With Michael

Chapter 42 - Birthday Surprises

3rd of January, 1996
Brooklyn and Janet are 29, Michael is 37

Michael: The past two months have been eventful.

After Paul and Linda left, Brooke fell into that awful place of depression again.

So I tried to help her get through this without breaking down myself.

She slowly accepted everything. By this time she was smiling again, she was laughing again. Real laughter.

We were in Rio. I was mostly filming 'They Don't Care About Us', but I took the chance to make this trip for her to relax.

And since tomorrow we're celebrating her birthday, along with the tenth anniversary for our engagement, I thought we could celebrate it away from home.

I got Cynthia and Janet to join us, so she would have company with her while I was roaming the streets of Rio.

We all really needed to shake off Chris's death, because the sadness just didn't leave.

The helicopter Brandon and I were in landed on top of our hotel after the long day of shooting.

My soon-to-be brother-in-law kept talking on the phone the whole way down the elevator.

Him and Janet are supposed to get married in April. It's just so exciting.
I'm the best man, of course, along with Brooke who's the maid of honor.

He smiled as he hung up, "We got little visitors waiting for us in your suite."

I raised an eyebrow.
"Okay, Mr. Muscle." I said, turning to the mirror to fix my hair.

"Mr. Muscle? Where did that name come from?" he cackled and rolled his eyes.

"Have you seen yourself? I get why Dunk always talks about your body with my wife."

"She does?" his eyes lit up.

I puked a little in my mouth before turning back to the mirror.

We heard a 'ding', and stepped out of the elevator.

Walking down to Brooklyn's and I's hotel room, I vaguely heard screams of joy from it. They belonged to little children and I immediately knew who joined our trip.

Jason and Katie were jumping up and down on our bed. Naturally, I put the biggest smile on when they noticed us.

"Da-da!" Kate's big eyes popped out when she saw Brandon.

He caught her when she jumped into his arms, hugging her tightly.

"Hey, uncle Mike." Jason said.

He put his hand up in the air, making me high-five him.

"How was the flight, buddy?" I asked and ruffled his hair.

"You know I don't like when you do that, uncle Mike," he crossed his arms and groaned. "Where's my mom?"

He seemed to be very irritated with everything.

"Ma-ma?" Kate turned to her father.

"I'll go see where the girls are. Let's go, Katie." Brandon mumbled, leaving with Kate.

As soon as he left I took a seat next to Jason.

"What's up?" I asked him.

"Nothing." he answered, not looking at me.

I swear, this kid was just like his aunt, his dad, and his grandfather. Stubborn.

"Come on," I nudged his shoulder. "Tell me."