Carousel {Michael Jackson Love Story} [with NEW, additional chapter 6]

Chapter 1 - Consulate General

Carefully slipping my hand into his shirt, I touched the cloth of the t-shirt over his stomach, heated by the body underneath. The music drifted away from me. Over the rushing in my ears, I loudly heard his fast, shallow breaths coming through parted lips, his stomach under my hand rising and falling in time.

Then I moved into him, my right hand sliding around his waist, diving deep into his clothes, pulling the left hem of his shirt from his pants in the process. I felt him letting go of the horse behind me. His eye lids flickered shut. His mouth was dry both from arousal and from drinking wine; he still tasted of it, sweet and bitter. Arms closed around me.

And then I pulled him down with me.

***

I'd never been one of the party people, not during school and not during university, either. But being a Junior Lawyer, stuck somewhere between the Bar Exam and the Bench Exam, the parties are the best thing. You've made it. You've passed the Bar Exam. You stumble down the stone steps of court, and for a while you are so high, you think it just can't get better than this and nothing will ever matter to you again. For years you have been studying, preparing, worrying, and suddenly you are somebody, a young academic in the second half of your twenties with the world at your fingertips. In the morning you've been nothing but a nerdy student, and in the afternoon police officers click their heels when you as much as look at them funny. That's a turn of events to set anyone's head spinning.

Though having already worked in court for a few months and having spent the same amount of time with the prosecution, that was still the state of mind in which I came to the West-German Consulate General in Los Angeles, a few months in an attorney's office in Japan fixed for a follow-up, the booked ticket already in my pocket. I had spent a year in university in Japan and was looking forward to returning to the country. LA was the icing on the cake; summer, sunshine, a few months away from court in a place where nobody knew your name. It was the last time before the seriousness of the legal profession would require a more settled behaviour, and my colleague Christina and I were determined to make the very best of it. The Consulate didn't really have much work for lawyers anyway. So we set to working the parties whenever an official invitation was passed down to us.

One of the best parties was a hotel opening on a Friday night. The food was superb, when your champagne glass was empty you were given a new one, and the music was live. We didn't know anyone, but lawyers are good at keep-talking-when-you-haven't-got-a-clue, and by the time most of the food had been eaten and the music had become funkier, we had found ourselves a fine group of party people consisting of the hotel executive, the engineer and the team of interior designers from Hawaii, all men in their late thirties safe for one lady. We sat around a table in the hotel bar dinking Veuve Clicquot, talking, laughing and clearly being up to no good. The party was like a bubble; local politicians, diplomats, artists, money, and two little lawyers who were having a ball - or were at least trying their very best to.

One of the artists present was Michael Jackson. He merged with the bubble, stood talking with one group of people, then with another. My colleague didn't show any interest in him, though I pointed him out to her. "He's weird," she said. "He's no fun."

Granted, he did stand around holding on to a glass of what might have been orange juice, clearly not being one of the party folks. But when the Champagne bottle at our table was empty, and I noticed him standing alone for a moment - watching the band, maybe - I offered to get a new one from the bar. The orange labelled bottle in hand I casually walked over to him.

"Hello, good evening. How are you?"

"I'm fine," he smiled friendly. "And you?"

"Oh, I'm great! It's a wonderful party, a pleasure to be here." I paused, then, "I'm sorry! My name is Anna. I'm from the West-German Consulate General." That was always the door opener.