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sotheywrotestories · 6 years

Text

Gotta Love to Hate

Request;

ok sooo can you do like a sherlock x reader where shes bipolar? I swear ive searched high and low for any good reader inserts with a bipolar reader but theres almost none :(( soyeah. I dont really mean like the classic “he comforts her uwu” but more like her having..a psychotic episode? If thats too much u can just do an ambiguously mentally ill reader who has the same empathy issues as him and she gets him u know. Anyway do either!! Love u x

-Nonnie

Pairings; Sherlock x Reader

Warnings; Psychotic episode, arguing, bipolar disorder, some curse words

A/N: I’ve never dealt with a psychotic breakdown, nor am I trying to romanticize them.

Sherlock knew when he first started dating (Y/N) that it would be a challenge. With early symptoms of psychosis, paired with a tragic history, Sherlock knew that not everything would be easy.

Early in the relationship, (Y/N) appeared to have it under control. She seemed stable with an occasional mental breakdown, but nothing major. Sometimes having major mood swings, but Sherlock credited that to her being bipolar.

However, lately, Sherlock has noticed some changes.

His first concern was her lack of sleep. Normally, she would sleep next to him. Not quite cuddling, but close enough to know he was there. Now, there have been countless times where Sherlock has woken up to find her gone, searching for her until discovering her in an armchair with a book. On top of that, he noticed her getting irritated at his attempts to bring her back to bed, in most cases, downright refusing to go to bed in the end.

Of course, Sherlock had looked all into bipolar disorders when he met (Y/N), knowing full well that these could be symptoms of a psychotic episode, but he kept quiet. Knowing that asking would only detonate the bomb that surely was ticking in her head.

“There is flour, everywhere!” John laughed. “Look at what you’ve done!”

“Me? This is you!” (Y/N) laughed as well.

“What’s going on?” Sherlock smiled, walking into the kitchen.

“Oh, nothing,” (Y/N)’s smile melted off her face. “I’m going to go take a nap.”

(Y/N) brushed past Sherlock and slammed herself in their room.

Over the next few days, Sherlock noticed her bright and cheery disposition, especially the day her and John baked all day. It wasn’t uncommon for her to go from happy to emotionless, this was normal. Sherlock let out a sigh of relief, hopeful that the worst had passed.

It hadn’t.

Now, Sherlock was aware of (Y/N) being bipolar, but never did he think she would have an actual psychotic break.

John noticed it first. The way (Y/N) talked to people who weren’t there...the strange thoughts she shared with John and Sherlock...things weren’t adding up.

Sherlock decided it was necessary to approach the subject.

“(Y/N)?” he asked.

“Yes, Sherly?” she smiled.

“Are you...high?” he asked delicately. “Are you having hallucinations?”

“Hallucinations?” (Y/N)’s face contorted into confusion. “No?”

“You’ve been...having conversations with people who just aren’t there. Are you sure you aren’t high?” Sherlock asked again.

“Sherlock,” (Y/N)’s voice was stern. “I can guarantee you that I am not high.”

Knowing the argument would not go anywhere, Sherlock let off. He turned back to John later that day, expressing his concern.

“She has to be on some form of a drug,” Sherlock offered. “That’s the only explanation.”

“Sherlock...,” John trailed off.

“What?” Sherlock snapped.

“Have you considered the possibility of her experiencing a psychotic episode?” John layed the idea out.

Of course, Sherlock didn’t want to. He didn’t want to imagine that. It was a possibility, of course, but Sherlock did what Sherlock does, he pushed it away in his mind palace, refusing to accept the cold reality.

“No,” Sherlock shrugged.

“That’s the only thing I can think of,” John argued. “Consider it.”

And, despite not wanting to, Sherlock considered it. He considered his lovely girlfriend battling something that was beyond his control.

After observing her, noticing the way she wasn’t showing up at work anymore, her sudden dislike of food, anything, really, Sherlock realized that yes. That was exactly what was happening. Probably pushed by her lack of sleep due to her damn bipolar disorder and the sudden amount of stress at work, (Y/N) was experiencing a psychotic episode.

“You were right,” Sherlock admit over a cup of tea as (Y/N) slept on the couch before them, not having slept the night before.

John nodded. “We need to watch her. Assuming this all started roughly a week ago, we need to see how long it lasts. That’s all we can do.”

Sherlock didn’t like the idea but it’s what they had.

(Y/N) grew more and more irritable with Sherlock watching over her every second of the day. More than once turning to talk to a “friend” that wasn’t there, angrily turning to Sherlock when he pointed this out.

“He is right there! Right there!” (Y/N) shouted at Sherlock.

“No! (Y/N), I am telling you! There is no one. No one here beside me and you,” Sherlock huffed.

(Y/N) turned to her left again. “Don’t mind him. Please, continue with what you were saying.”

One thing that seemed to stay was her bipolar emotions, though she mainly only lashed out at Sherlock.

Weeks passed, Sherlock growing wearier until it slowed. It didn’t happen all at once, it was more like (Y/N) was waking up. She stopped talking to her hallucinations as much, her emotions reigned in. Only once or twice a week Sherlock would wake up without her beside him.

John was content with the length of the episode, not too long. Longer than a normal episode, but not long enough to cause worry.

And one day, (Y/N) woke up, made a cup of tea, and went to work.

“Do you think it’s over?” Sherlock asked John.

“I believe so,” John shrugged. “But with her being bipolar...it’s just something we need to be on the lookout for, now.”

True to this, both men watched (Y/N). Not closely, but close enough to see when something was wrong. It was terrifying enough the first time it happened, Sherlock didn’t want to go through it again.

Worst of all is (Y/N) seemed to not quite understand. She knew, of course, something bad had happened. She just wasn’t aware of what it was. Maybe it was better this way.

But Sherlock never forgot. He would always remember the worry and pain he felt. Never again would he push away the possibility.

It was real now, and Sherlock knew, this is exactly what he was getting into.

Tags;

@thatcluelessone @ima-fucking-nerd @embrace-themagic

#sherlock holmes x reader #sherlock x reader #holmes x reader #x reader

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zoemurph · 7 years

Text

before sunrise

on ao3 (full note on ao3)

its been a really tough week, but as always, i really love the murphy siblings. i also really love my friends. thank you for putting up with me and im sorry for the silence. ill try to make it up somehow if youll let me.

warning: minor mentions of throwing up from "it's around 1:30" to "'zoe?' connor asks softly", because zoe is sick. its not described much at all, but figured id throw it out there. let me know if theres anything else i should warn about.

enjoy

It’s 4:17 in the morning when Zoe tip toes down the stairs and then makes eye contact with Connor, who’s sitting on the couch, eating cereal and staring at a blank TV screen.

Connor takes another bite of cereal and then puts the bowl down in his lap. “Hey.”

Zoe nods and walks into the kitchen, putting her instrument case on the floor by the table when she passes it.

Connor stares ahead at nothing for another few seconds before he takes his cereal and moves to join her.

“What are you doing up?” he asks, leaning against the island in the center of the room.

Zoe keeps her back toward him as she rummages through the fridge. “Competition,” she says shortly.

“At four in the morning?” Connor asks in surprise.

Zoe glances at him over her shoulder, eyebrows furrowed. “Yeah? Transportation time?”

Oh right. “Still, that’s really fucking early.”

She keeps staring at him. “Well you’re up.”

“That’s different,” Connor points out before stirring his cereal mindlessly.

“Why, ’cause you’re not leaving?” Zoe pulls out an orange and closes the fridge door with her elbow.

Connor rolls his eyes. “No. Cause I never went to bed. There was no ‘waking up’ involved here.”

She frowns as she peels her orange. “Why didn’t you sleep?”

He shrugs and takes another bite of cereal.

“Hm.” Zoe slowly pulls apart the orange. “So did you just sit on the couch all night and stare at the TV?”

“Yes.” She looks surprised. “And then I grabbed a bowl of cereal and then I kept staring at the TV.” Connor keeps his gaze steady as Zoe decides what to do with that information.

Eventually, Zoe settles for “Oh.” And all other aspects of their relationship considered, Connor will settle for it.

“I have to go,” Zoe says suddenly. She slips past Connor and back into the dining room. She scoops up her case and grabs her keys off the hook without another word.

“Good luck,” Connor says from the kitchen doorway.

Zoe pauses at the front door. “Thanks.”

It’s 5:23 in the morning and Connor is sitting on the kitchen counter eating cold pizza.

Zoe hesitates in the doorway before she steps into the kitchen and leaves her backpack on the island.

“Early,” Connor says.

Zoe hums in agreement. She pulls a loaf of bread out of the cabinet and pops two pieces in the toaster. “Why are you up?” she asks as she opens the door to the fridge and pulls out the jelly. Someone, probably Connor, used the rest of the strawberry. She’ll settle for grape.

Connor shrugs.

They sit in silence as they wait for the toast to pop.

“Coffee?” Connor asks suddenly.

Zoe shakes her head. “I’ll stop at Starbucks on my way into school.”

Connor squints at the time on the stove. “It’s early.”

“I’m helping Alana with setup for the assembly today.” The toast pops. Zoe grabs a knife and a plate.

“You’re part of Student Council?” Connor asks. He doesn’t seem surprised. She’s not sure how to take that.

“No.” She focuses on spreading jelly evenly across the pieces of bread. Easier said than done. “I’m just helping Alana, you know how Student Council is.”

There’s a pause before Connor says, “No. Not really.”

Zoe looks up from her toast. “No one does shit,” she says flatly.

He lifts his pizza in acknowledgement. “Mood.”

She rolls her eyes. “Fuck off, Alana does everything. People don’t care, it just looks nice on college apps.”

“Sorry she has to deal with that,” Connor says after a moment. “It’s cool that you care.”

Zoe looks over to him. He’s staring off into the distance as he eats his pizza, like he didn’t say the words at all.

It’s 1:02 in the morning. Connor is hanging off the side of the couch upside down as Evan snores softly on the other end, curled up in a ball and hugging a pillow.

The stairs creak and he sits up, groaning as he uses abs that he definitely doesn’t have. The sudden change makes the blood rush from his head, and he grabs onto the arm of the couch as black spots burn his vision and his head spins. When it passes, he squints up at Zoe in the darkness.

She’s frozen in the middle of the stairs, eyes wide.

Connor hauls himself off the couch, moving for the first time in at least eight hours, which his body hates. He motions for Zoe to follow him into the kitchen and hears her following him quietly after a moment. He flicks on the light as he enters the kitchen and immediately heads to the fridge. Cynthia bought whipped cream and he’s not above squirting it directly into his mouth.

Zoe leans against the counter and crosses her arms over her chest.

“Did you want something?” Connor asks softly, pulling the can of whipped cream from the shelf.

She starts to shake her head then stops. “Couldn’t sleep,” she admits after a minute.

Connor puts the cover on the island before shaking the can. “Relatable.”

“When did Evan fall asleep?” she asks.

Good move. Evan is always a safe conversation topic. Just like Evan is a safe person to be around. Evan is just safe, that’s the best description Connor has come up with for him so far. “Maybe like half an hour ago. Long day.”

Zoe nods slowly and stares out of the kitchen into the darkness of the living room. “I can’t believe he fell asleep on the couch.”

Connor smiles. “Evan can fall asleep anywhere if he’s tired enough. He fell asleep leaning against Jared the other day.”

He watches Zoe fight a smile before he tips his head back and squirts whipped cream into his mouth. She’s probably judging him, but he remembers doing this with her when they were young. Younger. Their mom would put out strawberries and put a little bit of whipped cream on their plates. When she left the room, they’d sneak into the kitchen and squirt whipped cream into their mouths.

“That couch is the worst,” Zoe mutters. “Dad needs to move on so we can get a new one.”

Connor lowers the whipped cream and nods. They’ve had that old couch for as long as either of them can remember. It’s one of the only parts of the house that isn’t constantly updated. At one point it was comfortable, but now the cushions are flattened and the springs are dead. A night’s sleep on it is a guaranteed back ache for at least two days afterward.

“As long as Evan is asleep,” Connor says. He holds out the whipped cream to Zoe.

She stares at the can for a long moment before she takes it from him. “Why aren’t you asleep?”

Connor raises his eyebrows at her. “Sleep is for the weak.”

Zoe gives him a flat look.

“I took a nap after school in the library while waiting for Evan,” Connor says. “I can’t sleep.”

Zoe keeps her eyes on the floor for a moment before she lifts the whipped cream to her mouth and squirts it in.

Avoidance. Nice.

“You should go to sleep soon,” Connor says eventually. “You have that rehearsal today, right?”

She nods slowly. “It’s fine. I can sleep on the bus.”

Connor makes a face.

“I’ve done longer rehearsals on less sleep.” Zoe grabs the cap off the island and covers the whipped cream. “Besides, this is good practice for college.”

Connor watches her as she opens the fridge door to put away the can. They don’t talk about college. Or the future. For a while there they didn’t talk at all. And then talking about the future was too tentative, because it wasn’t something they thought they’d actually look at together. “Performance or education?” he asks as the fridge door swings closed.

“Performance,” Zoe murmurs. “But I’m also thinking about music therapy. There aren’t many schools with great programs but…” She trails off and looks at her feet. The socks she’s wearing are mismatched, one is covered with stars and the other with Marvel superheroes.

“You should go to bed,” Connor says.

Zoe nods. “You too.”

At 2:49, Zoe gives up and closes her history textbook. Her brain hurts and her eyes hurt and her neck hurts. She pushes away from her desk and stands up, stretching out her back and wincing when something pops. Then she goes down the stairs as quietly as possible because she desperately needs chocolate before she starts crying.

She almost has a heart attack when she flicks on the kitchen light, because Connor is sitting on the floor in the dark eating cup ramen.

“Oh my god,” she gasps, stumbling backward.

Connor looks up at her and then raises a hand. “Hey.”

“Don’t do that!” Zoe hisses. “I almost screamed.”

“Cool.” Connor takes a sip from his cup ramen.

She puffs up her cheeks and blows air out from between her lips as she pulls open the cupboards. “What are you doing up?”

“Studying. Emphasis on the dying part.” She glares at him and he shrugs. “I got sick of writing about literary fiction versus commercial fiction, fucking sue me.”

“Maybe I will.” Zoe finds a half used bag of chocolate chips from the last time they made pancakes. She pulls it out of the cabinet and tosses the bag clip on the island before joining Connor on the floor. “Want some?”

“Nah I’m eating healthy.”

She rolls her eyes and dumps a handful of chocolate chips into her palm. “Okay then. Are you just writing that paper or…?”

“Yeah at the moment.” Connor picks at the styrofoam cup. “Ev and I are meeting up after school tomorrow so he can study for Environmental Science and Alana promised she’d help me with math.”

“Alana is a gift,” Zoe muses before stuffing the entire handful of chocolate chips in her mouth.

“Mhm. What about you?”

Zoe holds up a hand as she chews the chocolate chips. She has so much to do and she’s trying not to think about it too much. Mostly she’s just stress eating, which is admittedly better than Evan’s stress not eating, but not by much. “Right now it’s history,” she says after she swallows. “I’m trying not to think about music theory. Or precalc. Or graphic design.”

“Ask Jared,” Connor says. “He’s good at that shit. He might be able to hack onto the computers and fix something real quick after class if you need him to.”

“That’s cheating, Connor.” Zoe takes another handful of chocolate chips.

“Do I look like I give a shit?” Connor asks before tipping his head back and draining the rest of the broth in his cup ramen.

Zoe shakes her head. “You look like you want to have too much salt in your body.”

“I’m already mostly salt,” Connor deadpans. “A little more can’t hurt.” He holds out his hand for a chocolate chip. Zoe generously gives him two. “You’ve got White for precalc, right? Because we need to talk about how terrible she is.”

Connor glances up from his laptop screen at 3:19 in the morning to see Zoe hovering at the edge of the stairs, hugging herself. He pauses the YouTube video he was mindlessly watching and pulls his earbuds out. “Why are you up, Zo?”

She shakes her head. “Couldn’t sleep.”

He wonders if she’s really that tired and out of it that she didn’t notice the nickname slip. “Why’d you come down here?” he asks. “Do you need like…food or something?”

She shakes her head again. “You’re always up.”

Connor can’t argue with that one. He still hasn’t figured out how to force himself to adopt a normal sleep schedule yet. He’s working on it, but every few weeks it gets really out of whack and he has to start all over. It’s a process. An annoying one.

“Do you…want to talk about it?” he asks slowly.

Zoe hesitates. “I kind of just want to sit,” she says.

Connor sits up and swings his legs off of the couch. “Then sit.” He scooches over as far as he can so she can have all the space she needs.

Zoe curls up on the other end of the couch, leaning against the armrest and wrapped up in a ball.

“Are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?”

She nods. “Yeah.”

He frowns.

“Go back to what you were doing,” Zoe murmurs. “I don’t want to bother you.

Connor looks to his YouTube video. He hadn’t been all that invested before but he’s even less invested now. After a few minutes, he clicks the search bar and looks for a composer, one he overheard Zoe talking about the other day that she supposedly really likes.

He’s not sure if he should know her favorite composer or not. He’s not really sure how any of this works. He just hopes he gets the name right.

Connor listens to songs while checking in on Zoe every few minutes out of the corner of his eye. Eventually, he finds a song that seems calming enough and unplugs his headphones, turning his laptop volume on low.

Zoe looks over to him in surprise.

Connor just shrugs and stuffs his headphones in his pocket. He clicks over to a new tab and does his own thing as the music plays.

Zoe moves closer as the song ends. “Can I…?” she trails off, gesturing to his laptop.

Connor blinks. “Oh yeah, sure.” He pulls the YouTube page back up before handing it over. He rubs his eyes as Zoe looks through the recommended videos.

He’s startled by the first note of the next song.

“Sorry about that,” Zoe apologizes.

“It’s cool.” Connor runs a hand through his hair. “Just tired.”

“You should sleep,” she mumbles.

You too. “On this couch?” Connor asks. “Fuck that.”

Zoe moves to hand Connor his laptop back.

Connor pushes it back towards her. “Keep it. You’ve got better taste in music.”

“You finally admit it,” she murmurs.

He pulls his legs up onto the couch and crosses them, letting his thoughts sink into the music. Zoe does have a nice taste in music, at least when it comes to instrumental band music. He glances over to her at one point and she’s nodding along to the beat, swaying back and forth with some of the dynamic changes.

Connor gets a weird feeling in his chest. Zoe’s hair is longer than he thought it was and she has circles under her eyes. She looks tired and he doesn’t think he can blame that on just tonight.

He has the overwhelming need to protect her. It’s weird.

“What’s this?” she asks, tilting the screen and pointing to a video that shows up in the recommended videos column.

Connor squints at it. “Some comedy sketch. I just kind of let YouTube run on autoplay when I’m out of it and weird shit starts showing up in my recommended videos.”

Zoe purses her lips before scooting closer. “I wonder if it’s funny,” she says as she clicks the video.

Zoe falls asleep on him about six videos later, when they’ve somehow gotten to a video on the top ten animated villain songs. Connor shuts his laptop and sets it on the table in front of them, careful not to move too much so he won’t disturb her.

It’s around 1:30 when Zoe stumbles out of bed and down the hallway, barely throwing the bathroom door open in time to bend over the toilet. She wipes her mouth with a tissue and flushes the toilet, grimacing.

Gross.

She groans as she sinks to the cold tile floor. It’s nice against her hot skin, but doesn’t change the fact that everything hurts and is awful right now.

And she thought she was maybe getting better.

“Zoe?” Connor asks softly.

She doesn’t turn away from the toilet, just lifts a hand in acknowledgement.

“You okay?”

Zoe takes a few slow breaths before she says, “I’m okay.”

“Here.” He flicks the light on and sits on the side of the tub. “Not going to school, huh?”

Zoe groans. “Please…”

Connor gives her a weak smile and yanks a hair tie out of his hair, his hair falling out of its ponytail as he does so. “Here.”

Zoe takes it and pulls her hair up into a messy bun. At least it’s out of her face now. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. You’re sick.” Connor leans closer and presses the back of his hand to her forehead. “And burning up. Shit, Zo, when did you take medicine?”

“Um…” She scrunches up her face. “Before bed?”

Connor looks up as he does some math in his head. “Yeah okay, you can take more now.”

“How long has it been?” she asks.

“Like nine hours.”

Zoe blinks. “Are you sure?”

“Sleep is weird and so is time.” Connor stands. “Do you think you can come downstairs with me or is staying hunched over a toilet a better idea?”

Zoe slowly gets to her feet. Connor grabs her arm when she wobbles a little. “I think I’m okay. I’ll be down in a second.”

“I’ll be in the kitchen.” Connor pauses in the doorway. “If you fall, just start yelling or something.”

“Sorry for waking you up,” she calls after him.

“You didn’t,” Connor promises.

Zoe brushes her teeth and stares at herself in the mirror for a minute. She looks like a corpse. She hates being sick and all of her homework is just piling up into a terrifying mountain of death.

She also feels like she’s going to pass out.

Water is good.

She leans heavily on the railing as she climbs downstairs, following the trail of lights Connor left on into the kitchen. He’s drinking orange juice and sitting on the island. He’s left out a medicine cup filled with purple grape flavored lies. Zoe scowls as she picks it up.

“Bottoms up,” Connor says, lifting his glass in a toast. “Actually wait.” He hops down from the island and opens the fridge, pulling out chocolate syrup. “Go.”

Zoe huffs and downs the medicine, trying not to gag.

“Open wide,” Connor says, uncapping the chocolate syrup.

Zoe opens her mouth again as Connor squeezes chocolate syrup in. Then he does the same to himself.

“You didn’t take medicine,” Zoe says.

“I’m taking care of you,” Connor says. “This is my payment.”

Zoe rolls her eyes. “‘m fine.”

Connor gives her a look. “Sure.”

“I’m almost an adult, I can take care of myself.”

He shudders. “Don’t remind me.”

“Why? Is me being an adult that scary?”

“No, it reminds me that I’m an adult.”

Zoe laughs. It turns into a cough and Connor pats her back until she can breathe right again.

“My laptop is still hooked up to the TV if you want to illegally watch Disney movies,” Connor says.

Zoe nods. “Yeah, that’d be good.”

She curls up on the couch with a blanket because now she’s too cold even though Connor insists her fever is up, and takes a water bottle from Connor when he hands it to her over the back of the couch. He pulls up Princess and the Frog without Zoe even having to argue that it’s way better than Lilo and Stitch.

“Thanks,” she mumbles. “Was I supposed to take that medicine with food?”

“Not sure,” Connor admits. “But here.” He holds out a box of Saltines. “Found these in the back of the cabinet. Bland, salty, and white. Just like me.”

Zoe snorts as she takes them from him. “You aren’t that bland.” She opens the box. “Don’t you have school in a few hours?” Connor shrugs. “Whatever.”

At 12:36, Zoe pulls open the front door. Connor ducks his head as he squeezes past her and into the house.

“Thanks,” he whispers as he pulls down his hood. It started raining as he had walked home and now all of him is a little damp.

Zoe crosses her arms. “Where were you?”

“Out.” Connor moves to go into the kitchen. He needs something warm to eat or drink right now. He can’t feel his hands.

She grabs onto his jacket, yanking him backwards. “Seriously?!”

Connor sighs and gives in. “Can you let me, like, get a snack? It’s not a big deal.”

“It is if it involves you sneaking in and out.” She shoves him. “I thought you were getting better than this.”

“I am,” Connor snaps. He jerks free and stalks off to the kitchen. He pulls open the fridge and stares at its contents, which doesn’t help the fact that he’s freezing.

“Here.” Zoe grabs a container of leftovers out of the fridge and shoves it at Connor. “Those are going to go bad. If you’re going to be midnight snacking, at least eat something we need to get rid of.”

“Closer to one am,” Connor corrects. “Round up.”

Zoe glares at him.

She continues to watch him with an unimpressed gaze as he heats up pasta from last week in the microwave.

“When did you sneak out?” she asks when there are fourteen seconds left.

Connor pulls the microwave door open before it can beep. “About nine.”

“Why.”

He ignores her and bumps her over to get to the silverware.

“Connor,” she says warningly. “I won’t help you sneak in and out if you won’t tell me what’s going on. There’s nothing stopping me from getting mom or dad right now.”

“You wouldn’t,” he says flatly.

Zoe takes a deep breath.

“It’s none of your business,” he hisses.

She scowls. “You making me let you back in makes it my business. Why didn’t you bring your key? Come on. That’s basic.”

Connor shrugs. “I left it at Evan’s my mistake.” He focuses on his pasta and tries not to look at her.

“Evan’s?” Zoe asks. “You haven’t been over his house for like…two days. Besides, you had your key earlier…today…”

Connor stuffs his mouth full of pasta. She can’t question him if he can’t talk and he can’t talk if he’s eating.

There’s a long pause that gives him far too much time to chew the way too big bite of pasta he took.

“You were at Evan’s?” Zoe asks softly.

Connor nods and continues to not look at her.

“Why?”

“He needed someone,” Connor mumbles. “His mom was at work and Jared was working on a project and Ev didn’t want to bother them.”

Zoe sighs. “You could’ve just told me that.”

“It really wasn’t any of your business. And besides,” he meets her eyes, “you assumed the worst.” Which stung more than he was willing to admit it did.

Zoe shifts uncomfortably under his gaze. “Yeah, I did. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he mutters. He stabs a piece of pasta with his fork. “It’s whatever. Thanks for letting me in.”

“Always.” Zoe clears her throat. “You can always like…tell me stuff. If you need to. I know I’m not like… I know it’s different but— yeah.”

Connor glances at her. “Yeah.”

It’s 3:44 in the morning when Zoe wakes up with a cramp in her calf and an incredibly dry throat. She practically stumbles down the stairs as she tries to walk off the cramp and bumps into the doorframe when she tries to enter the kitchen.

She grumbles to herself and rubs her shoulder before flicking on the kitchen lights. She blinks in surprise. “Connor?”

Connor looks up from where he’s sitting on the floor, hair messy and face streaked with tears.

“Are…are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he mutters. His voice sounds hoarse.

Zoe hesitates. “Do you— Can I do anything? To help?”

Connor presses a hand to his forehead and squeezes his eyes shut.

“Connor?” she asks softly. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

He takes a shaky breath. “No.”

“What can I do?” She steps a little closer. “How can I help?”

“Just…stay. For a minute.”

Zoe sits down on the kitchen floor an arms length away from Connor. She’s supposed to be good at this comforting thing, but now that she’s here she has no idea if she’s supposed to do or say anything. She settles for just sitting in silence, because that’s all Connor wanted. For her to be here.

There’s probably something deep in that, but she’s tired.

“I’m sorry,” Connor chokes out after a few minutes.

Zoe furrows her eyebrows. “For what?”

“Everything.” He buries his face in his knees. “Everything,” he repeats, voice muffled.

Zoe takes a breath. “I’m not leaving,” she promises as she stands up. She pulls two plastic cups from a cabinet. The colors are faded and old but for some reason, their mom hasn’t thrown them out yet. She fills both up with water before joining Connor on the floor again. “Here,” she says, holding out one of the cups to him. “Hydration is important or something.”

Connor looks up to her with watery eyes before taking the cup. He wipes his face with the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “Sorry.”

“I just got you some water,” Zoe says. “It’s not a big deal. And it’s what I came down here for anyway.”

Connor stares down into his cup. “Still.”

Zoe sighs. No time like the present. “I accept your apology,” she says. “I don’t forgive you for everything, and I don’t think I can, but I accept your apology and I want to move past it. Look to the future and all that stuff. I… I want to help, Con. If you’re okay with that.”

Connor sniffs. “You don’t have to do that.”

“Yeah but I want to.” There were years where she had just given up and she’d stopped thinking he could get better. And in the end he proved her wrong. “I offered to.”

Connor takes a deep breath. “Don’t. Not if— it’s not worth it if you’re going to be like mom and think this is fixed quickly because I’m sick of pretending I’m better than I am.”

“I know,” Zoe murmurs. “I want to know if you’re actually okay or not. I want to know if I should be worried or… You’re my big brother. I just want you to be that.”

Connor’s face crumples and Zoe puts her cup down on the floor before taking his cup from his hands and putting it down next to hers. She touches his shoulder. “Connor?”

He pulls her into a tight hug, burying his face in her shoulder.

For a moment, she’s frozen. She can’t remember the last time they hugged. Or the last time that it felt real.

Zoe hugs him tight as they sit on the kitchen floor, the sun not even above the horizon yet. She still doesn’t really know what to say. Because she doesn’t actually know if things will get better. She wants to hope, but years have made her cynical and that’s really sad for her to say as a seventeen year old. So she just hugs Connor until he’s ready to let go.

Then they sit on the couch and watch Lilo and Stitch together, illegally on the first site that doesn’t threaten to give Connor’s laptop a virus. And she doesn’t even argue against it.

#zoe murphy #connor murphy #dear evan hansen #deh #deh fanfic #my fics #im sorry

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