Freakish (Dear Evan Hansen)

So Big, So Small

/Author's Note: I feel like shit from writing that chapter. I'm sorry./

TRIGGER WARNINGS: BLOOD, DEPRESSION, THOUGHTS OF SUICIDE

Monday was strange. It felt like something was missing, missing from everyone. Everyone knew what had happened to (Y/N). It was carving away everyone's sanity. Had they done something to cause this? Had they done something that led to her death? If so, what had they done?

This first person you could notice was Jared Kleinman. No hateful comments or asshole-remarks, just silence. He didn't talk, he didn't eat, he didn't do anything at all. He just sat, nodded his head in class, and tried to be respectful. It was like a trance had gone over him.

Jared didn't exactly make fun of (Y/N), but he didn't exactly help them either. Sure, he didn't feel like he was offending them, but now, he realized he could have been, and that's what scares him. He could have been responsible for their decision, and that's what he's scared about.

The next person was Evan Hansen. He seemed more nervous, more fidgety. The thought of (Y/N) brought him back to the previous Summer when he broke his arm when he fell. He kept getting flashbacks throughout the day. He tried not to panic around anyone, but it did happen sometimes. He felt guilty, he felt dirty. He felt like a root cause because he could have sparked the idea.

Evan always saw the teenager in school, usually alone or with Connor. Now there's a space at the lunch table where they once sat, empty and cold and unfeeling. He didn't dare go near it. That was (Y/N)'s spot, and (Y/N)'s spot only.

Next, Alana Beck. She seemed to be more productive today, like she needed to do things in wake of a fellow student's death. While most of the school was struggling, she was excelling. It was like she was scared of falling behind. She needed to stay ahead, she had to. She had to keep her brain as sharp as possible or she would succumb to her fears of failing. She kept working.

Fear of failing made her act like this. If she failed, she couldn't be the person she was. She couldn't do what she loved or behaved the way she did. She didn't want this event to cause a rip in her personality or her chances of succeeding in life instead of succumbing to the pain and failing like so many people often do.

Zoe Murphy was just all around sad. She never got to know (Y/N), even though the teen was dating her brother. It hurt her a little knowing that she never got to meet (Y/N), like someone who had been taken away too soon from life. Graduation was just a few weeks away, she had only a few weeks before she would have been free from the hell hole.

Zoe knew that no one liked the school, but she knew if (Y/N) was anything like Connor, then it was the worst for them. Relentless torment, judgmental eyes, much unneeded hate for just being themselves.

Finally, Connor Murphy. He took the biggest hit. He didn't eat, didn't sleep, didn't talk to anyone, didn't do anything. He locked the door of his room and cried, yelled at the wall thinking that all of it was his fault. It wasn't. It was society's fault for this.

Society is the reason we hate ourselves, it's the reason we hate each other. That self loathing feeling we get when we look in our mirrors and feel nothing but disgust and get a putrid taste in our mouths, it's because society has taught us that no one will ever be perfect and loved and appreciated and valued for who they really are.

Society tells us that we can't live who we love, that we can't be who we are, can't present ourselves as ourselves, and that we must conform and be like everyone else. It's taught us that boys can't love boys and girls can't love girls, and that a boy can't play with dolls and a girl can't play with trucks. It's taught us that if someone isn't a boy or a girl, they're retarded and autistic and should stop trying to be a special snowflake.

Society taught us that our mental issues don't exist and that we're being over dramatic. That our anxiety is just "nerves" and we need to get over them. That our depression is just being sad. That PTSD only happens in soldiers. That our eating disorders can easily be solved. That cutting is only for attention.

What Connor couldn't see was the fact that it wasn't his fault, and he didn't see that society was to blame for all this pain through everything.