Marvel and Kevin Feige cancelling and shelving black actor-led projects like Wonder Man and Blade and sidelining characters like Monica Rambeau but has future plans to put fugly zionist and Thin Blue Line nutjob Jon Bernthal in several projects...it's so bleak.

It is also not lost on me the disproportionate spotlight female characters in the MCU get, but sure put this misogynist bum who goes out of his way to associate with Hollywood abusers and predators of women in everything Feige!

And the amount of women in the Marvel fandom continuing to shamelessly support this man especially on here 🥴

I just fucking moaned

♩ ❤︎ ݁ 𓂂 𝒆𝒙𝒕𝒓𝒂 𝒆𝒙𝒕𝒓𝒂 ! rach twnty-smth afro latina.

read all about it ── sheher gemini y2k enthusiast.

Mfs will really come into your job and get mad at you cause they can’t read or misunderstood something

a fighter post

Yall Ngl I get absolutely geeked as fuck when my favorite authors be following me back after I read they bomb ass stories. I love commenting and leaving so much love on their post!! You guys deserve all the loveeee!! you’re doing God’s work. Signed by yours truly ( an absolute fein )

@angelfacediary. @japinesedenim. @king-mila. @mjtvv. @freakinme. @megsnotokay. @sugarcookiemj. @michaeldiary. @curlypytclubx. @strangerexee. @brownsugarletters. @bawdylanguageee. @blkkbratt. @cherrishkissed. @cupidslyrics. @loves2tour. @1andonlytashae. @pvtypyt. @dreamylace. @1andonlytashae. @hernamewaswinnie. @szalipcombo. @cloudsofwineandbooks. @bawdylanguageee. @narratedillusions. @kissmyglxck. @theonlyfemme. @mikesbian. @naturallykae. @jsgoodfriends. @multifandomposts-blog. @plan3tch1ld. @missharper33. @syrndollie. @fullofmelaninsarcasmandepression. @callmeoncette. @jks-luvr. @pvt-luv. @kissmyglxck. @kitty-trash. @plumppies. @youluvyanni. @yearlyjams. @killathrxlla. @slvttyfied. @szalipcombo. @saintwrld. @soleantoinette. @dollfacegallery. @douceurrrr. @faiology. @jermajestysbaby. @ebvnydesires. @soleantoinette. @siighrns. @mikesfaveater. @mikedotorg. @dollfacegallery. @sunsetdrvr. @yourleogf. @king-mila. @myxstrx. @jeonsblackgf-writes. @theonlyonlinefish. @syrndollie. @mamasturn. @darkseidex. @darkseidesx. @phia-writes. @motherismotheringggg. @jks-luvr. @tauroist. @alohaluz. @sqrixm. @urbanfunkchild. @angelcrescent. @undercovermoonwalker. @yourlove7. @siighrns. @xwixnk. @judesboots. @1-800-angel-ok. @redemptioninthe4ethers. @cravemyhoney. @mamasturn. @bvtterfliess. @glossedupdollxx. @enjoyherself. @msbiasstuff. @megsnotokay. @angelcrescent. @undercovermoonwalker. @eunoiadoll. @ridingreeves. @ttinkabella. @haintbleus

ty so much for even tagging me , here are some of my lovies who i adore (੭´͈ ᐜ `͈)੭♡ @humannatures @3leni @prettyoungcee @prettyangeliczz @honeysmoonave @hunnyskisses @dreamylace

🪽— and to the black writers of the mj community, please don’t ever let someone behind a screen dim your light. Don’t let them encourage you to stop doing something you love just because it bothers or doesn’t impact them personally. What you do is art, and if other women or men other races are allowed to do so, we can too. I love you all so much and being in this community with so many black woman has meant the world to me because irl I can’t keep a friend. So thank you for being you. Please don’t let negativity bring you down, as poc we’ve been going through stuff like this for years either way. Don’t let them take what you love away from you too. Don’t let them win.

I love you guys, please don’t leave. Your important.

mooties ilysm truly🤍 :: @prettyangeliczz @ridingreeves @michaelcurls @barbiedollybabe @mikesfaveater @douceurrrr @destroyeddisco @dreamylace @angelcrescent @billiejeansdream @nnyeinu @jks-luvr @mjssolocup @brownsugarletters @bvtterfliess @pvtypyt @mikedotorg @oneflygirl @angelfacediary @cherrishkissed @siighrns @kkgalerii @youluvyanni @faiology @enjoyherself @luvingkiku @doleuia @vhsbliss @dollfacegallery @mattbymills @ebvnydesires @chmpngekisses @syrndollie @coeurlace @plan3tch1ld @sunsetdrvr @pvt-luv @nyctogeny @multifandomposts-blog @dollthoughtz @pinkaronii @narratedillusions @peterpansdreamer @deletedkisses @strangerexee @yearlyjams @doefern @tabloidangel @sculpted2 @thrillerhaze

(If I didn’t tag you dw, ily just as much. Or you haven’t mooted me back yet lol)

Please repost & tag some more black creators not mentioned to spread the love!🫶🏾

　　　　　　　　　SUPPORT BLACK AUTHORS

　　　highlighting some amazing Black authors for you to follow!

@angelfacediary. @japinesedenim. @king-mila. @mjtvv. @freakinme. @megsnotokay. @sugarcookiemj. @michaeldiary. @curlypytclubx. @strangerexee. @brownsugarletters. @bawdylanguageee. @blkkbratt. @cherrishkissed. @cupidslyrics. @loves2tour. @1andonlytashae. @pvtypyt. @dreamylace. @1andonlytashae. @hernamewaswinnie. @szalipcombo. @cloudsofwineandbooks. @bawdylanguageee. @narratedillusions. @kissmyglxck. @theonlyfemme. @mikesbian. @naturallykae. @jsgoodfriends. @multifandomposts-blog. @plan3tch1ld. @missharper33. @syrndollie. @fullofmelaninsarcasmandepression. @callmeoncette. @jks-luvr. @pvt-luv. @kissmyglxck. @kitty-trash. @plumppies. @youluvyanni. @yearlyjams. @killathrxlla. @slvttyfied. @szalipcombo. @saintwrld. @soleantoinette. @dollfacegallery. @douceurrrr. @faiology. @jermajestysbaby. @ebvnydesires. @soleantoinette. @siighrns. @mikesfaveater. @mikedotorg. @dollfacegallery. @sunsetdrvr. @yourleogf. @king-mila. @myxstrx. @jeonsblackgf-writes. @theonlyonlinefish. @syrndollie. @mamasturn. @darkseidex. @darkseidesx. @phia-writes. @motherismotheringggg. @jks-luvr. @tauroist. @alohaluz. @sqrixm. @urbanfunkchild. @angelcrescent. @undercovermoonwalker. @yourlove7. @siighrns. @xwixnk. @judesboots. @1-800-angel-ok. @redemptioninthe4ethers. @cravemyhoney. @mamasturn. @bvtterfliess. @glossedupdollxx. @enjoyherself. @msbiasstuff. @megsnotokay. @angelcrescent. @undercovermoonwalker. @eunoiadoll. @ridingreeves. @ttinkabella. @haintbleus

　　　　　　　　　　　　A growing list...

　　　　Who's your favourite Black (MJ) writer? I'll add them!

it’s my birthday!!! i don’t know about yall but im feeling twenty two!!! 🎀🧁what a blessing it is to live to see another birthday and hope to live many many more. i’m so grateful for the many blessing and lessons ive learned this far but most importantly friends. i love each and everyone of yall and hope to continue to get to know you guys day by day and get closer to the ones who i cherish the most. i love yall so much xoxo and ill save you all a slice of cake!

@yearlyjams @douceurrrr @siighrns @reverieglow @yourleogf @humannatures @szalipcombo @faiology @mikedotorg @bvtterfliess @honeysmoonave @ebvnydesires @chmpngekisses @pvt-luv @prettyangeliczz @pinkaronii @angelcrescent @melaninjoys @multifandomposts-blog @invinor @plan3tch1ld and so many more!

in the 𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐭𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭. 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 ݁ ﹒ ❝᷀ົ pepsi incident.　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

　　❝ 𝒻.  popstar!reader 𝑥 thriller!𝒎ichael ❞ 𓂃 m.𝓁ist

intro. ❪ 𝔀.𝐜. 5.8𝑘 ❫ ✐ after michael’s pepsi accident, you find yourself using his phone number after three months of no contact. 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜs ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ.

　　　　　　❤︎︎ ゛reblogs are appreciated .ᐟ ( ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈)ഒ

❛ 𝓳anuary 27, 1984 — 𝓁os angeles, 𝑐alifornia. ❜

The news interrupted whatever mindless television program you had allowed to play in the background.

You had not been paying much attention to it. The television had merely been there to fill the silence of your living room, producing enough indistinguishable noise to prevent you from becoming too aware of how alone you were with your own frustration. You had spent most of the afternoon seated on the carpet, surrounded by crumpled lyric sheets, discarded pencils, and several cups of tea that you had forgotten to finish before they went cold.

You were attempting to write a song. Attempting was the important word. Every line you produced seemed either painfully insincere or suspiciously similar to something you had already written before, and every melody felt borrowed from a younger, more inspired version of yourself. You had been staring at the same unfinished verse for nearly twenty minutes, tapping your pencil against the paper while silently considering whether throwing the entire notebook across the room would count as a productive artistic decision.

It was then that the music on the television stopped abruptly. The change in tone caught your attention first. There was something immediately ominous about the polished seriousness of a news anchor’s voice, the kind which could make even an insignificant story feel worthy of alarm. You continued staring at your lyric sheet for another few seconds, only half-listening, until you heard a name that made every other sound in the room disappear.

“—Michael Jackson has reportedly been injured while filming a commercial at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.”

Your pencil stilled against the paper as you slowly looked up. A photograph of Michael appeared beside the anchor, one you had seen before in magazines and newspapers, where he was smiling beneath carefully arranged curls as though he did not have a single reason to feel frightened by the world around him.

For one strange moment, you did not understand what had been said. Like the words of the anchorwoman were complete gibberish. Injured. Commercial. Shrine Auditorium. Each word floated separately through your mind, refusing to join into a complete thought because the completed thought was one you did not want to comprehend. Then the photograph disappeared, replaced with footage of an ambulance, crowds pressed around the venue, and people rushing through a side entrance while reporters fought their way closer to the commotion.

You rose so quickly that several sheets of paper slid from your lap and scattered across the carpet.

“During the filming, an apparent malfunction involving stage pyrotechnics caused the singer’s hair to catch fire—” Your stomach dropped.

The anchor continued speaking, but you hardly heard another complete sentence. One witness claimed to have seen flames. Another said Michael had continued performing for several seconds before realizing what had happened. The details seemed to shift depending on who was telling the story, each account somehow managing to sound more horrifying than the one before it.

You moved closer to the television and placed one hand against the edge of the console, gripping the wood tightly enough for your fingers to ache.

The footage kept replaying. You caught a distant glimpse of a stretcher being pushed through a crowd of people. The image was unsteady and obstructed by reporters, security guards, and flashing cameras, making it impossible to distinguish the face of the person lying upon it. You knew it was him anyway.

“Oh my God.” Your voice sounded unfamiliar in the empty room. The telephone sat only a few feet away, and your eyes moved toward it instinctively before stopping.

You could not call him. Could you? You had not used the number once since he had given it to you.

For nearly three months, the matchbook had remained tucked inside the smallest compartment of your purse. You carried it everywhere, transferring it from one bag to another whenever the occasion required a change, all while pretending that its continued presence meant nothing. You told yourself that you had simply forgotten to remove it. You told yourself it was amusing to keep. You told yourself many things, all of them far easier to accept than the truth—that the small piece of cardboard had become strangely precious to you.

You had considered calling more times than you would have ever admitted aloud. After difficult rehearsals, when every person in the room seemed to want something different from you. After cruel articles, particularly the ones which compared you to Michael in ways designed to make both of you look petty and ungrateful. Once, after waking from a dream you could not entirely remember, although his voice had somehow remained with you long after the images had disappeared.

Every time, you found a reason not to do it. It was too late, you were too busy—he was probably busy too. You had nothing really important to say.

Eventually, the excuses became easier to repeat than the real reason. You were afraid he would not want to hear from you.

It was a childish fear, in retrospect, particularly because Michael had been the one to write down his number and instruct you to use it. But affection had already begun to make you irrational. Even before you properly understood that affection was what you felt, it had given him the unique ability to embarrass and reject you in ways no one else could. A newspaper critic could declare you talentless and you would survive it. Michael could sound even slightly disappointed to hear your voice, and you suspected the humiliation might stay with you for the rest of your life.

Now, however, as you stared at the television while strangers speculated about the severity of his injuries, none of those excuses mattered. You hurried toward the chair where your purse had been abandoned and began searching through it with trembling hands. Lipstick, keys, a folded receipt, a compact mirror.

Your fingers finally closed around a thin piece of cardboard, and you pulled it free. The club’s gold lettering had begun to fade around the edges after months of being handled far more often than you would have liked anyone to know.

You opened the matchbook. His number remained written across the inside in dark ink and beneath it, the same three words stared back at you.

Call me sometime.

Your heart pounded painfully. You carried the matchbook toward the telephone and sat beside it, but then you remained there, staring at the receiver as though it were something capable of hurting you.

All you had to do was lift the receiver, dial the seven numbers written inside the matchbook, and ask whether he was all right. It should have been simple—certainly far simpler than the dozens of conversations you had already imagined having with him over the last three months—but now that the opportunity had been forced upon you, every possible outcome seemed capable of frightening you into stillness.

Your thoughts immediately began inventing reasons to delay. Perhaps the number had changed, or one of his family members would answer and demand to know who you were. Perhaps Michael was sleeping, unconscious, or in too much pain to speak. Worse still, perhaps the reporters did not yet know the full extent of his injuries, and dialing the number would place you before a truth you were not prepared to hear. None of these fears were reasonable enough to justify doing nothing, but fear rarely required reason; it merely required the smallest uncertainty through which it could enter and begin multiplying.

You snatched the receiver from its cradle before your mind could construct anything more terrifying. The dial tone filled your ear, and your finger hovered above the first number, then you placed the telephone down again.

“Damn it.” The television continued speaking behind you, the reporters offering update after update in voices so composed that they almost sounded detached from the reality of what had happened. They spoke of a stable condition, of a specialised burn unit, of family members arriving at the hospital and representatives requesting privacy while investigations continued into the accident. Every new piece of information was intended to reassure the public that Michael Jackson was alive, conscious, and receiving the best care available, yet none of it brought you any comfort.

None of those carefully rehearsed statements had come from him, and until they did, your imagination insisted upon filling every silence with possibilities far crueler than the facts. It was astonishing how quickly fear could distort a person’s thinking. Only minutes ago, you had been irritated with yourself for failing to finish a song, and now you found yourself wondering whether the owner of the telephone number tucked inside your purse was lying unconscious somewhere across Los Angeles.

You returned to the telephone and picked it up again. This time, you dialed three numbers before hanging up.

It was ridiculous. You had stood before thousands of strangers without allowing your nerves to show. You had endured interviews designed to embarrass you, smiled through criticisms that would’ve broken less stubborn people, and argued with Michael Jackson himself in the middle of a crowded soundstage without surrendering so much as an inch of ground. Somehow, however, the simple act of asking whether he was all right felt infinitely more terrifying than any of those things ever had. Because this was not an argument. There would be no clever remark to hide behind and no public rivalry to explain your interest. You could not pretend you were calling because a manager had instructed you to or because some shared obligation required it.

You would be calling because you cared, and there was no rivalry, sharp remark, or convenient excuse capable of disguising that fact from you anymore. The realization settled painfully beneath your ribs, exposing something you had spent the last several months refusing to examine too closely. Whatever Michael had become to you, it was no longer something harmless enough to ignore, because the thought of him hurt and frightened somewhere across the city had already reduced every reason you had invented for keeping your distance into complete insignificance.

His photograph appeared on the television again, smiling beside the grave expression of the news anchor, and that was finally enough to push you beyond your fear. Before you could reconsider, you lowered yourself beside the telephone, lifted the receiver, and dialed every number written inside the matchbook. Your fingers trembled as they moved, but you did not allow yourself to stop this time.

The line began to ring. With each unanswered tone, your courage weakened. By the third, you were already preparing to hang up and convince yourself that you had tried, that perhaps he was asleep or surrounded by family, and that calling again tomorrow would somehow be easier. But then, just as your hand began to move toward the cradle, the ringing stopped.

“Hello?” You went completely still.

It was him. His voice sounded quieter than usual, roughened slightly by exhaustion and whatever medication the doctors had administered, but it was unmistakably his. The relief of hearing it was so immediate that, for several seconds, you forgot you were expected to respond.

“Hello?” he repeated, sounding more alert now. “Who is this?”

“It’s me.”

Silence greeted you from the other end, and your fingers tightened around the receiver as you wondered whether those two words had been hopelessly presumptuous. There were hundreds of people who might have introduced themselves to Michael Jackson that way, but a small, unreasonable part of you had assumed that he would know.

“You?” he asked, and the recognition in his voice almost caused your eyes to burn.

“Yeah.”

Another pause settled between you before he said, very softly, “You actually called.”

Under any other circumstances, you would have teased him for sounding so surprised after practically ordering you to use his number. Tonight, however, the familiar instinct to hide behind some clever remark failed you, because the fear had not yet loosened its grip around your chest.

“I-uh.. I saw the news.”

His breathing changed slightly. “Oh.”

“Are you okay?” You finally asked.

“I’m fine.”

The answer came far too quickly, delivered with the same automatic composure he used whenever an interviewer asked something invasive and he wished to discourage any further questioning. It awakened an anger in you that was not truly anger at all, but fear taking on a sharper shape because fear itself felt too vulnerable to expose. Michael had just been injured in front of hundreds of people, yet he was already attempting to make the situation easier for everyone else by reducing his own suffering into something harmless. You hated that instinct in him, perhaps because you recognized it so well.

“Jackson,” you said firmly.

“What?”

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Tell me you’re fine like I didn’t just watch you get carried out of a building on a stretcher.”

He went quiet, and you immediately regretted the sharpness with which the words had escaped. It was almost defensive, as though somebody had insulted him and you were preparing to argue on his behalf, except the person dismissing Michael’s pain was Michael himself. You had spent months pretending that you found him irritating, but the prospect of him neglecting his own well-being seemed to irritate you far more than anything he had ever said to you.

“I wasn’t carried out,” he corrected after a moment.

You stared ahead in disbelief. “That is absolutely the part you’re choosing to focus on?”

“They wheeled me out.”

“You are unbelievable.”

You rubbed a hand across your forehead, pushing several loose strands of hair away from your face, and then heard a faint sound through the receiver. It took you a second to realize that he was laughing.

The laugh was weak and brief, hardly more than an amused breath, but hearing it released something inside you that had been painfully restrained since the news report began. You pressed your free hand against your eyes, suddenly afraid that the relief might make you cry.

“This isn’t funny.”

“I know.”

“Then stop laughing.”

“You sound mad.”

“I am mad.”

“At me?”

You hesitated, because you did not know how to explain that you were angry at the pyrotechnics, the commercial, the people who had continued filming, and every person currently telling him to be grateful rather than allowing him to admit that he was frightened. Most of all, you were angry because he had been hurt and you had possessed no way of knowing whether he was safe.

“I don’t know yet,” you answered.

“I didn’t set myself on fire.”

“Really, Jackson?”

“Sorry,” he murmured, his voice shrinking in a way that betrayed the fact that he was still trying not to smile.

Despite yourself, a laugh escaped you, although it sounded dangerously close to a sob. You attempted to swallow the sound before he could recognize it, but Michael had always been far more perceptive than you gave him credit for.

“Hey,” he said, all amusement disappearing from his tone.

You lowered your hand from your face. “What?”

“I’m really okay.”

This time he did not sound dismissive. Instead, he spoke as though your fear had become another thing he felt responsible for easing, and you realized that if you continued sounding frightened, he might spend the entire night reassuring you instead of acknowledging what had happened to him.

“They treated me,” he continued. “I’m resting now, and everybody keeps checking on me every five minutes.”

“Good.”

“It’s annoying.”

“Good,” you repeated, without the slightest sympathy.

“You want me to be annoyed?”

“I want somebody watching you.”

“There are plenty of people watching me.”

“That isn’t what I meant.”

“I know.”

The words rested gently between you. He understood that you did not mean doctors, nurses, security guards, or family members moving in and out of his room. You meant that you wanted somebody near him who would notice if he was hurting and refuse to accept the first easy answer he gave them.

You heard the quiet rustling of sheets on his end, followed by a strained exhale as he attempted to adjust himself. The sound caused your irritation to vanish as quickly as it had appeared.

“Does it hurt?” you asked, and you hated how small your voice became.

Michael did not answer immediately. “A little.”

“A little?”

“More than a little.”

Your chest tightened again. “Did they give you something?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it helping?”

“Some.”

You nodded even though he could not see you, your eyes drifting back toward the television. The report had moved on to another story, but the ambulance, the crowds, and the brief glimpse of the stretcher remained fixed in your mind.

“I was scared,” you admitted before you could stop yourself.

Michael seemed to become completely still on the other end of the line. “You were?”

You could have retracted the confession. You could have blamed the dramatic coverage or laughed about how the reporters had managed to frighten half of Los Angeles, but the matchbook was resting on your knee, reminding you of every occasion when you had wanted to call and refused to do so.

“Yes.”

His answer came so quietly that you almost missed it. “Me too.”

Until then, Michael had always seemed almost impossible to frighten. You had watched him step onto enormous stages as though they belonged to him, performing beneath blinding lights with a confidence you secretly envied. Even when he became nervous during interviews, he knew how to fold the discomfort beneath careful smiles and gentle answers, allowing the public to mistake his self-control for fearlessness.

“When?” you asked.

“After.”

You waited without interrupting him.

“When it happened, I didn’t understand what everybody was doing,” he explained slowly. “People started runnin’ toward me, and somebody pushed me down. I could smell somethin’ burning, but I didn’t know it was…”

He stopped, and your fingers curled around the telephone cord.

“You don’t have to tell me.”

“No, it’s okay.” Michael inhaled carefully before continuing. “I didn’t feel it at first. Not really. Then everything started hurting at once, and everybody was lookin’ at me. There were so many people there.”

His voice no longer carried any trace of the humor he had used earlier. He did not sound like Michael Jackson, whose face covered magazines and whose records seemed to play everywhere you went. He sounded painfully young—just Michael, hurt and frightened, while attempting desperately not to allow anyone around him to hear it.

“I kept thinkin’ I had to stay calm,” he whispered. “Because if I looked scared, everybody else would panic.”

“You were allowed to be scared,” you told him, and the protectiveness returned to your voice with such force that it nearly surprised you. You could not understand how anyone had allowed him to believe that even this moment had required something from him. “You were the person who got hurt, Jackson. You didn’t owe anybody a performance.”

The word lingered between you because performance had come to define almost every aspect of both your lives. You performed happiness at parties, confidence during interviews, and gratitude whenever somebody crossed a boundary. Apparently, even pain required the correct presentation.

“I don’t know how to turn it off,” Michael admitted.

You leaned further back into the chair. “Turn what off?”

“The part of me that knows people are watching.”

You understood him immediately, and perhaps that was what frightened you most.

“Sometimes I don’t think it turns off,” you said. “Even when you’re alone.”

“You feel it too?”

“All the time. I’ll be sitting by myself and still wondering what I look like, whether I’m behaving the way everybody expects me to, or if I’m wasting time when I should be working.”

“Yes,” he answered so quickly that your heart ached.

“It’s like somebody’s always waiting for you to make a mistake,” he continued. “And if nothing goes wrong, they wait for somethin’ anyway.”

“Then they make something up.”

“Exactly.”

“And tomorrow, there’ll be a dozen different stories about what happened today.”

“They already have some.”

You frowned. “You’ve seen them?”

“Somebody turned the television off, but I heard people talking in the hallway.”

“Don’t listen to any of it.”

“You’re telling me not to read the papers?”

“For once, yes.”

“You read all of them.”

“This isn’t about me.”

“You told me you only read some of them.”

“That isn’t important right now.”

“So, you admit you lied?”

You released a disbelieving laugh, recognizing the deliberate distraction for what it was. Michael had successfully moved the conversation away from the accident and onto you, which was likely exactly what he had intended.

“You nearly caught fire today, and you’re using this moment to prove I read articles about you?”

“I told you, I didn’t do it on purpose.”

“You are exhausting, Jackson.”

“But you called.”

There was something delicate beneath his teasing, and the softness of it caused you to look down at the matchbook again.

“I did.”

“Why?”

Your lips parted, but the honest answer remained lodged somewhere behind your ribs. You had called because seeing him on that stretcher had made the entire room tilt, and because, for several terrible minutes, you had believed that your last genuine conversation might have ended with a telephone number you were too frightened to use. Somewhere between your first argument and the night at the club, he had become important to you, but you were not prepared to give him the satisfaction of hearing that yet.

“You told me to call sometime.”

“It took me getting burned?”

“Apparently.”

He laughed again, slightly stronger this time, and you smiled despite yourself.

“I’m sorry,” you said. “I should’ve called before.”

“I could’ve called you.”

“You don’t have my number.”

“I could’ve gotten it.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

He hesitated before answering. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to.”

“You gave me your number.”

“That was different.”

“How?”

“Because then it was your choice.”

Your expression softened. Of course that was how he saw it. Michael had spent most of his life surrounded by people who made choices for him, deciding where he would go, what he would wear, what he would say, and which version of himself the public was allowed to see. When it came to you, he had handed over the decision entirely, perhaps because he knew better than most how uncomfortable it felt to have someone force their way into your life.

“I wanted to,” you admitted. “I just didn’t know what I was supposed to say.”

“You could’ve said hello.”

“Very helpful, Jackson.”

“It worked tonight.”

“Barely. I almost hung up.”

“I know.”

You straightened in surprise. “How?”

“You were breathing into the phone.”

Your face warmed. “I was not.”

“You were.”

“Maybe that was somebody else.”

“Calling my private number?”

“You could have another secret rival.”

“One is enough.”

You smiled by happenstance before immediately wiping it clean. “You really think I’m your rival?”

“Sometimes.”

“Only sometimes?”

“Tonight, you’re not.”

The answer settled somewhere unexpectedly deep inside you. “What am I tonight?”

Silence followed the question. For a moment, you worried that you had crossed a line neither of you was prepared to acknowledge, because there were some questions that only revealed their intimacy after they had already been spoken.

Then Michael answered quietly, “My friend.”

You lowered your eyes. Friend was such a simple word, but neither of you had used it before. You had been colleagues, competitors, annoyances, and, according to the press, enemies. Friendship had formed privately beneath those labels, growing during the few moments when neither of you felt obligated to perform for the other.

“Is that what we are?” you asked.

“I think so.”

“You don’t sound very sure.”

“I’ve never had a friend who insulted me this much.”

“Maybe your other friends aren’t honest enough.”

“Maybe.”

The warmth in his voice made you smile again. “All right then friend, you need to rest.”

“I am resting.” He protested before you argued back.

“Talking to me isn’t resting.”

“It is a little.”

The answer disarmed you completely. He had said it without flirtation or calculation, simply confessing that your presence, even delivered through a telephone line, made the night easier to endure. You heard him shift again, followed by another quiet breath of discomfort.

“Jackson?”

“I’m here.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m sore.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

Michael sighed. “I don’t know.” The honesty silenced you.

“Everybody keeps telling me how lucky I am,” he continued. “They keep saying it could’ve been worse, and I know that. I’m grateful it wasn’t worse.”

“But?”

“I keep seeing it.”

You drew the receiver closer to your ear. “Seeing what?”

“Everybody runnin’ toward me. The lights. I close my eyes, and it’s still bright.”

Your heart ached for him. The accident had ended hours ago, but some frightened part of him remained inside it, trapped beneath the lights and surrounded by people whose panic had told him that something terrible was happening before his own body could.

“Then don’t close them yet.”

“I’m tired.”

“You don’t have to sleep.”

“What am I supposed to do?”

You glanced toward the clock and realized that it was already nearing midnight.

“Talk to me.”

“About what?”

“Anything that isn’t today.”

He considered the suggestion before asking, “What were you doing before you saw the news?”

You looked toward the lyric sheets scattered across the carpet. “Trying to write.”

“Trying?”

“It wasn’t going very well.”

“Why?”

“Because everything sounded awful.”

“Sing it to me.”

Your eyes widened. “Absolutely not.”

“Why?”

“Because it isn’t finished.”

“So?”

“So, you’re not hearing it.”

“You said we could talk about anything.”

“Talking and singing are two different things.”

“Not to us.”

You became quiet because, whether he had meant to or not, Michael had touched upon an intimacy neither of you had acknowledged before. Music was the one language you had both spoken before learning how to explain yourselves in any other manner. It existed before the rivalry and before the industry had taught you to treat vulnerability as something dangerous.

“Come on,” he urged gently. “Just a little.”

“You’re using your injury to manipulate me, Jackson.”

“Is it working?”

“No.” You paused, looking down at the unfinished verse. “Maybe.”

You lifted one of the lyric sheets from the carpet and scanned it with growing uncertainty. “It’s rough.”

“I won’t judge it.”

“You judge everything.”

“Not tonight.”

Something about the promise made you give in. You balanced the receiver between your ear and shoulder before singing the first few lines quietly, your voice trembling slightly at the beginning—not from stage fright, but from the intimacy of being heard without any instruments, studio effects, or roaring audience to hide behind.

When you finished, Michael said nothing.

“Well?” you asked, suddenly regretting the entire thing.

“Do it again.”

“Why?”

“Because I liked it.”

“You don’t have to say that because you’re injured.”

“I’m still capable of havin’ an opinion.”

You sang it again, and this time Michael began humming beneath you, discovering a harmony before you had even reached the second line.

You stopped immediately. “What was that?”

“Nothin’.”

“You changed the melody.”

“Only a little.”

“You said you wouldn’t judge it.”

“I’m not judging. I’m helping.”

“You’re impossible, Jackson.”

“Sing it again.”

You did, and he joined you once more. The unfinished song gradually became something different between you, where Michael suggested holding one note longer and you argued that the change made it unnecessarily dramatic. When he reminded you that you had once accused him of being dramatic first, you changed the subject before he could enjoy winning the argument.

From there, the conversation wandered naturally. Music transformed into childhood memories, where you told him about the first time you performed in front of your family by standing upon a coffee table while everyone attempted not to laugh at your seriousness. Michael spoke about watching performers from the side of the stage when he was little, studying every movement before trying to recreate the routines alone.

You discussed the records you loved, the films you could watch repeatedly, and all the places you wished to visit without being recognized. You even spoke about the foods you missed eating without someone commenting on your body afterward, which was the sort of admission neither of you would have made during daylight.

The conversation moved without effort. Sometimes you spoke over one another, and sometimes neither of you spoke at all. You discovered that Michael did not mind silence; he appeared to settle into it whenever he no longer possessed the energy to speak, trusting that you would not mistake quietness for disinterest.

At some point after two in the morning, his breathing began to slow.

“Are you falling asleep?” you asked.

“No.”

“You took ten seconds to answer.”

“I was thinking.”

“About what?”

“Sleepin’.”

You smiled, unwillingly this time.. “Then go to sleep.”

He did not answer for several moments, and you wondered whether he had finally drifted away until his voice returned, quieter than before.

“Will you hang up?”

Your fingers stilled against the telephone cord. The question had been entirely absent of pride, exposing the fear beneath it before Michael had time to disguise it. He did not want to be left alone with the images waiting behind his closed eyes.

“Do you want me to?” you asked.

“No.”

Your chest tightened. “Then I won’t.”

“You don’t have to stay.”

“I know.”

“It could be a while.”

“I know that too.”

A tender silence passed between you as you pulled the blanket from the back of the chair and draped it over yourself.

“I’m not going anywhere, Jackson.”

The surname left your lips more softly than it ever had before. You usually used it to irritate him, withholding his first name because you knew he wanted to hear it and because teasing him allowed you to keep some emotional distance between you. That night, however, it no longer sounded dismissive. It sounded private, almost affectionate, and Michael seemed to recognize the difference.

“Okay,” he whispered.

Every few minutes, one of you began speaking again. Michael asked whether you believed people could know each other in another life, and you told him it was a strange question to ask after three in the morning. When he complained that your observation was not an answer, you admitted that you liked the idea of it—he did too.

You asked what he would have become if he had not been a performer. Michael listed several possibilities before deciding that none of them felt right, and when he asked the same question of you, you realized that you could not answer either. Music had taken so much from both of you, yet neither of you knew who you might have been without it.

“Maybe that’s the problem,” you said.

“What is?”

“We’ve spent so much time being what everybody needs us to be that we don’t know what’s left when they go home.”

Michael remained quiet for a long moment before asking, “Who are you when everybody goes home?”

You looked around your living room at the abandoned tea, the lyrics scattered across the carpet, and your bare feet curled beneath the blanket.

“I don’t know yet.”

“Me neither.”

“Maybe that’s okay.”

“You think so?”

“We’re still young.”

“Sometimes I don’t feel young.”

“Neither do I.” You rested your head against the chair, thinking about how strange it was that the world considered both of you old enough to carry entire careers while neither of you felt certain of who you were. “Maybe we can remind each other.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. We can do stupid things and talk until four in the morning when we both have schedules the next day.”

“You have something tomorrow?”

“Rehearsal.”

“You should’ve told me.”

“Why?”

“You need to sleep.”

You laughed softly. “You’re the one who asked me not to hang up.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“You heavily implied.”

“That isn’t the same.”

“Do you want me to go, Jackson?”

He answered without hesitation. “No.”

You smiled into the darkness. “Then stop worrying about my rehearsal.”

“You’ll be tired.”

“I’ll survive.”

“You’ll blame me.”

“Probably.”

“See?”

“But I won’t hang up.”

His voice softened. “Thank you.”

You closed your eyes, and the silence lasted for several minutes. You listened to him breathe until the panic that had controlled you earlier finally began to loosen. He was alive, he was safe, and although he was hurt, every slow inhale offered proof that he was healing.

On the other end of the telephone, Michael shifted faintly.

“Are you still there?” he murmured.

“Yes.”

“Just checking.”

You pulled the blanket more tightly around yourself. “I’m still here, Jackson.”

Outside the window, the dark sky gradually began to soften into a pale shade of blue. The city remained mostly quiet, suspended somewhere between night and morning, and you had no idea how many hours had passed since you first dialed the number.

“You called,” Michael said sleepily.

You smiled. “We established that hours ago, Jackson.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you saying it again?”

“Because I’m glad.”

Your heart stumbled, producing the same strange confusion it had whenever his words sounded too intimate to belong within the rivalry you had created. You turned toward the window even though there was no one in the room from whom you needed to hide your expression.

“Me too.”

His breathing evened not long afterward. You waited several minutes before speaking again, although your voice came out little more than a whisper.

“Jackson?” He didn’t answer. This time, you knew he had finally fallen asleep.

You should have hung up, but instead you remained in the chair with the receiver pressed gently against your ear, listening to the quiet proof that he was all right. You thought of the night at the club, the matchbook, and the challenge in his eyes when he told you not to make him regret trusting you.

Your thumb traced the telephone cord. “I won’t,” you whispered, knowing he could not hear you.

Or perhaps it was easier to say because he could not.

You would later understand that this was the night your rivalry truly began to lose its shape. There would still be arguments, jealousy, public denial, and enough stubbornness between you to cause months of unnecessary suffering, but the change had already occurred. Michael had permitted you to hear him frightened, and you had allowed him to know that the possibility of losing him frightened you too.

Morning light crept slowly across the living room, illuminating the discarded lyrics and forgotten cups of tea. For the first time since the news interrupted your evening, you could breathe without feeling the same terrible ache in your chest, because although the walls between you had not disappeared completely, sometime between midnight and sunrise, they had begun quietly falling apart.

© honeysmoonave. ❘ Definitely one of my favorite chapters I’ve wrote (◜ ㉨ ◝ʃƪ) my babies are finally getting around to each other ! I’ll be posting the next chapter tomorrow hehe! Get ready for the angst 🫣

🏷 : @gorgystarr, @daphne020708, @floralsightings, @swe3tyann, @18lkpeters, @valky4e, @justfaefaeee, @xxxercess, @sorasomi, @bbyjjunie, @rosiiee3, @iluvbeingdelulu4evaaa, @mochimommy2002, @cyb3rsw1rls, @kyumiiee, @ch3rrybl0ssomtree, @scknights, @lavendernightsky, @iris-xoxo-juhu, @bouncylikebouncyball, @lotuspetalss, @nata-de-coconuts, @slugstarzz, @michaeljacksonsonlylady, @inbredfawn, @popzeenat, @rlm-11

‎ . ݁⋆ ۶ৎ ݁˖ . ݁ jaafar’s growing facial hair all of a sudden.. {18+}

You stare at Jaafar’s face as he sits across from you on the couch, absentmindedly rubbing your feet while being completely focused on the tv.

Everything is fine until you notice the stubble on his face. He looks sexy with it obviously, but when did it happen?

Your brows scrunch tightly, confusion spread across your face as you stare at the sudden growth of dirt above his lips and chin. So without thinking, you speak.

“Baby…you been eating pussy?”

⋆˙⟡ she a bad lil' chick, a fly lil' chick. ⋆˙⟡ —

꒰ mean!wife!mother!black!fem reader ✗ bad era!father!michael꒱

꒰ HEADCANONS ꒱

LOCATION : NEVERLAND RANCH ୨୧

You gifted Michael two kids just like he asked. Two twin boys! Solan & Sean, both five years old. But they got on your last nerves when you thought you finally had some alone time—damn, you were wrong.

There was a walk-in closet in your shared bedroom with Michael that was HUGE. You would hurry and go pour yourself a glass of wine. You hid it in one of your heel shoe boxes, and put it back where it was before anyone saw you.

“sigh—Jesus.” You moved your hair out the way, tucking your fresh sew-in behind your ear as you sat down on the carpet.

       it all starts with an impromptu fan event. the crowd you'd stumbled upon was large and vast, such that you were confident upon looking at it that you'd find one of humanity's, or at least america's, champions in the thick of it. you were, according to your mother, to go in peace to the lands of men. to nurture america's citizens as though they were your sisters from themiscyra, to draw forth the truth, and to show all evil that the power of justice is both undeniable and undestroyable. it was a hefty mission, indeed, but as you were the fastest, strongest, and cleverest on the isle, you took the weight of the challenge with glee. besides, it's every girl's dream to go and explore, is it not?