Chapter Text
Connor Murphy was dead. That was the only thing that he knew for a fact.
Connor remembered the weight of the pills in his shaking hand the moment before, and sinking into the blackness the moment after. He remembered the certainty that he wasn’t going to be stopped or discovered by a family member. He remembered knowing that this was it.
He knew he was dead.
He did not know why he was now sitting in the middle of a completely white room. There weren’t any doors. It felt like he had been drawn into an art student’s reference book.
It wasn’t a hospital room. Even the ones without furniture or windows had some amount of human error (whether is was a stain on the floor or a dent in a wall). This place was devoid of any mistake. It was completely blank.
But it couldn’t be a hospital anyway, because that would meant that someone had saved him.
Briefly he considered that this was purgatory. That would make some sense. He wasn’t exactly pure enough for heaven, but he doubted he was fucked enough for hell.
When he was alive he hadn’t worried much about what happened after death. He’d never really listened to the shit his father’s church spewed, or the spiritual phases his mother had gone through. Connor had always thought that death would be like going to sleep and not waking up. He didn’t mind the afterlife only consisting of a soft blackness.
This, however, was unpleasant.
The space around him seemed to be radiating light. It made his head hurt. It made him confused that he could feel pain. Maybe this was hell after all.
Connor wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitting there. He found the whole not being aware of time thing very cliché. Which, now that he thought about it, would probably support the hell theory. This was Connor’s punishment for being a terrible son and brother: a boring cliché headache. For moment, Connor really did believe that he was going to be stuck like this for the rest of eternity.
That was why the tap on his shoulder startled him. He refused to admit that he sprang backwards, but at least he was able to stumble to his feet without tripping. His body felt like he had been sitting there for ages.
Standing where his back had been facing moments before was Alana Beck. Only, it wasn’t her. He knew it couldn’t be.
For one, he was fairly certain that Alana Beck wasn’t dead (and her dying the same time as him felt too coincidental to be real). Plus, if or when Alana Beck died she wouldn’t end up the same place as Connor.
And there was something off about the girl standing in front of him. It reminded Connor of looking at a staged photo of someone he saw regularly. He could recognize Alana’s face, the way she parted her hair. But there was something a little too presentational about her. He didn’t know Alana very well. In fact, he barely knew her, but he’d seen her enough to recognize that those weren’t her eyes. They were too frozen.
“You’re dead,” Not-Alana told him in the crystal clear voice the real Alana always spoke in.
“I know,” he uttered his first words since death. They came out smoothly. He expected his throat to be clogged and horse after the pills, but instead his voice was crisp.
“Good,” she grinned at him. It didn’t look right. “Then we can skip the freaking out bit.”
“What are you?” he asked before he could think of a better way to phrase that.
He was prepared for a lie. He was ready for her to tell him she was Alana, and he should know that since they’re such good ‘acquaintances.’ Instead her lips pursed into a very different sort of smile, and her eyes flickered over him. It took a second form him to realize that she wasn’t annoyed, she was impressed.
“You’re smarter than you look,” she told him. “I don’t know, maybe you could call me a ghost. I got demon once. Why don’t we go with that? I’m the closest thing to a demon you’ll meet.”
“So this is hell?" he asked.
“No,” she shook her head. Her voice was light. “It’s far from it.”
“Okay,” Connor took this in. “Um, why do you look like Alana Beck?”
“I don’t have to,” she seemed slightly offended at the question.
Connor wondered if she was asked pointless things a lot. Did she talk to people a lot? He can’t imagine the dead having anything but questions.
“I figured this form would be easiest for you to cope with,” she continued. “If you want I can change to your sister—”
“No,” he said too quickly. He didn’t want to see Zoe, even if it was just an image of her. And he did not want to hear her voice, even if it was only an imitation.
“Okay, then,” Not-Alana nodded matter-of-factly. “We can get on to business.”
“Business?” Connor echoed.
“Connor Murphy, welcome to your second chance,” she announced.
“What?” he blinked at her.
“You’re getting the chance to live again,” she explained. “If you can save someone else."
"What I don’t want to live?” Connor asked.
He had ended his life for a reason. He didn’t want a do-over where he knew he’d only screw everything up more. He didn’t want to feel pain anymore. That’s what death was supposed to be. It wasn’t supposed to be sitting in a white room talking to a demon in the form of someone he knew from high school.
“That’s not for you to decide,” she informed him.
“I killed myself,” he stated. “I chose to die.”
“Humans always think that life and death is in their hands,” she sighed, a knowing look passing over her face. “It never really is.”
“I don’t want to save anyone,” Connor held his ground. He just wanted an end.
She regarded him cooly before asking: “Do you want to be a murderer?”
“What?”
“If you do nothing, he will die.” She spoke this as if she was talking about something simple. “You don’t want that on your conscience when you move on.”
He. So Connor wasn’t being asked to save just anybody, there was a specific person Not-Alana had in mind. Connor didn’t like this. He couldn’t save himself, how was he supposed to help someone else?
“Who?” he asked, even though it probably would have been smarter not to know the name of the person he was about to accidentally kill.
“You don’t know how this works yet,” she crossed her arms, but smiled as warmly as he figured was possible for her. “You’ll get the hang of it. I can’t tell you any more.”
“You didn’t tell me anything,” he started.
She took a step closer to him.
“You need to go to sleep now,” she said levelly. She reached her arm out to him.
“Don’t fucking touch me—”
He didn’t stumble backward in time. The second her cool palm made contact with his forehead he was slipping from the white room into darkness. But this time he knew the darkness wasn’t going to stick.
Connor woke up on his feet.
He was standing in the middle of a zoo. For a second it was just disorienting. One moment he was falling, the next he was on his feet. He missed the darkness as soon as it was gone. The world around him was too bright, loud, and real.
Hesitantly, he stepped forward, barely able to catch himself from stumbling. He felt dizzy. Maybe that was the fault of the pills. He wasn’t entirely sure what they did to him. He’d just hoped it would be more permanent than it was turning out to be.
Connor hadn’t been to a zoo since he was in elementary school. It was crowded. He didn’t realize this many people chose to spend their weekends in the hot sun, surrounded by other sweaty people and the smell of animals. He couldn't see the enjoyment.
Connor started walking, his feet dragging on the dirty cement. He didn’t understand what he was doing here. How was he supposed to figure out how to save the life of someone who’s name he didn’t even know?
He scanned the crowd for Not-Alana, but his eyes couldn’t find her. He’d been dropped in the middle of a fucking zoo with little explanation and no instruction.
“What am I supposed to do?” He demanded at the air.
Wincing, Connor realized that maybe shouting into a crowd of people wasn’t the best way to get answers. Even if Not-Alana was spying on him, he doubted she was going to lend a hand after what she’d said before knocking him out. So all he’d really accomplished was making everyone standing remotely near him think he was crazy.
Only, none of the people around him spared a glance.
Connor was used to not being noticed by others, but this was different. This wasn’t a crowd of people pointedly ignoring him. It was as if—
“They can’t see me,” Connor spoke loudly. The lack of reaction from everyone around him proved his theory. Well, that only made everything ten times harder.
He kept walking.
Aside from being able to slip past people without feeling eyes on his back, this didn’t feel much different than life. The sun was still irritatingly bright, and the cheerful voices of others were still gnawing at his nerves. He still hated strangers. He hated the sunny smiles on their overly cheerful faces.
Everything about this place was just too obnoxiously happy. There were too many picture perfect families and couples. It was like he’d been zapped into a painting of a spoiled child’s understanding of reality.
Except for the couple yelling at each other next to a water fountain.
Connor wasn’t the type of person to eavesdrop. Unless if had to do with his parents of Zoe, he usually kept the hell out of other people’s business. However, he was invisible and these were the only two in the entire area that weren’t grinning like idiots. Not seeing what was going on would be a waste.
It took him a second to notice the kid standing behind the woman’s legs, and staring up at his parents with wide eyes. He looked scared. Connor wondered if either of the pair were violent, or if the kid just didn’t like the shouting. Judging by the way he was inching backwards, Connor was going to go with the later.
He pitied the boy. Even if the five-year-old couldn’t understand whatever his parents were yelling about, Connor was certain that he’d be able to see that his family was the only one not smiling. Connor knew that feeling all too well.
He watched the kid stumble away, unnoticed by the two adults, before breaking into a run. He didn’t know that toddlers could move that fast. But, without fulling realizing what he was doing, Connor followed.
Dodging the people littering the sidewalk slowed him down. Connor vaguely wondered what would happen if he tried to plow through them, but decided to save knocking unsuspecting zoo patrons on their asses for after he’d caught up with the little boy. He wasn’t entirely sure why he was doing this. It was almost like his feet were acting on their own accord.
What was he supposed to do when he found the kid? He was an invisible ghost, he couldn’t do anything.
The word ghost felt like the only way to describe his existence right now. For most of his life he hadn’t believed in spirits, or anything remotely supernatural. Acknowledging anything like that just felt like another connection to whatever weird spirituality phase his mom was sucked into. But what else should he call this?
The kid stopped when the crowd thinned out and the cement gave over to a grassy area. Connor watched him slump under a tree, pulling his knees to his chest. It made him look even smaller. As Connor approached, he realized the kid was crying.
What now? It wasn’t like Connor could go get his parents or a security guard. All he could do was stand there and watch the kid cry.
Hesitantly, he sat down next to the tree. Usually when small children cried the sound was shrill. It broke through the air in a harsh demand for attention. This kid’s tears were silent. He wasn’t crying for the reaction of others, he was crying because he was hurt. Connor had never witnessed this in someone so young. It was sad.
Eventually the kid lifted his gaze up. Connor watched his eyes scan the unfamiliar surroundings he’d darted to moments before. He stopped on Connor.
That was weird.
“Where am I?” the kid’s small voice whispered.
That was weirder.
“You can see me?” Connor blurted.
The kid was probably too young to realize how odd of a question that was, because he just nodded his head. Why could a toddler see him and no one else?
There were still tears in the kid’s eyes. He was looking to Connor for some sort of answer. Connor guessed he seem like an adult in comparison. Maybe the kid knew that he’d been sitting there the whole time.
“Do you want to find your parents?” Connor asked him.
He nodded again. Connor stood up, but the kid didn’t move. He just kept staring at Connor with enormous brown eyes.
“Come on,” Connor held out his hand. Slowly the kid grabbed onto his fingers, using Connor to pull himself up.
Connor led him back the way they came. He doubted that the parents were still at the water fountain. He wasn’t sure how long they’d been sitting under the tree, but he was certain that even the most distracted parents would have noticed their child’s absence by now. Connor also doubted that they’d be able to find the couple by just walking around. The kid would probably start crying before they were even close.
They kept walking until Connor spotted a security guard. He stopped, and kneeled down to talk to the toddler who was still clutching his hand.
“Hey, you see that guy?” Connor made his voice as gentle as he could. He’d never ben good at talking to children.
“Yes,” the kid stated, his gaze following where Connor pointed.
“He’s like a police man,” Connor didn’t know how else to explain security guard to a five-year-old. “Go tell him you don’t know where your parents are, he can find them for you.”
The kid’s face scrunched up.
“Can you?” he asked.
“No,” Connor answered.
“Why?”
The truth wasn’t the most believable answer, but it wasn’t like Connor was talking to someone old enough to question his logic.
“I’m invisible,” he stated.
“No,” the child informed him.
“Yes, I am,” Connor said back.
“I see you,” the kid pointed out.
Okay, that was a reasonable argument. Connor considered trying to show the kid that the passers by thought he was talking to the air, but there was the chance that would freak him out.
“That’s because you’re special,” Connor told him slowly. The kid just blinked at him, so he went on. “Only you can see me. The thing is, that guy isn’t special, but he’s nice and he’s gonna want to help you.”
The kid looked at the security guard again, then back at Connor.
“Do I have to?” he asked.
“Do you want to find your parents?” Connor asked him, his voice nearing irritation.
“Mommy can find me,” he decided.
“Look,” Connor forced himself to not sound frustrated. “All you have to do is tell him your name and that you’re lost.”
“I’m not supposed to talk to strangers,” the kid chirped.
“You’re talking to me,” Connor reminded him.
“I know.”
“Oh my god,” he muttered through his teeth. He gave the kid a pleading look. “Please? You’re mom is probably worried.”
That seemed to get some effect. Connor wondered how many times younger him would have stopped doing something stupid or annoying because he knew it would make his mother upset.
“Can you come too?” the kid asked in a small voice.
“Yeah,” Connor nodded. “Yeah, sure.”
Connor walked next to the kid as he made his way to the security guard, who looked concerned the second he noticed the five-year-old by himself. The kid ended up not having to talk at all. When the security guard asked where his parents were, all he had to do was shake his head. Connor didn’t understand why it had been so easy for this boy to speak to him and not an adult who had a far more trust worthy appearance. Maybe it was because Connor had sat under the tree near him.
The kid glanced worriedly at Connor when the security guard began to lead him to the help desk. Connor nodded, then realized he didn’t have to nonverbally communicate that he was going to follow.
“Right behind you,” he said in a voice he hoped was assuring.
The security guard pointed out the different animals they passed on the way to the help desk. Connor figured that this was in an attempt to cheer the kid up, and it worked for the most part. He saw a small smile creep onto the kids lips, and he did look less scared than he had when he realized he didn’t know where he was.
The woman at the help desk had a sickly sweet voice, but the boy didn’t seem to mind. The security guard explained that he’d wandered away from his parents and they’d need to announce that he’d been found and where his parents should meet them. The woman asked the kid for his full name. He looked at Connor, who nodded again.
“Evan Hansen.”
“What?” Connor was glad he was invisible.
“Evan Hansen,” the kid said again, his eyes darting to Connor with fear he’d done something wrong. Connor quickly plastered a fake smile on his face. He couldn’t deal with this boy—with Evan Hansen—crying at his direction right now.
This couldn’t be the same person he’d gone to school with. The person he’d pushed in the hall, and who’s weird letter he’d taken. That was impossible. It had to just been some weird coincidence.
Only, now that Connor was thinking about it, there was something familiar in this kid’s face. He remembered Evan Hansen’s eye color. If he tried very hard, he could remember Evan Hansen’s eyes. They were brown, and he’d seen them go very wide when he yelled at him. His eyes looked exactly like this child’s.
Barely three minutes after the announcement had been made over the zoo’s speaker, Evan’s parents were running toward them. Well, the mother was running, the father was following at a significantly slower pace. Connor knew what it looked like when parents were a unit, and what two people being forced together by a mistake they’d made looked like. He knew his own parents were rarely on the same page, but these two looked like they were on entirely different books.
Connor watched Evan hug his mother. She was crying. He wondered how scary it must have been for her, even if her son had only been lost for fifteen minutes.
The father listened to a lecture from the security guard, while the mother made Evan promise he would never do anything like that to her again. He only nodded. She looked guilty. She wasn’t the type of parent to blame her kid for a mistake. Connor imagined she was mentally berating herself for taking her eyes off of him.
The ordeal was a little too much. Connor didn’t need or want to be watching it. Silently, he waved at the kid before retreating into the crowd. He didn’t exactly know what to do now, so he settled for just walking.
Not knowing ended up not to be so big of a problem. One second he was trying to get past a crowd of overly excited families, the next he felt a rush of tiredness pour into him.
In less than a second, his vision was blurring and then fading into darkness.