The Neverland Inn : One-Shot Collection

NL Daughters

The door swung open that night. The figure looked around to check their surroundings. Michael watched them come in and for the first time since he was alive, his guard was down. His vertigo was telling him this person wasn't a stranger. Forces told him that he'd known them before death.  They stepped inside and softly, they held the handle as it shut, knowing it'd rattle. But how could they have known? They let down their hood and they scanned all four walls in the foyer. And they started up the steps. The moved a piece of stray bangs behind their ear and shivered to the coldness. It wasn't the house that was cold and they froze at the touch. Michael stood close but he immediately hid after seeing the person react. Michael didn't know what was happening. The person looked over their shoulder and looked him in the face. Before they could make him out, he fades into a blur and they turn their attention back. Only special kinds people could do that. To look at Michael, when they wanted to. People who could sense spirits was one of the things Michael was always afraid of now that he was gone. But now he wasn't afraid. He stayed behind in the hallways and he noticed they seemed to know exactly where they were headed. He followed but at a distance and kept watch. Their hair was short but features were very feminine. He didn't want to try to read their mind if they had a sixth sense. He kept his distance that way too. They unlocked the screen to their cellphone and used the flashlight. Down the  hallway, next to Michael's library, they stopped. Infront of the mural the girls saved. They reached into their cloak and Michael felt scared if they had spray paint. But they didn't have spray paint. They pulled a candle from the robe and Michael found himself curious to what they had planned.
They took a zippo lighter and lit the wick. Their face was revealed in the fires orange glow and Michael hid in his room at their identity.
'No. No. No. Not like this. Why is she here? Not now. Not like this.'
He said to himself
A tear hit the hardwood from the individual's cheek and there, they held their shoulders in a soft sob. They looked to the mural and tears began to pour down both cheeks.
A door opens and Dee looks out to see a person at the end of the hall. She sees them knelt down at the mural and she immediately hurries to Shan and Faith's room. All the girls awake and immediately see the sight. The person stops their sniffing and turns their head to see that they're spotted. They knock over the candle trying to flee and they start for the door. They wipe their face while running and the girls follow in pursuit. 
"We're proving Michael wrong tonight! This isn't happening again!" Faith shouted following and caught up to the figure close. After the last break in, the girls became more on a high alert. Faith hops onto their back making them begin to yell,
"Its me! It's me!" They sling Faith away and under the hood they were exposed. "Its me!"
They said again. There she stood. The girls all gasped as Paris Jackson removed her cloak and stood with glassy eyes from crying.
"Oh my god.." Faith began to apologize but Paris shakes her head.
"No. You're okay. I would've done the same. I'm sorry for intruding..."
The girls stand in disbelief and Shan says,
"Paris, you're not intruding. We told Janet to make sure you knew to come whenever you wished. Didn't she tell you?"
Paris looked to the ground and mumbled, "We're not on the best of terms right now.." she shrugged and held her arms,
"Matter of fact, I'm not on the best of terms with anything right now. That's why I felt it was finally time to come."
She gathers her things but Dee speaks up,
"You know. You don't have to leave. We're real sorry we interrupted your moment back there. We'll go back to bed."
Paris shakes her head and she says, "No really it's okay. I just needed to Um...to see something of daddy's. I remember seeing this on the internet and I wanted to see it for myself." She looked up to the mural again and led back up the way.
The girls sat down next to her as she seemed to be a little more comfortable. Michael was no where. He never even gave a cold draft. Paris sat with them and told her stories of Michael. Stories she loved the most with her father and showed all her memorial tattoos. Like show and tell in an ink gallery. Her short hair was a story too. So was her piercings. But all were sentimental stories, she never painted her body, 'just for fun'
"One day, we were riding in the car from this charity banquet in Santa Monica. And I was being a little kid, I didn't know I was giving him a hard time. The entire day there I begged him to get me one of the charity balloons from the lobby and he kept saying 'No, they aren't yours.' I was really being a brat and a handful. He was so stressed back then and there in the car, I asked him to play my 'Look at that' game. I'd tell him to look at something out the window and tell me what color it was."
The girls all giggled and Paris looked down to continue,
"But that game I never let him stop holding my hand. That was always my favorite too, the 'Daddy hold my hand' game. He was such a good man and I wish I could've told him."
She checks the time on her cellphone and the girls all stand to assume she needs to leave but Paris stands only to say outloud,
"Are you just gonna stand there all night?"
The girls look around confused. Paris was looking to a nearby wall and she said the words again. In what seemed like a blur, a mist came to view. Paris kept her fixated expression. She clenched her fists and there he appeared. Michael  stood exactly where she looked to and the girls pieced it together. They all begin to panic but Michael looks emotionless.
Paris turns to say, "He didn't know when I came here, but I'm able to see things other people can't see. I had a dream that my father stood in his mansion in the dark and that's why I came here."
"So...you can see Michael, even when he doesn't want to be seen?" Dee asks and Paris nodded,
"I can feel when a spirit is trying to hide. I've always been kinda weird like that. I guess I am a little strange. But I can't forget what my father's presence felt like."
Paris knew he was here. She could see him and he knew. Paris felt her lip quiver and she says,
"I don't want you to hide from me. Please don't hide."
Michael strolled closer and he says,
"I didn't want you to see me like this. I didn't want to upset you."
She looks to the ground and the tears begin to flood her face. She saw Michael begin to scan her up and down, making her begin to shield her tattoos. Michael shook his head easing,
"Paris..no.. don't."
She looks up and she sobs,
"I dreamt of this for a long time. I dreamt of only you for a year. A year daddy!"
She swipes her arm at him in a moment of angst and it passes right through his mist body. He feels helpless and he looks to the three in the back. They look to each other and Dee mouthes, "The illusion." Paris needed comfort and Michael could only give her that closure of solace in one way.
Michael closes his eyes and there he takes full fledged control of his form and counterfeits a heartbeat. He makes his skin warm and a pulse thriving. He lets the glow fades from his eyes and there he reached for his daughter. The girls all passed into the next room for their privacy and Paris reacts to his touch. He forms into the fatherly face she always knew and she looks to him and wipes her eyes. She looked unsure but he pulled her into his embrace. His heart beat in her ears falsely but it felt like her mist vivid of dreams. She smiled and for the first time in many years she held her father closer than ever. Feeling her broken heart heal even just a little.
"I always hoped that you'd come. I knew that you were special. I knew you'd be able to see me."
She takes a breath and says,
"Janet didn't want me to look for you. After you passed she insisted I needed to move on after I was finished mourning."
Michael nodded and he says,
"You know? The girls told me that after I passed the world changed somehow. I'm very neutral on how I see that. A lot of things have changed. But one very precious thing hasn't, and that is my daughter. You're still so beautiful and strong. I never want you to forget it. Believe it, embrace it."
She smiles and she hears the heavy groaning of the grandfather clock downstairs reading three in the morning. After the third bellow, Michael lets her go and pats her back, "So how did you get in here anyhow?"
She smiles and giggles, "I shimmied the lock with my credit card."
Michael scoffs and remarks,
"Now who taught you that?? Paris you're only 17!"
They both laugh and she says, "Daddy, I need to get home. Janet will kill me if she knows I'm out."
Michael looks to her astounded and says, "You snuck out too!?! Paris Katherine! You know bet-"
She hugs his neck mid sentence before leaving and she asks, "Don't be mad? Please?"
He hugs her back as his expression melts. Paris whispers, "And please don't tell me not to come back. Please?"
Michael gives in and he smiles.
"Like I could ever stand telling you no? Just make sure the girls know you're coming."
She smiles and begins to take her leave. Behind her, Michael stood watching her leave.
"Paris!" He interjects making her stop. She looks to him and waits for his words. Michael becomes lost in speech but says,
"Tell the boys. And my brothers. And my mother and father. That I love them. I still love them."
She nods and says soft, "I'll tell them I dreamt of you. A really good dream."
He nods and again she tries to leave before Michael continues, "Baby!"
She giggles to his stalling and he only says smiling, "I still love you. You still make me so proud. I love you and your brothers still so much."
She smiles wider and she reminds, "We still love you. We haven't forgotten, daddy. Not even blanket. He still won't cut his hair."
She lets herself laugh in the tender love moment and she breathes,
"I won't let them forget. I promise."
Michael nods and finally he lets her go. He blows a kiss as does she in return and the door shuts. Michael lets go of energy and there he fades back to translucency. He sits on the steps, low hearted. He brings his twined fingers to his lips and remembers the days with his children. On his wrist, jingled the bracelet of Paris' he wore when he passed. He traced his misty fingers across the false beads that read
'For Daddy.'
He smiled and he hears a bedroom door open in the upstairs. The girls all pace from the room and see Michael's apparition sitting. They keep quiet but find their way to his side. Letting the moment be silent, they made sure he wasn't alone. In the break, Michael adds,
"If I had tear ducts I'd be crying my eyes out." He goes further sighing,  "I'd cry until I had no more strength to do so. But no, I'm eternally numb."
Shan looks confused and she says, "Uh Mike. Do you think this is numbness?"
Faith speaks up and says, "Did you read that somewhere? So ghosts can't have feelings now??"

"Michael you just showed love for your daughter. That isn't numb. Sure maybe you can't cry. But you show emotion everyday." Dee says.
He sighs and only looks down. He holds back his hair but Dee keeps on, "This is emotion too. Are you going to be okay?"
He nodded but they could tell he needed time to heal his spector entity of a mind. Michael never dreamed his children would show up to Neverland after his death. He never wanted them too. He knew they'd only become upset. But tonight, Paris did change his mind. His only daughter, with a hidden talent to see what's hidden found him in his hiding. Michael coaxed the girls to return to bed with it being so late and one by one they did so. Michael was left by himself there, no form or apparition. Only his thoughts. In his shape, he traces a hand over his daughters bracelet one more time and found himself humming. He hummed the song he had dedicated to them more than ever.
'My daytime, my nightime my world. You are my life.'
The girl's phones all buzz at the same second and all groan to check the message tone that rang. An unknown number had sent a text. But reading the text they all smiled and knew just who it could be.
'I know its strange but I'm gonna ask you to take care of that ghostly weirdo for me. He's the best daddy I've had in the entire world. You guys keep him company, I can tell. Just don't stop believing-PJ.  Adios!'
Shan looks up confused and texts in a group message,
'So how'd she get our numbers?'
The girls text back replying,
'Maybe she is psychic!'
'I knew it. She's so cool!'