips—a kiss that was soft, lingering, and full of a quiet, beautiful promise.

he stood up first, his movements slow and deliberate, and held out his hand to help you off the desk. when you stood before him, he took the time to fix your blouse, his fingers moving with a tender focus that made your stomach flutter. he smoothed your hair back and pulled his own coat off, draping it over your shoulders. it was still warm from his body, and it smelled like rain and him—the scent of home.

he took your hand, interlacing his fingers tightly with yours, and led you toward the door. he didn't care about the discarded files, the overturned coffee, or the scattered magazines—the entire world felt like it had been reset the moment you had chosen to let him back in.

outside, the rain had stopped. the city streets were slick and glistening under the glow of the streetlights, quiet and waiting. bill was waiting by the car, his posture relaxing the second he saw the two of you emerge together. he didn't say a word; he just opened the door, a knowing, relieved look in his eyes. as you slid into the back seat, michael pulled you into his side immediately, his arm wrapped firmly around your shoulders. he rested his head against yours, his gaze fixed not on the city outside, but entirely on you. he looked at you with a quiet, grounding peace, as if you were the only thing in the world that mattered. "i love you, baby.." "i love you, mikey..."

you rested your head on his shoulder, his hand coming up to gently massage the back of your neck, his thumb tracing soothing circles against your skin. the car pulled away, driving into the quiet, cool night. you didn't know how the world would react, or how the press would write their stories tomorrow, but for the first time in a long, long time, you weren't afraid of the future. you were exactly where you were supposed to be, tucked safely into the side of the man who had finally, truly, chosen you.

if you ever have a request, an idea you'd like to see, or would like to be added to my tag list, please feel free to reach out or leave a comment. i'd love to hear from yall :)

tag list: @meowwnchild @erenstitanweave @daniaalhaid @j5rneymercies @tenderlyboundlessparagon @moonwalkarchives

proseandj

stress relief

michael jackson x black!reader

synopsis: after a usual meeting gone wrong, michael's left pent up and frustrated. you, as the loving and attentive girlfriend that you were, decided to help him get rid of some of that stress.

warnings: smut(18+), cock-warming, pre-otw!era mike (i suppose you can consider this as prequel to "from the start". i know i had a bunch of requests for that), sub!mike

It was a quiet evening at the Hayvenhurst household. You were hanging out in Janet’s bedroom, passing the time and chatting with her while you waited for Michael to return. He was currently trapped in his fathers office, having a meeting with him and his brothers—a meeting he had very clearly dreaded going to. Michael never came back in a good mood after dealing with them, and it was always because his father never failed to say the wrong thing out of his mouth. Fortunately for Joseph, Michael was way too nice to ever disrespect him. You, on the other hand, were always ready to cuss him out over your boyfriend. But because Michael preferred you didn't stir up the drama, you kept your mouth shut for his sake.

"So, did you and Mike plan to do anything later?" Janet asked, leaning back.

"Well, we had planned to convince Bill to let us use the car so we could go to a drive-in movie," you replied. "But I'm most likely gonna have to be the one behind the wheel."

Janet chuckled. "What makes you say that?"

"'Cause your brother can't drive worth a damn," you said, a faux-irritated smile breaking across your face.

It was the honest truth, too. The last time you let Michael take the wheel, after him repeatedly convincing you he was a great driver, he almost caused a head-on collision. You had scrambled to make him pull over immediately, taking the keys and driving the two of you back home yourself, vowing never to be a passenger princess to his driving ever again until he learned to drive properly.

Janet burst out laughing because she knew it was absolute truth. "Well, I mean—he’s gotten much better now!"

"Yeah, sure, J." You gave her an amused, skeptical look.

Just as she was about to try and defend her brother again, the bedroom door creaked open, revealing Michael. He looked completely slumped, a slight furrow in his brow and his jaw set tight. You knew that look all too well, the meeting had obviously been a disaster.

"Dunk, can I have my lady back?" he asked, his voice still soft despite the tension rolling off him.

You turned to Janet with a sheepish, apologetic smile before slipping off the edge of the bed.

"Sure, sure. Not like we were havin' a conversation or anythin'," Janet said, playfully rolling her eyes at her brother's eagerness.

"Don't worry, we'll finish talkin' later," you promised her, just before Michael reached out and took your hand. He led you out of his sister's room, gently closing the door behind you.

The moment the two of you stepped into his own bedroom, Michael completely collapsed, flopping face first onto his bed and burying himself in the pillows with a muffled, exhausted groan. You looked down at him, your heart aching with a soft, sorrow-filled expression. Crawling onto the mattress next to him, your skirt riding up slightly, you reached over and began to rub your hand in soothing, steady strokes up and down his back.

"That bad?" you asked softly.

As if your gentle touch was the exact green light he needed to finally let it all out, he turned his head to the side, resting his cheek against the pillow so he could look at you.

"I just don't understand why he doesn't listen to me," Michael vented, his voice thick with frustration. "He never lets me do what I wanna do. I can't even finish my album because he's still trying to hold onto 'the brand.' The brand is old, man. I'm so tired of this. I can't even get a word in during those stupid meetings."

You kept your touch steady, continuing to rub his back and nodding every once in a while to let him know he had your full attention. It was rare to see Michael this genuinely irritated. He was always so calm and polite, usually choosing to let things roll right off his back. So when he was truly upset enough to let the mask slip, it always took you aback, making you want nothing more than to protect him from it all.

You couldn’t lie, though—seeing him so intensely worked up stirred something deep inside you. It was usually a difficult task for you to keep your hands off your boyfriend on a normal day, but damn, seeing him like this was making it a thousand times worse. The sharp crease in his brow, the subtle, simmering anger flashing behind his eyes, and the way his long fingers would flex into tight, soft fists as he spoke—it was incredibly sexy and it was completely turning you on.

Then, suddenly, an idea hit you.

"Y'know, I think I know of a way to help you get your mind off it, baby," you said softly, your voice dropping into a lower, smoother register.

"What?" He looked up at you, his big, long-lashed eyes wide and blinking with a mix of exhaustion and sudden curiosity.

"Flip over."

He hesitated for just a fraction of a second, completely caught off guard by your command, before doing exactly as you said. He rolled over, resting his back against the soft mattress and looking up at you. Without another word, you crawled forward, straddling his lap so that your hips aligned perfectly, your crotch resting right on top of his.

"Baby, w-what—" he started, his voice cracking slightly. His hands nervously but instinctively came up to rest on your hips, his fingers gripping the fabric of your skirt.

"You want my help, don't you?" You tilted your head, looking down at him through your lashes. Your voice was as soft as silk. You leaned down just enough to caress his jawline, your fingers trailing up to cup his chin and the soft skin of his cheek—a specific touch you knew always drove him crazy.

Oh, you were doing this shit on purpose. The corner of your lip smirked slightly as you felt him react to your gesture, a sudden heat radiating between your bodies as he began to harden underneath you.

"I—yes..." he breathed out, his chest rising and falling heavily as his eyes darkened, completely trapped under your spell.

"Good," you murmured.

You leaned down the rest of the way, capturing his lips with yours in a deep, slow kiss that effectively melted away every last drop of his frustration.

you parted your lips slightly, letting your tongue slip out to beg for entry, which michael didn't hesitate to eagerly give you, letting out a soft sigh as his wet muscle slid hungrily against yours. even though the two of you had sex plenty of times before, michael could never help how easily his body reacted to you. every single touch made him feel like it was his first time all over again, and you secretly loved the power you had over him.

He let out a low groan deep in his throat as you sucked gently on his tongue, your hips beginning to roll in a slow, agonizing grind right against his growing bulge.

"Mama..." he whimpered into the kiss, the sound raw and completely helpless.

Hearing him like that only spurred you on, but you weren't ready to give him full relief just yet; you still wanted to tease him a little more.

"Hmm?" You hummed softly, finally parting your lips from his. A thin, glistening string of saliva lingered between you for a heartbeat before snapping, and you immediately dipped your head, trailing a path of searing kisses down to the sensitive column of his neck.

Michael’s large hands twitched restlessly against your waist, his fingers digging into your hips with a desperation that bordered on painful. You could feel the hard ridges of his thigh muscles flexing beneath you, a silent testament to the war he was fighting with himself. Even now, driven half-mad by need, he hesitated. He was terrified of overstepping, of pushing too fast—completely forgetting the countless times you’d told him that your body was his to claim without permission.

You sat back up, pulling away from his skin. The sudden loss of warmth drew a needy, pathetic whimper from the back of his throat, a sound that sent a jolt of heat straight to your core. You didn't stop moving, though. You began to roll your hips in a slow, deliberate circle, the heavy denim of his jeans grinding perfectly against your clit. The friction was agonizingly precise; every slide, every press, sent sparks dancing across your vision. You knew if you kept this pace, you’d be sobbing his name and coming apart right there on his lap.

"Oh god... baby, please..." Michael choked out. His eyes were squeezed shut, his breath coming in sharp, jagged hitches as he sucked air through his teeth.

His grip on your waist tightened with a sudden surge of strength, his knuckles turning white as you ground down harder, pinning him with your weight. He was utterly at your mercy, his chest heaving violently as he tried to survive the overwhelming pleasure you were coaxing out of him.

But you weren't finished.

You slid off his lap for a brief, teasing moment. Michael’s eyes snapped open, tracking every movement as you hooked your fingers into the waistband of your panties and slid them down your legs in one fluid motion. The room fell into a heavy silence, broken only by the sound of Michael’s ragged breathing. He watched you, mouth agape, practically drooling at the sight of you.

As you settled back onto his lap, the sudden contact made him gasp. You reached down, the metallic clink of his belt buckle echoing in the room. You slowly dragged the zipper down, the sound loud and purposeful. With a desperate lift of his hips to help you, you yanked his pants and boxers down just enough to let him spring free. He was beautiful—long, thick, throbbing, and already weeping a heavy bead of pre-cum at the tip.

Suddenly struck by a wave of vulnerability, Michael covered his face with his hands, a flush creeping up his neck. Even after everything, he still had that adorable streak of shyness.

"Mikey, what'd I say?" you said softly, your voice a velvet caress. You reached up, gently but firmly prying his large hands away from his face, forcing him to look at you. "You don't have to hide from me. I'm always gonna make sure you're comfortable, alright?"

He swallowed hard, his throat bobbing as he gave you a small, fragile nod.

Reaching down between your bodies, you wrapped your fingers around his pulsing shaft. The heat of him was overwhelming. Using your thumb, you smeared that slick bead of pre-cum over the flushed, sensitive head of his cock before beginning a slow, rhythmic stroke. The friction was instant. Michael’s head snapped back against the pillows, his eyes rolling back as a helpless moan tore from his throat.

You leaned in, your lips brushing the shell of his ear, your voice dropping to a wicked, commanding whisper.

"You gotta be quiet, baby."

ur hand became a blur of straight heat and friction, stroking him with a relentless movement that had michael unraveling. He was a hot mess beneath you, his hips bucking violently into your palm, desperate to bury himself in your touch. His whimpers had turned into needy, guttural whines, his voice cracking as he pleaded silently with his eyes.

You watched, fascinated, as the tip of his cock wept uncontrollably, the thick lubricant pooling against your skin with every wet, sliding motion. The noises were filthy—the slick fwap of skin on skin filling the air. He was pulsing in your grip, the veins along his dick standing out in relief as he neared the edge. Every time he tried to thrust upward, you tightened your hold, reminding him exactly who was in control of his pleasure. He was vibrating at this point, his breath coming in shallow, desperate gasps.

"Baby—oh God—I'm—I'm finna—" Michael’s words were barely intelligible, reduced to breathless whimpers as he spiraled toward his edge. His hips were bucking uncontrollably now, trying to force himself into your palm, his entire frame trembling as he tried to hold back. You felt his dick twitching intensely—that told you he was this close to releasing all over your fingers. Just as he was about to reach his peak, you snatched your hand away.

Michael let out a low choked, wounded sound, his head snapping back against the pillow. He almost cried as his climax that was just within reach was snatched away from him. He laid there, chest heaving, his skin layered with sweat and burning. He looked wrecked—utterly undone by you. He didn't even have the strength to plead. he just stared at you with a look of starving desperation, his dick still pulsing and weeping, begging for you to finish what you started.

Without another word, you shifted, moving with a predatory grace until you were positioned perfectly above him. You hovered for a moment, the sticky head of his cock brushing against your soaking entrance, before you began to sink.

You slid down slowly, a soft gasp escaping you as you felt the familiar stretch. You bit your bottom lip hard, your eyes fluttering shut as your body molded around him. No matter how many times you did this, you didn't think you'd ever truly get used to the size of him; he filled every single inch of you, stretching you to your absolute limit.

The moment you bottomed out, Michael’s entire body jolted. A loud, guttural moan began to tear from his throat, but you were faster. You leaned forward, pressing your palm firmly over his mouth, muffling the sound into a desperate, vibrating hum.

"Michael..." you warned, your voice a low, dangerous whisper that vibrated against his skin.

He looked completely wrecked beneath you, his head lolling back into the pillows, his eyes rolling back as he succumbed to the sensation. You were scorching—a tight, wet vice that gripped him with an intensity that felt almost violent. Even as you warned him again to stay quiet, your body was low key betraying you. Your walls were pulsing around him, milking him in tight contractions.

Every pulse was a taunt, a silent dare for him to lose control. Michael let out a muffled, frantic sound against your palm, his hips giving a small, involuntary twitch upward, trying to bury himself even deeper into the heat of you. He was heaving, his breath coming in hot, jagged bursts through his nose.

You held yourself perfectly still, your hips locked in place as you sat flush against him, his dick buried to the hilt inside your slick, pulsing heat. Your hand remained clamped firmly over his mouth, your eyes locked onto his as you both listened to the sudden noises coming from the door.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"Mike? You in there?"

Marlon's voice, muffled through the wood of the bedroom door, cut through the air. Michael's eyes went wide—why now of all times to check on him?. His body tensed beneath you, every muscle coiling like a spring, his breath hitching sharply against your palm.

You didn't move.

You couldn't move. Not if you wanted to keep this game going. But God, the way he was twitching inside you—the way his dick throbbed in deep pulses against your velvet walls—it was making it damn near impossible to stay still. Your puffy clit was aching, your thighs trembling with the effort of holding yourself, perfectly still, and right on the edge of just saying “fuck it” and bounce on him like he’s silently begging you to. You shifted your hand slightly down to his chin, leaving room for him to speak.

"Yeah, I'm—I'm in here." Michael's voice came out strained, cracking at the edges, but he managed to force the words out. His eyes were pleading with you, begging you to let him move, to let him breathe, to let him fucking move.

You just gave him a slow shake of your head, a wicked smirk curling at the corner of your lips. Your hips gave the tiniest roll—just enough to make him gasp against your hand, his fingers digging into the flesh of your hips hard enough to bruise. God, you were so cruel.

"You good? I saw you leave Pop's office lookin' like you wanted to punch a wall." Marlon's voice was closer now, like he was leaning against the door. “I know what he said was messed up.”

Michael's chest was huffing, his nostrils flaring as he struggled to regulate his breathing. His dick was screaming inside you, begging for friction, anything—but you were a stone wall, unmoving.

He swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing. "Yeah, I'm—I'm good. Just tired, man. Gonna turn in early."

You leaned down, your lips brushing against the shell of his ear, your voice a silken whisper that only he could hear. "You're doing so good, baby. Such a good boy f’me.”

Michael's eyes squeezed shut, a shudder wracking his entire frame. A single bead of sweat trailed down his temple. His hands slid from your hips to grip the sheets beneath him, twisting the fabric into knots as he fought for control.

"You sure? 'Cause you know how he gets. Always got somethin' negative to say about the music, the choreography, the way you breathe." Marlon let out a bitter chuckle. "I swear, one of these days I'm gonna tell him off myself."

Michael's jaw clenched. His hips gave an involuntary, desperate twitch upward, burying himself even deeper into your heat. You bit the inside of your cheek to keep from moaning, your walls clenching around him in response.

"N-no, I'm fine." His voice cracked on the word fine, and he had to pause, taking a shaky breath before continuing. "Just—just got some... things on my mind. Workin' through it."

You had to give it to him—the lie was smooth. Almost believable, if it weren't for the way his voice was drenched in barely suppressed lust. Your thumb traced a slow, teasing circle against his cheek, and he shuddered beneath you.

Marlon sighed on the other side of the door. "Yeah, I feel you. Look, don't let what he said get to you t’much. You know he's just bitter 'cause you're outgrowin' his vision. The album's gonna be great, Mike. Don't let him mess with your head."

"Yeah," Michael breathed out, his voice strangled. "Thanks.."

A beat of silence. You could feel Michael's pulse hammering through his cock, feel the desperate, trembling energy radiating off his body. He was holding on by a thread. A single, quivering thread.

"Alright, well... I'll let you sleep. You need it. Night, Mike."

"Night, Marlon."

Footsteps retreated down the hallway, the sound growing fainter and fainter until it disappeared entirely. The moment the coast was clear, Michael let out a shuddering, desperate breath, his body going limp with relief.

But you still didn't move.

You put your hand back over his mouth, your hips locked in place, your walls still clenching around him in slow, torturous pulses. You wanted to see how long he could last. You wanted to see him beg.

"Baby..." he whimpered against your palm, his voice broken and raw. "Please... please, mama... I can't—I can't take it no more..."

You tilted your head, feigning innocence. "Can't take what, angel?"

A frustrated, desperate sound rumbled in his chest. His hips bucked upward again, trying to find any kind of friction, but you lifted yourself just slightly, denying him the contact.

"You know what," he gasped, his eyes glassy and pleading. "Please... I need you to move. I need—I needa’ feel you."

You leaned down, your lips hovering just above his, your breath mingling with his in the narrow space between you.

"Then beg me, Michael."

His eyes fluttered shut, a broken moan escaping his lips. He was completely, utterly undone—a masterpiece of desperation and desire, laid bare beneath you.

"Please," he whispered, his voice cracking. "Please, mama... ride me."

You lifted your hips agonizingly slow—dragging your soaked walls along his length until just the tip remained inside you. Michael let out a choked, desperate sound against your palm, his hips bucking up instinctively to chase the friction you kept denying him.

"Shh," you cooed, your voice dripping with fake sympathy. "I know, baby. I know."

You sank back down in one smooth motion, and the sound that escaped him was barely human—a high, keening whimper that vibrated against your hand, his eyes rolling back as you filled yourself with him again.

You set a pace that was torturous in its slowness. Deep, languid rolls of your hips that had his dick dragging against every sensitive inch of you. The wet, nasty sound of your ass meeting his hips filled the room, but Michael was quiet now—just as you'd commanded. His whimpers were soft, but desperate, no less.

"Gosh..," he breathed, his voice a ragged whisper against your skin. "Oh, please... faster... I need—"

You cut him off by clenching around him, hard, and his words dissolved into a shuddering gasp.

"No," you whispered, your lips brushing his ear. "You need to take what I give you. And right now, I'm givin’ it to you slow."

A tear slipped from the corner of his eye, trailing down his temple and into his curls. He was a mess—a beautiful, trembling mess, his hands fisting the sheets, his chest glistening with sweat, his lips parted and glossy as he panted for air.

"Baby," he tried again, his voice cracking. "I'll be good—I'll be so good—just please—"

You rewarded him with a slightly deeper roll of your hips, and his back arched off the bed, a silent scream caught in his throat.

"That's it," you murmured. "That's my boy."

You kept him on the edge for what felt like an eternity, alternating between maddeningly slow grinds and sudden, sharp little pulses of your hips that had him seeing white spots. His whimpers grew more frantic, his hands eventually leaving the sheets to grip your soft thighs, his fingers pressing into your flesh like he was afraid you'd disappear.

"Please," he whispered again, his voice barely audible. "Please let me cum... I need it... need you..."

You looked down at him—his tear-streaked cheeks, his swollen lips, his desperate, glassy eyes—fuck, he was so pretty. and you felt a surge of affection so powerful it nearly undid you.

"Okay, baby," you said softly. "Cum for me."

You slammed your hips down hard, grinding against him in tight, circular motions that had you both gasping each time his tip kissed your cervix. Michael's mouth fell open, a silent cry on his lips as his release hit him like a tidal wave. abd you felt it—felt him pulsing inside you, hot and thick and endless, his body shuddering beneath you as he spilled himself deep into your soaking pussy.

The feeling of him coming undone pushed you right over the edge with him. Your own orgasm ripped through you, your walls clenching around him in spasms as you rode out the wave together, your forehead pressed to his, your pretty mouth in a perfect ‘o’ shape, and your breath mingling in the heavy, humid air.

For a long moment, neither of you moved. The only sounds were your breathing and the distant hum of his family in other places of the house settling around you.

Finally, you lifted your head, looking down at him with big, soft eyes. A lazy, satisfied smile at your lips as you brushed a damp curl away from his forehead.

"Feel better?"

Michael let out a breathy, exhausted laugh, his eyes still half-lidded and hazy with pleasure. He reached up, his hand cupping your cheek with a tenderness that contrasted so beautifully with what you just did to him.

"Yes, baby," he whispered, his voice hoarse but warm. "S’much better."

He pulled you down into a soft, lingering kiss, his lips tasting of salt and sweetness and gratitude.

"Thank you," he murmured against your mouth.

You smiled, your hips giving one last lazy roll as you felt him softening inside you.

"Anything for you, Mikey."

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