September 4th

On Monday, September 4, 1972, "Ben" had not yet won its Golden Globe Award. It just started selling the 1,701,475 copies Motown noted. It was still climbing the Billboard Hot 100 to become Michael's first solo Number One. Most radio stations were too ambivalent about the song to put it in rotation. Its delicate orchestration and plaintive vocal weren't as disturbing as the "friend to call my own" Michael celebrates. That Ben's a killer rat, the title character of a cult horror sequel. Ben squeaks in varying octaves to his best friend, a misfit boy with a heart condition who understands. They plan their assault on mankind from the sewers. Michael saw it countless times. He'd wait through the credits to see "'Ben' sung by Michael Jackson."

Michael already loved rats. Mother Katherine remembers just how much. During a family dinner at a Los Angeles restaurant, she watched Michael sprinkle crumbs into his shirt pocket. Finally, she asked what he was doing: "At that moment a rat poked its head out of Michael's pocket, and I had my answer." According to her, Michael bred them: "I'd see big brown rats scurrying through the ivy and bushes from time to time. After a while, I was surprised to see the rats seemingly change color; some were partially white, a few totally white. Then it dawned on me that Michael was letting his white rats out into the yard, and they were mating with the wild rats." He had 30 in a cage in his bedroom. Sister LaToya remembers stuffing towels under her door at night to keep out the escapees. Michael kept them until he discovered they ate each other.

"Ben" changed the way Michael sang. It gave him the clout to voice his preference. He started recording his leads separately. Later his brothers would sing around them. Often, other anonymous voices were blended into the mix behind him. Still, Michael felt he deserved more respect. He started complaining to Motown mogul Berry Gordy. Producers "won't let me sing the song the way I want to," Michael grumbled. He remained disappointed: "I could have done so much more with what I was given, if they'd let me." He was worried, too, about his newly 14-year-old body changing. LaToya noticed he kept "trying to sing high." His mother knew Michael's more pressing concern: "the shame he felt about his acne." His mood dampened: "Michael was so embarrassed by the bumps on his face that he didn't want to leave the house. When he did, he kept his head down. Even when he talked to me, he couldn't look me in the face." She saw her new son "around the house photographing flowers and dewdrops ... delving into his own world."

"Ben" does, too, with repeat listening. One pass at the ballad's two minutes and 45 seconds doesn't do justice to its precociousness. With a first listen, it's a friendship hymn. Another take brings out its plea: "Ben, the two of us need look no more / We both found what we were looking for." Michael's stress on Ben and We almost stretch them into another syllable. It doesn't express intimacy as much as make its case. After all, his four-legged friend's still searching or retreating—"always running here and there." Ben still feels "not wanted anywhere." Soon, the background sessions singers stand out. Men's voices echo young Michael's. They're almost cloying after Michael confides, "I used to say 'I' and 'me' / Now it's 'us,' now it's 'we.'" By then the strings kick in to complement the dulcet plucks of guitar strings. It's the kind of sentimentality that Angelo Badalamenti perfected for Twin Peaks' score: both familiar and unseemly. Somehow, the 13-year-old in the recording booth knew how to sell the track's hothouse love. There's a solemn confidence that the beauty of affection comes from intention, not always actualization.

Shortly after "Ben"'s August release, Michael spies a teenage fan backstage. He and his brothers just played the Forum in Inglewood, California, 20 miles South from their new Encino home. She's dressed in high-waisted red slacks and a matching tube top decorated with home-made Jackson 5 buttons. J-5 logos dangle from her ears. Rhonda had all of their records. She couldn't believe she had front row seats, or that Jackie Jackson was really looking at her. Michael saw her back and braided hair. Sensing someone, she turned around to find "a cute little guy. He had big teeth, a flat, wide nose, a perfectly combed natural ... like any pretty 14-year-old black boy you'd find in the neighborhood somewhere." Michael noticed the piece of paper in her hands and warned, "I don't think you should meet him." Rhonda wondered if Michael understood what was on the note. "My brothers, sometimes they don't treat girls too good," he explained. "Don't go."

Rhonda had left her boyfriend and her sister. Now she was taking a cab to an apartment building in Encino. Jackie was inside wearing briefs and gym socks. She was struck by his "high speaking voice, which was such a contrast to his masculine features." He thanked her: "We could never make it without fans like you." When she left, a white limo arrived. Michael and Marlon bounded out. Onstage that night, Marlon played the congas for one of his first appearances as the sixth Jackson 5. Now he went in to find his brother. Michael looked at Rhonda with disappointment: "Did you just have sex with my brother?" Rhonda cried. "He [had] the saddest, most understanding eyes," she remembered. "Don't ever do that again, OK?" he worried. "Are you going to be all right?" She took his seat and rolled up the window. "By now, I was really sobbing. Then I noticed that Michael had tears in his eyes, too." As she was driven away, Rhonda "looked out the back window and the last thing I saw was Michael Jackson standing there waving good-bye to me."