Jermaine Jackson - You Are Not Alone: Michael, Through a Brothers Eyes

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Copyright 2011 by Jermaine Jackson

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Touchstone Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

While every effort has been made to trace the owners of copyright material reproduced herein and secure permissions, the publishers would like to apologize for any omissions and will be pleased to incorporate missing acknowledgments in any future edition of this book.

The following images their respective owners: Insert p.1 (bottom right) UK Press/Press Association Images, (top left) Press Association Images, (top right) NPG.com.

The following images Harrison Funk: Insert (middle left, bottom). All other changes Jackson family collection.

Billie Jean 1987 Mijac Music (BMI). Words and music by Michael Joe Jackson; All rights administered by Warner/Chappell North America Ltd. Used by permission.

Smooth Criminal 1982 Mijac Music (BMI). Words and music by Michael Joe Jackson; All rights administered by Warner/Chappell North America Ltd. Used by permission.

Word To The Badd Copyright 1991 Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Ecaf Music, Green Skirt Music Inc., Black Stallion Music, Pebbitone Music, Warner Tamerlane Publishing Corp. All rights on behalf of Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC and Ecaf Music administered by Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

First Touchstone hardcover edition September 2011

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Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Control Number: #2011935899

ISBN 978-1-4516-5156-0
ISBN 978-1-4516-5159-1 (ebook)

I have built a monument more lasting than bronze and higher than the royal palace of the Pyramids. I shall not totally die, and a great part of me will live beyond death. I will keep growing, fresh with the praise of posterity.

Horace, 23 BC

YOU ARE NOT ALONE

THE BATHROOM MIRROR AT A LITTLE hotel in Santa Maria, California, is fogged with condensation, and there is so much steam from my morning shower that my reflection is rendered invisible. As I stand at the sink, dripping wet and wrapped in a towel, the opaque glass is now nothing but an inviting canvas of mist on which to log a thought I have been repeating in my head.

MICHAEL JACKSON 1,000% INNOCENT, I daub with my finger, ending with a period that I convert into a smiley-face. Believe in the happy ending.

I stare at this message and focus on a visualized outcome: victory, justice and vindication. It is March 10, 2005: day eleven of the courthouse circus that sees my brother accused of child molestation.

MICHAEL JACKSON 1,000% INNOCENT, I read again. I continue to stare at the top left corner of the mirror, watching the smiley-face start to run. Transfixed, I flash back to Michaels bathroom at the Hayvenhurst estate in Encino, outside Los Angeleshis home prior to Neverlandand know that I am mimicking in 2005 what he did in 1982. Back then, in the top left corner of his mirror, he took a black felt permanent markerto match the black marbleand scrawled: THRILLER! 100s MILLION SALES... SELL OUT STADIUMS.

Think it, see it, believe it, make it happen. Will it into reality, as taught to us in childhood by our mother, Katharine, and father, Joseph. You can do this... you can do this, I can hear Joseph insisting during early, scratchy rehearsals as the Jackson 5, were doing this over and over until you get it right. Think about it, say it, see yourself doing it, visualize it happening... and it will happen. Plant it in your head and focus with all your heart, Mother added, more gently. This was drilled into our young minds decades before positive-thinking became fashionable. Our minds are preprogrammed not to entertain doubt or half-heartedness.

Michael knew the scale of the breakthrough, innovation and success he desired as a solo artist with the Thriller album, so that one thought transcribed on his mirror was his positive starting point. Years after his move to Neverland, the permanence of the pens marker had flaked and the message appeared to have disappeared to the naked eye, yet it had left its imprint embedded in the glass, because each time that mirror fogged, the faintest outline of his words could still be seen, as if it were one of those secret codes written by a magic pen. Condensation and misted glass always remind me of Michaels written ambition.

From the eighties, nobody knew about a lot of what he created until its execution, but the idea or concept was written down somewhere he could see it daily, or recited into a voice recorder as a visualisation he could see or hear. He didnt share ideas because he didnt want anyone to interfere; he relied on mental strength for his focus. Between November 2003when he was arrested and chargedand this day in March 2005, hes needed that strength.

Awake at 4:30 a.m. each day of the trial, hes bracing himself, getting prepared, psyching himself up to withstand another day of ritual humiliation.

Yesterday, March 9, Gavin Arvizo, the 15-year-old boy being showcased as the victim, began his incredible testimony, going into graphic detail. I was seated behind Michael the whole time, as I have been since the start.

Outwardly, my brother projects a hardened image: detached, expressionless, almost cold. Inwardly, the bolted brackets that had been holding him together are snapping violently under pressure, one by one.

I look at my mirrored message now fading as the air rushes in, but the intent remains stark: Michael will be found innocent. I would carve it into my grandmothers gravestone if I could. Think it, see it, believe it, make it happen.

But whatever intent I put out there is not enough to remove the ache and worry we feel as a family. I find myself constantly reflecting, going back to a time when we believed Hollywood to be only a magical place; when we believed in the Yellow Brick Road.

I watch the local news on the television in my room, looking ahead to day 11 of the trial. I think of Michael at Neverland. The cars will be pulling up in the courtyard. He will have been up four hours, eaten breakfast on a silver tray in his room, alonestealing time on his ownbefore coming downstairs, giving himself 45 minutes between departure and arrival. His routine is clockwork, organized like some backstage itinerary.