Soooo sorry for the wait! It's starting to get really busy in school, and my graduation ceremony is on Monday (!!) and then it's straight to finals 😩

Hope you enjoy this chapter!

~ShoamEmily

~

21st of February, 2003
Michael is 44, Angela is 38, and Jake is 40

Michael: "Happy birthday, Blanket!" everyone around the room cheered.

Prince and Paris helped their baby brother blow out the candles on his cake.

"Who wants cake?" I asked, and all of my nephews and nieces raised their hands and yelled 'me' with excitement.

After all the Jackson kids got their piece of cake, I noticed Lily and Eric being encouraged by Jake to go get some cake.

He was here, of course, and tried to be as quiet as he could, since our friendship was pretty private, and non of my family members knew about him.

"Come on, since when are you two embarrassed from Michael?" he said, crouching down in front of them.

"I want mommy." Lily told him.

He sighed, "Mommy is out with her friend. Remember, she said she'll bring you a present when she gets home? And we're here at Neverland with Michael, and Prince and Paris. You love playing with them."

"But we want mommy." Eric followed his sister's actions of pouting and crossing his arms over his little chest.

"Guys," Jake frowned. "Michael was gracious enough to have us at his baby's birthday party, and have us overnight. You love it here, so go and have some fun with the other kids, okay? We'll see mommy at home tomorrow, I promise."

Lily and Eric weren't convinced, but still came forwards to where I was sitting with my children.

"Prince, Paris, why don't you go and play with Lily and Eric?" I suggested, giving Blanket to Janet.

"Sure, daddy!" my daughter smiled and sprinted out of her seat along with Prince.

I walked over to Jake, "Hey, I saw that. At least they listened."

"I just hate when Angela doesn't come over here with us. I don't get it, this place is amazing. And the kids always have something to do, she would have so much fun."

Really, I was glad that Angela didn't come. Now it's only me and him, and our kids. I had no tolerance for Angela's attitude.

"I'm sure she'll warm up to me one day," I rolled my eyes. "But in the meantime, why don't we go supervise on our children?"

"Yeah, who knows what trouble they already got themselves into?" he laughed.

~

"Daddy, what color would you like?" Paris smiled and showed me the pallet of colored powder makeup she had. It was one of those kids toys, but she loved it.

"Um, blue." I said.

"I want green, please." Jake told his daughter who had an identical pallet as Paris.

Both of our daughters started making up our faces and laughed as they did.

"What's so funny?" I asked suspiciously.

"I think they made us look funny." Jake sighed.

"Probably." I chuckled.

"Can we look?" Jake asked Lily.

"No, daddy! Only when we say."

"Okay, pumpkin."

A knock on Prince's and Paris's room door interrupted the girls from putting more fake makeup on our faces, and Janet walked in with Blanket in her arms.

"Everyone's heading out, and Blanket's getting pretty tired..." she said.

"I'll come downstairs in just a minute. And give Blanket to the nanny, she'll put him to bed." I told her.

She nodded, smirking before leaving. "You did a great job, Paris. I'm proud of ya."

I hurried to look at myself in the mirror and was horrified by the mixture of colors on my face.

But I laughed it off, telling Paris she did a good job.

Quickly, I cleaned up my face and took Prince and Paris downstairs with me to say goodbye.

~

After putting all the kids to sleep, Jake and I decided to head down to the theater and watch a movie.

We barely watched it, and mostly talked or drank a couple of glasses from a strong liquor bottle. Well, I did. Jake drank apple juice.

Halfway into our movie, I saw a woman entering the theater.

"Jakey, guess who's here?" Angela covered Jake's eyes and giggled.

"What are you doing here, baby?" he asked her when she took a seat next to him.

"I decided to join you, I was bored at home." she shrugged and kissed him.

I had no choice but to watch as Jake gave into her touch.

I snickered and tried focusing on the movie without the picture of them making out in the corner of my eye.

"Hey, Mike, we're going to bed..." Jake mumbled.

"Goodnight." I sighed.

I heard Angela giggle loudly on their way out of the theater, and I was left alone, with only the movie playing in the background.

~

After the movie ended, I went back to the house, and tried falling asleep.

I guess I was feeling a bit lonely now, when I actually had no woman in my life. Jake had Angela, and everyone around me was either in a relationship or married.

And yet, here I am, a single father with three little kids. I always thought it would be better that way, because I didn't want any woman to hurt me anymore like Lisa Marie Presley did.

I rubbed my face and decided to see how the kids were doing.

Prince, Paris, Lily, and Eric were all sleeping peacefully together, so I moved onto Blanket.

"Hey, baby boy," I whispered when I saw he was awake. "Can't sleep, either?"

He smiled up at me and I took him into my arms.

"You look so much like your mother, you know that?"

I sighed, "I miss her, Blanket. She was a really good friend of mine. We used to talk about everything... But I guess everyone walks away from you once you give them money."

What was I saying? I couldn't blame her for disappearing after Blanket was born. That was our agreement. She gives me my baby boy, and I give her a decent amount of money for carrying him for 9 months, then she leaves.

"Dada." Blanket said and put his head against my chest.

"Daddy's really lonely, baby boy," I sniffled and wiped my tears. I quickly shook my head and pulled my son closer to me. "But he has you and your brother and sister, so he doesn't need a woman in his life. You're all daddy needs."

Blanket's smile got bigger and I gave him a kiss, knowing I was lying to the both of us.

~

12th of June, 2006
Michael is 47, Angela is 42

Michael: I paced back and forth, waiting for one of my bodyguards to tell me if they found Angela.

Last night when I returned to the bedroom after putting Rose to sleep, Angela wasn't there, and immediately I got worried.

We haven't found her yet, and it's already 10 in the morning. I was thinking of the worst, she's been gone all night. She had no phone, and she didn't leave a note, nothing.

"Blanket, be careful when you play with them." I told Blanket when I noticed he was getting too close to the babies who were on their play mats.

"Michael, where's mom?" Eric asked.

"That's what I'm trying to figure out..." I answered. "I gotta make a call. Make sure Blanket plays nicely with the babies, okay? Don't let him get too close."

"Okay." he smiled.

Just as I left the living room, Javon ran up to me.

"We found her, sir," he said. "She's somewhere Downtown."

I sighed in relief, "Their old house... Thanks, Javon."

"Of course, sir. I'll take you there."

I nodded and hurried to call Grace before following him.

~

Angela: Tears streamed down my face as I took another one of Jake's jackets out of the closet.

We used to live in quite a small townhouse in Downtown LA, because honestly, we never needed much.

It was his military jacket that I pulled out. He used to serve in the navy, but quit once his family decided he needed to go to rehab for his addiction to painkillers. Another reason why he and Michael bonded so much.

Every jacket he had smelled like him, and I didn't want to move onto the next one. On our bed there were three piles: clothes of his that I'll keep to myself, clothes that I'll give to charity, and clothes that I'll throw away.

It's taken me a long time to only go over his clothes, and I've been here all night. His jackets are the last pieces of clothing I've been going through, and luckily, most of his clothes were going to charity.

I searched inside the military jacket's pockets, only to find his dog tags.

His dad would probably want these.

I put the dog tags around my neck and folded the jacket nicely and put it aside.

I pulled out another piece of clothing, but stopped when I heard the front door closing.

"Angela?" Michael called. "Angela, where are you?"

His voice got closer with each second, and he sighed when he saw me.

"There you are, you had me worried sick-" he stopped saying when he looked at what I was holding.

It was one of the simpler clothes Jake had; a simple, red, pullover.

"That's- Oh..." Michael's eyes turned sad, and the tears welled up in them.

"What?"

"He wore that on my first day at the rehab center... I remember really liking it, and he said he'd give it to me one day, if I finish my program with excellence."

"Take it." I came over and put it in his hands.

"A- are you sure? Aren't you keeping it?" he asked.

I nodded, "It means more to you than it does to me. Plus, I'm trying to let him go... I'm clearing out the house and I'll rent it to someone. I went to Dr. Avery last night, and she said this would be the best way to let him go... I need to get rid of his things, and keep only the things I think I'll want the most. I'm doing pretty good, that big pile on the bed is all going to charity."

"Oh, wow..."

"Yeah, but there are still a lot more things that I need to go through." I sighed.

"I'll help. Grace is with the kids. We have the whole day." he smiled.

I grinned back. "Thanks, Mike. Come on, put the pullover on."

Michael took off his jacket and I helped him put it on.

"It looks good on you," I commented. "You should wear pullovers more often."

He leaned down and kissed me, while putting his large hand on the back of my neck. But almost instantly, he pulled away.

~

Michael: Something felt different about Angela's neck, like she had another necklace on. The only necklace she wears daily is a necklace that's been in her family for generations.

I pulled away as fast as I could and looked at her, confused.

"What?" she furrowed her eyebrows.

"What's that?" I pointed at the different looking necklace.

"Oh," she smiled sadly. "It's Jake's dog tags."

"From his days in the army?"

"Yeah, I'm giving it to his dad, along with his military jacket. Just thought it would be safer around my neck."

I gave her a kiss on the cheek, "That's very thoughtful of you. Come on, let's get to organizing this place."

~

"Michael, look what I found." Angela called and I hurried to stop what I was doing.

We've been here for almost 5 hours now, and we were close to being finished. A lot of Jake's things were going to charity or to other people in his life that Angela thought they should get a little memory from him.

Along with the pullover I got, I was also given the framed picture Jake used to have on his nightstand of me and him, with Paris, Lily, and Eric.

"I found this among our many photo albums... It's me as a little girl, my mom made this years ago after our trip to Italy. It was the first time we went to visit my grandparents there, I remember it so clearly..."

I looked at a photo of Angela, Rosa, and Luciano eating ice cream.

"Wow, you looked so much like your mother as a little girl... What happened?" I chuckled.

Angela shrugged, "The Brown family genes must have been stronger on me. Luci is a copy of my nonno- I mean, my grandfather, and Rosa looks exactly like mom. See?"

She pointed at a picture of an older man, who I understood was her grandfather. Luciano did really look like him.

"I'd love for you to take me there one day." I whispered.

"Italy?" she said and I nodded. "I think that's a great idea. A family vacation would be nice, huh? And maybe you could take me to Gary."

I rolled my eyes, "I think Italy is a little more exciting than Gary, Indiana."

"I still want to go there."

I kissed her lips. "Fine, if you really want to, I'll take you."

"It's only fair if I show you my roots. I'm sure I'll have a great time," she kissed me back. "And, Mike?"

"Yeah?"

Angela straddled my lap and gave me a much deeper kiss.

"I-"

You love me. Say it.

"I want to give you another baby."

I was disappointed that she didn't say what I wanted her to, but I couldn't hide my excitement.

"But we only had one meeting with Dr. Avery." I told her.

"I don't need three more to know I want another child from you. Or children, in that matter. I want as big of a family as we can have, too, so why not? I already wasted my 20's, I'm not gonna waste my 40's."

"Thank you, Angie. Thank you, thank you, thank you..." I gave her neck small kisses.

My wife giggled and played with the ends of my hair.

"Come on, let's finish up here and go back home." she said.

She kissed me again, then got off my lap and went back to organizing Jake's things.

~

Angela: It was a party when we came home. The kids all said they were worried and missed me so much.

The babies wouldn't leave me alone, and when I'd put them down they would start whining.

And since I haven't slept for over 24 hours, my body was taking notice. Michael, though, seemed perfectly fine.

"How come you don't show how tired you are?" I asked him with a yawn.

He helped Rose and Jared onto the bed, and gently lay on them on their stomach.

"I'm used to being tired. Before you came along to sleep in bed with me, I rarely got any sleep. In those days I'd even ask my kids to sleep with me so I wouldn't be alone. I hate sleeping on my own. And when I toured, I didn't get much sleep, either. I used to go days without sleep, until I'd collapse. Got that habit rid of, though, once the kids came along." Michael explained.

"You're kidding. I wouldn't be able to handle such little sleep."

"Not even a little. Being a huge pop star isn't always as fun as it looks. I mean, it has it's perks, but then again, I went through a lot in my life."

"Yeah, I know that." I sighed and rubbed his back.

I suddenly felt something wet on my hand, and when I looked down, Jared was sucking on it.

"Baby boy, what are you doing?" my husband chuckled and pulled our son to him so he could cuddle him close.

Jared scoffed and reached his small arms for me.

"Oooh, you want your momma... Why didn't you say?"

I rolled my eyes and took my baby in my arms. Michael picked Rose up and unlike her brother, she snuggled close to her dad.

A total daddy's girl.

Jared yawned loudly, and I followed. Rose wasn't so far behind us, and Michael laughed at us.

"I think it's time I put these two to bed. You try and sleep, okay? It's been a long day for you."

The babies whined as Michael tried picking them up, tears filling their eyes.

"They're doing that on purpose, they know I can't resist their crying faces..." he groaned. "Fine, you can sleep with me and mommy tonight. But only tonight, I'm gonna need this time to make you a big sister and brother."

"Michael!" I scolded, covering the babies' ears.

"What? They won't remember this, anyway."

I cracked a smile and rolled my eyes. We're gonna have to lock our door from now on.

"I'm gonna go change." Michael said and disappeared into his closet room.

I looked at his nightstand where he put the pictures of him and Jake I gave him today.

Jake's not here, Michael is.

I had to keep reminding myself that the entire day, just so I could organize all of Jake's belongings.

Rose's squeal snapped me out of my thoughts and I saw her and Jared looking at each other with a huge smile over their faces.

~

Michael: I put Jake's pullover on a hanger and put it next to all of my lesser fancier clothes. But that didn't mean it was less special.

I sighed and pulled on my PJs, then returned to the bedroom to find Angela and the twins passed out on our bed.

There was a huge smile on my face when I crawled into bed next to them. As soon as I was in bed, Rose cuddled into my chest.

"Goodnight, baby girl." I kissed her cheek and started drifting off myself.

Soon enough, I was in dreamland, where Jake decided to pay me a visit.