Wait For You - 'Look After You' Sequel - A Michael Jackson Fanfiction

Chapter 10

Michael
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The door clicked shut behind them, and for a long moment, I didn't move.

The sound of it closing echoed through the room, then faded into silence.

I stood there, staring at the door like it might open again. Like she might walk back in and say something else, anything else.

But the longer I stared, the more I realized she was really gone..

Her voice still lingered in my head, calm but uneven, soft but steady. I could still see the look in her eyes when she told me the truth about that night, when she said she thought I was dead.

That she'd turned the gun on herself.
That she almost pulled the trigger.

My stomach twisted.

I turned away, dragging a hand through my hair. The office felt smaller now, claustrophobic. Every breath felt heavy.

I walked toward the desk, the floorboards creaking under my steps, and sank down into the chair like my body had finally decided to give up.

The weight in my chest was something I couldn't name. Not anger. Not grief. Something deeper.

For a second, I just sat there staring at nothing, listening to the faint hum of the air conditioner and the steady beat of my pulse.

Then I reached for my wallet.

It was worn to hell, the edges soft from years of being handled. I opened it slowly, the motion automatic.

The photo was still there, folded behind a few bills.

I pulled it out carefully.

It was small, about the size of a playing card. The edges were frayed, the color almost completely gone.

I'd looked at it so many times over the years that the paper had started to thin. Her face was barely visible now, just a faint outline, a ghost of her smile, her hair, the soft shape of her eyes.

I stared at it, my throat tightening.

That photo had been my anchor for years. When I thought she was gone, it was all I had left, proof she'd been real, once.

That she'd laughed, breathed, loved me.
But now, sitting here, it felt like I'd been clinging to a ghost while the real thing had still been out there somewhere alive, breathing, changing.

The girl in that photo was gone.

The woman who'd stood in front of me earlier...she wasn't some memory I could hold onto.

She was something else now.

Harder. Sharper. Real.

And maybe that's what hurt the most.

I set the photo down on the desk, face-up, though there wasn't much left to see.

Then I reached for the drawer on my right. I hadn't opened it in years, but my hands knew the motion.

Inside, tucked beneath a stack of old papers and a half-empty pack of cigarettes, was the gun.

The same one from that night.

The metal was dull now, worn smooth from age and time.

I picked it up slowly, turning it over in my hands. It was heavier than I remembered.

For years, I'd told myself I kept it because I couldn't throw away what killed her.

But now I knew better.