You would think, wouldn't you, in the most prestigious mansions in L.A. that the furnishings would reflect the obscene amount of money the King has paid? Not that I am suggesting it should be Louis 14th or anything like that, but you would think it would at least be fine antique, not the kind of junk they've thrown in here.
Take this mirror for example; it might look nice and ornate, but I reckon if you stripped it down, all that fancy scroll-work would turn out to be simply moulded plaster covered in a thin layer of cheap gold paint. It might well have come from Wallmart!
And it's not even as if it's a good mirror, it has some rough crazed patches and it distorts the face – at least it does something horrible to mine – I know for a fact I didn't look that old in my own mirror at home; my eyes didn't look quite so world-weary and tired, my skin didn't have that pallid grey tinge . . .
No, this place is a long way short of a palace; it is hardly fit for the King.
A sudden sound, a sudden movement out of the corner of my eye – Christ he's still awake. Despite everything I gave him he is still awake, damn it. I will have to go back.
The Hippocratic oath I took all those years ago pledged me to help mankind, and I am employed at great expense to help the King, but with the excessive demands he makes on me I am constantly forced to bend to breaking point the fundamental principle of medicine: 'First do no harm'.
I pick up my small black leather bag and make my way past the monitor towards the master bedroom. The King looks so small in that huge bed; his black hair is messed across the pillow where he has tossed and turned continuously since my last call. His eyes, sunken pits of despair, follow my movements as I cross the large room to his bedside. He is so dreadfully tired . . . he does not have an ounce of mental or physical energy left in him. He is exhausted, yet still he cannot sleep.
It is exactly the same routine day after day; the constant demands of the work is sucking the life force out of him and night after night it is only my chemical release which can pluck him from this troubled world for a few precious but restless hours.
My fingers are trembling as I draw back the plunger on the syringe; the cocktail of drugs it contains is frighteningly powerful; we have long since left behind the usual remedies as each in turn has failed to work – only Propofol and Benzodiazepine have any effect at all now.
I struggle to find a vein in his emaciated body, but failure is never an option and with determination I finally locate a suitable place and empty the syringe into his arm. He sinks back onto the bed, thanks me politely and closes his eyes. With luck I should have a few hours of rest myself now.
I walk back to my room. I walk past the mirror. The man in the mirror is walking beside me, matching me step for step. I stop and turn. The man in the mirror turns to face me. He looks even more drawn than the last time; the mirror must be working its malicious Wallmart magic on him. It is hard to believe it is the same man who gazed back at me a few short weeks ago when the contract began. I smile at him, but the grimace the man returns displays no warmth, no humour, no humanity.
The man in the mirror is me and I am him. He is but my own reflection in a thin sliver of silver. But he doesn't look like me, he looks more as if he is a lifelike body-double . . . a doppelganger trained to dress like me, to walk like me, to mimic every movement that I make in order to create the illusion. But I am out here and he is in there, safe from the world behind his protective layer of glass. I shake the thought from my mind. I leave the man to his own devices and seek out my own small room.
Beside the CCTV monitor is my nightly medicine – a bottle of 21 yr old Courvoisier and a large glass. I always used to think that brandy glasses were that peculiar shape and that great size to allow the spirit to warm in the palms of the hands in order to fully appreciate the bouquet, but I know now that the reason the glass is so large is to accommodate a large measure of the precious medicine.
I pour. It sloshes around the bowl with a happy tinkly sound; the alcohol vapour condenses and runs back down into the amber liquid. I take a good deal more than a 5ml plastic spoonful of my medicine. I swallow, coughing as the fire burns my throat, and settle back into the chair where the troubles of the day slowly begin to evaporate.
Sometime later I emerge from a bizarre dream and for a few moments I am disorientated, but I have been here before and my tired brain quickly awakes to full capacity. Ignoring the leaden feeling behind my eyes I check my watch. It is far into the morning – much too far into the morning – I am late and I am needed.
The man in the mirror watches as I hurry down the corridor towards the bedroom; his face is contorted with terror; he seems to know something terrible that I do not. But there is no time; the King will need to be awake and I must ignore the man and hurry to him.
But I don't enter the room as I usually do, instead a feeling of deep dread stops me at the door. With my fingers wrapped around the fake crystal glass of the door handle I stare into the room like an anxious parent checking on a sleeping infant. I strain my ears for the faint sound of his breathing, I strain my eyes for the slightest rise and fall of his chest, but there is none. A soft gasp escapes my lips. Somehow I knew what I would find.
The King is gone . . . he is finished and I am surely finished with him. My career is finished, my life as I knew it is totally destroyed.
Very soon, as the whole world wakes from its slumbers, they will know; my name will be emblazoned in huge black letters across their front pages; my name will scroll in endless 'Breaking News' ticker tape across the bottoms of their screens.
The concert will be cancelled. Like a pack of starving wolves they will come for me: the hundreds of artists and artistes who have slaved to make the production work; the thousands who have dreamed the dream but all they will ever see now is their ticket money returned. And then there were the countless millions around the world who simply loved the man.
The King is dead and I have killed him. In years to come they will forget my name, I will simply be known as the doctor who killed Michael Jackson.
The King is dead . . .
Long live the . . .
But, no, there is no King to follow him, no Prince waiting in the wings to inherit his realm. He was unique. There will be no other to match him.
The professional part of me makes the necessary phone call; there is no other choice left.
The rest of me staggers like a drunken man down the corridor towards the sanctuary of my own room.
I pass in front of the mirror.
The man in the mirror is staring back at me; his smug expression says it all: they will come for me, but when they take me he will be safe behind his glass.
Then suddenly I have it – the words of the song the King was rehearsing just a few hours before, but more like a lifetime ago, have come back to haunt me – the words that are the answer to my dilemma.
I smile inwardly, but I cannot allow the man in the mirror to see me smile, he must not guess what is in my mind.
I take a firm grip on the fake gold Wallmart scrollwork and close my eyes. I pull myself forwards until my face is touching the mirror . . . until my body is pressed against the cold glass . . . cold as ice . . . impenetrable . . .
But then I give one last desperate heave and I slide through the surface, through the thin transparent layer and into the silver beyond.
I turn around and there before me, in the corridor, with a terrified expression on his face he stands. I see the blue uniform approaching him; the black gloved hand settling firmly upon his shoulder. They have come for him . . .
But I am safe in the mirror. Once they have taken him away they will no longer be able to see me. I will be invisible to the world.
They can take him wherever they want and do with him whatever they want . . . but they won't ever be able to take me – they can never get to me in here . . .
Footnote:
Michael Jackson died on 25th June 2009 after suffering cardiac arrest, only a month before his series of fifty 'This Is It!' concerts were due to commence.
Dr Conrad Murray was convicted of his involuntary manslaughter on 7th November 2011 and sentenced to 4 yrs imprisonment.
He was released on 28th October 2013.