Some of this is from the actual show.

Mention of suicide and self-harm and nudity. (but only a little of the last one)

My mom was sobbing into my dad who was looking down in shock. I wasn't, of course, glad he was dead, I wasn't glad Connor Murphy, my brother, was dead, but I didn't feel as bad as I should feel.  It didn't feel right being sad for a brother I never had. It just didn't feel right. He'd dragged me through the mud and now I was supposed to act like I was mourning for someone who didn't need it? Why?

We had to go look at him. Well, correction, I had to look at him. No one else could, someone had too. It's pretty traumatizing to look at your dead sibling. His skin was a milky grey and his mouth was open. He was now naked I guess, a cloth covering his chest to his feet. He had lines across his arm. deep ones, thin ones, ones in the shape of letters, numbers, shapes. Cuts. I was familiar with them, but you never get used to the feeling when you find out about them. I had seen his arms before, and these didn't look very new, so maybe he just hid them well. I had cut myself too. Once. Only once, when I was about 12 or 13. A thin line on my shoulder. It had faded, but if you look closely, you can see it. It was my family's fault, it was always theirs. I was escorted out.

A woman came in later. "Ma'am?" She spoke softly as my mom did to Connor during breakfast. She held out a letter. An elevator feeling swooped somewhere deep inside of me. A suicide note. It was all folded up, nice and neat. "It was found in your sons pocket." No one took it. I weakly smiled and stood up.

"I'll take it." She smiled back and handed me the little note.

My mom sniffed. "Why does it say, Zoe?"

"I'll show you in a second." I opened the note.

Dear Evan Hansen:- Evan? Evan Hansen? The kid Connor pushed down in the hallway? This just didn't... none of this did.

"Zoe, what does it say?"

"I-I haven't gotten far, but it's um... addressed to this kid Evan Hansen." I saw my mom and dad exchange glances. I kept reading.

Turns out this wasn't an amazing day after all... This isn't gonna be an amazing week or an amazing year, 'cause...'Cause why would it be? Oh I know, I know. Because there's Zoe. I stopped reading. Me?

And all my hope is... Pinned on Zoe. Poor guys fucking head is spinning. Me? All his hope is pinned on... me? No, that's not right... he hated me. He hated every aspect of me and nothing could change that and all he lived for was... me?

Who I don't even know and who doesn't know me, but you know. Maybe. Maybe if I did maybe if I could just talk to her, then maybe... Maybe nothing would be different at all. I wish everything was different. I wish I was part of... something. I wish that anything I said mattered to anyone... I mean, face it, would anyone even notice if I just- disappeared tomorrow? I didn't need to love him, that's not what he wants, but monster or not... This felt like something I would write too. Sure, I had Willa and Mallary and Caleb and everyone else... but no one... seemed to get it.

Sincerely,
your best and most dearest friend,

Me.

I set down the paper.

"What does it say?" My mom repeated.

"Just read it." I gave it to her.

---

"We have gathered here to mourn the death of Connor Murphy. He was, as my sources tell me, a fine man." I looked away. I was wearing this black dress with converse and it was raining lightly.  Mom was trying (and failing) to not cry. I cried too. It was hard not too, he was still my brother. The man spoke slowly like he was trying to nod us all to sleep. I couldn't hear what he was saying and I didn't care to be honest. My parents stepped forward, so I did too. We each shoveled in the dirt and then... it was over.

The thought of my brother rotting to bones in a wooden box was disgusting.

My mom and dad stayed away from each other, I didn't see either of them. So I did the only seemingly okay thing to do. I went to Willa's house.

Willa's house was this light blue at the end on a small street. I knocked on her door.

She opened it and crushed me in a hug. "OhmyGodIheardwhathappenedI'msosorryareyouokay?"

"Yep." I wheezed.

She gripped my arms. "You're still wearing black! Did you just come back from the funeral?! You should be with your family!" I smiled and shook my head.

"No, I shouldn't. Can I come in?"

Me and Willa watched some Harry Potter with her and her brother Jasper. I saw Willa looking at me and I could tell how she was thinking about how I had just come back from a funeral my brothers funeral and how I was acting normal and I was just watching a movie. I could see the liquid of questions building up behind weak barriers. And I didn't feel normal, but it didn't feel right to let go of everything. So I didn't say anything.

After a bit, I saw the barriers break.

"I don't get it! How can you just... sit there?" I looked at her. "I'm sorry! It's just that... you're fucking brother just died! How can you be so... casual!" I shook my head.

"I don't know." I laughed. "I don't know." We sat there for a minute. "I have to go. Sorry. Thanks."

---

Knock knock knock

I opened the door to reveal the Harrises standing there. They were carrying something in their hands. Chicken. Of course. Every so often the Harrises brought over just a whole bunch of chicken. It's pretty good too, but I don't think anyone was hungry.

"Hey..." Virginia Harris said. She had this silverly blond hair that was chopped to her shoulders. She had on this green thing that looked like a curtain as a dress. "So... we heard about Connor... we're so sorry... uh... here's some chicken, I hope you feel better!" She shoved it into my hands. I plastered on a smile. Her son Jamie, looked me up and down. He was this creepy kid, a Senior who definitely was into me. But he was tall and lanky with orange skin and tiny eyes and screamed at tiny freshman.

"Thanks. Have a good day!" I shut the door and sighed. I hadn't been to school for three days. I just wish I could leave, it couldn't stand it here any longer. My dad came downstairs, suppressed emotions in his eyes.

"Is that chicken? Did the Harris' come over? Mmm." It was easy to tell he was avoiding something.

"Dad? Is there something you want to say?" He sighed.

"Your mom wants to have Evan Hansen over for dinner tomorrow. We're going to speak with him now." Evan? Tomorrow? Now? And right on cue my mom came downstairs, face patched with makeup like glue holding together broken parts. She looked awful. Bags under her tear-streaked, makeup ridden eyes. Her hair was neat and her clothing was pressed. She looked so 'okay' that it looked horrible.

" Bye Zoe." She looked to dad. "You told her?" He nodded. "Okay well remember to look nice tomorrow." This time I nodded. And the door clicked and I was left alone.

—-
A light knocking on the door. I was the only one who heard it. There was Evan Hansen in a dress shirt looking like it was humanly possible to collapse in on one's self. I tried to smile but I have no idea how it came out. He looked even more nervous when it set in that it was me at the door. I noticed his cast. His cast. Connors name was scrawled across it in big black messy letters. I didn't realize how long we'd been there until my mom came to the door and hugged him and spoke to him, but none of it registered. I looked at him one last time and walked to the dining room. My seat was turned to the back of the kitchen, but it was now Evans. Connors seat stood vacated. No one spoke. No one seemed to eat. Well, except for my dad, who loved that chicken more than golfing so the bar was pretty high. Finally, my dad spoke, to which seemed to start a revelation.

"Would anyone else like more chicken?" Silence.

"I think your the only one with an appetite, Larry."

He tensed up. "The Harris's brought it over."

My mom looked to Evan. "Did Connor tell you about the Harris's?" Evan nodded quickly. I didn't believe him. I didn't believe any of this. "We used to go skiing, our family's."

"Connor loved skiing," Evan said. I looked toward him. His food was cut up, but untouched, though his glass of water was empty. He was sweating, that was easy to tell. He was nervous. And definitely lying.

"Connor hated skiing." I corrected him. He did. The was a ti,e where we went to this place in Massachusetts, Berkshire Hills. He never wanted to go. He and Jamie were supposed to get along as normal 12-year-olds should. But they hated each other. And they were both definitely not normal. Connor refused to ski and tried to run away. We found him ten feet past the entrance, still on skis.

"Well, right. That's what I meant. Connor loved... talking about how much he hated skiing." I dropped my eyelids to an appropriate level of 'are you serious'.

"So you guys, you-you hung out a lot?" My mom said.

"Pretty much." Evan avoided eye-contact.

"Where?" I wondered. My parents shot me looks. I chose to ignore them.

"Oh you mean, like, where did we..? Well, we mostly hung out at my house. I mean, sometimes we'd come to his house if nobody else was here. We would email a lot, though, mostly. So we wouldn't have to- he didn't want to always hang out in person, you know?" He said it all rambling, nervous words tumbling out, he couldn't stop. And it seemed like they didn't want him too.

"You know we looked through his emails. There aren't any from you." And we did. Emails from my mom telling him about new breathing techniques left ignored, messages from therapy and clinics. All of them unread or trashed.

"Well, no, of course, yeah, I mean, that's because he had a different account. A secret account. I should have said that before. That was probably very confusing."

"Why was it secret?" I said. I felt bad, of course I did, but I couldn't stop. Because this was not Connor Murphy.

"Just so that no one else could- it was more private, I guess, that way." But we never saw you anywhere at all with him.

My mom turned to my dad. "He knew you read his emails." But I did.

"Somebody had to be the bad guy." Interesting point. I turned to Evan, unthinking.

"The weird thing is, the only time I ever saw you and my brother together was when he shoved you at school last week." I didn't mean to say that. Not really, it just kinda came out. 

My mom snapped around. "He shoved you?!" 

"I um... I tripped!" That was it.

"No, I was there! I saw the whole thing! He pushed you. Hard." His gears were turning around and around.

"Oh. I remember now. That was a misunderstanding. Because the thing was, he didn't want us to talk at school, and I tried to talk to him at school. It wasn't that big a thing. It was my fault."

I asked the only thing that made sense. "Why didn't he want you to talk to him at school?"

"He didn't really want people to know we were friends. I guess he was embarrassed. A little."

"Why would he be embarrassed?" That voice. The same voice she used on my dead brother, her dead son four days ago.

"Um. I guess because he thought I was sort of, you know..." He trailed off.

"A nerd?" It slipped out. I never thought he was a nerd in any way. I just knew society did. I knew Connor did.

"Zoe!" My dad snapped at me. I looked away.

---

(Hey, so I'm leaving it here because I need to end it somewhere. Don't worry, I'm going to finish the dinner scene. I'm sorry if the second paragraph made you uncomfortable. 

Writer human out!)