Hello and howdy, my beautiful fan-sens. Just an idea I had that's been bouncing around my head for a while since I got into the show and listened to all the cut songs. I decided to write it in script format, sticking as close as possible to the style of the official libretto while also conveying how I saw it in my head, i.e. how they would choose to portray this if they'd decided to go this route.

Warning: you might need tissues.

Scene 1: [Int. Road]

(The screen at the back of the stage shows a projected image of a dark road at night. There are no streetlamps at all. The meagre moonlight is the only thing providing some level of visibility, but it's barely enough. Evan Hansen enters stage left, each step slow and deliberate, his posture uncharacteristically straight. A weight has been lifted from his shoulders, but his expression is completely blank, numb. He stops a short way from centre stage.)

EVAN: (Slowly and deliberately, even though there's nobody around to hear him) Dear Evan Hansen, today is going to be a good day, and here's why. Because today, at least, you're finally you. No more hiding, no more lying, just you. That's all you have. All that you're left with.

(Evan takes the last few steps towards the centre of the stage and sits down. His shoulders slump again briefly before he tries to perk up with faux-optimism.)

EVAN: (rambling at first out of habit but slowing down more and more as his terrible weight descends on him again) Maybe, someday, everything that's happened ... maybe it will all feel like a distant memory. Maybe, someday, no one will even remember about The Connor Project. Or me.

(Two distant headlights appear behind Evan. growing ever closer as his final monologue continues)

Maybe, someday, some other kid will be out here, feeling ... so alone. Wondering if maybe the world might look different from higher up. Better. And then maybe he'll start climbing once branch at a time, trying to get a better view, but then, just before it gets too high for him to come back down again safely, where he would have no choice but to just ... let go ... he'll stop, and climb back down again because he'll realise that it just ... isn't worth it. Not compared to what he already has on the ground. He'll land safely and ... keep going.

(The car is mere metres behind Evan. He doesn't move out of the way. He raises his head somewhat as if seeing something interesting in the sky.)

He'll keep going until he sees the sun.

(The car's headlights brighten to blinding levels, taking up the entire projection, before ... CRASH. The stage blackens almost immediately.)

Scene 2 [Int. Evan's room]

(Heidi is sitting on Evan's bed, wearing a black dress and looking around at the sparse furnishings as if she can somehow find him again if she looks hard enough. Her face is deeply haggard, her hair unkempt. She talks as if Evan is still there to hear her.)

HEIDI: I read that note. The one that Connor Murphy ... it was all over everyone's Facebook. "Dear Evan Hansen." You wrote it, didn't you?

(Beat)

I didn't know. I didn't know that you ... that you were ... hurting. Like that. That you felt so ... I didn't know. (voice cracking) How did I not know? You shouldn't have had to ... I shouldn't have had to find it from ...

(She trails off, knowing she'll break if she continues. Her eyes fall on Evan's lone cast sitting on his bedside table, long since sawed off. The crack cuts through the scrawled CONNOR. She picks it up and joins the severed parts back together, so the name is whole again.)

I know now. Last summer, what you did ... tried to do. I know you, Evan, and I love you.

(She sets the cast back down. It's next to a small framed photograph. She picks it up and looks at it next, tracing her thumb over the glass.)

Your dad ... do you remember the day he drove by to get his things?

(Beat)

It was a few weeks after he moved out. "Temporarily," we said ...

SO BIG/SO SMALL

HEIDI

It was a February day

When your dad came by, before going away

A U-Haul truck in the driveway

The day it was suddenly real

I told you not to come outside

But you saw that truck, and you smiled so wide

A real live truck in your driveway

We let you sit behind the wheel

Goodbye, goodbye

Now it's just me and my little guy

And the house felt so big

And I felt so small

The house felt so big

And I felt so small

(She puts the photo down, stands up and walks around the bed, placing her hand on the headboard, looking down at the pillow as if Evan's head is lying on it)

That night, I tucked you into bed

I will never forget how you sat up and said:

"Is there another truck coming to our driveway?

A truck that will take mommy away?"

And the house felt so big

And I felt so small

The house felt so big

And I ...

And I knew there would be moments that I'd miss

And I knew there would be space I couldn't fill

And I knew I'd come up short a billion different ways

And I did!

And you tried,

Tried, until ...

'Til, like that February day,

My darling guy has gone, you just slipped away.

Though I promised you, "I'll always stay.

Your mom isn't going anywhere,

Your mom is staying right here."

But your mom was going everywhere,

When I should've been right here.

In the end,

I wasn't here.

When it all felt so big,

And you felt so small.

Now the house feels so big,

And I feel so small.

Now we all feel too small.

(Beat. A knock at the door. Jared enters wearing a black suit and tie, jacket unbuttoned. Even so, it looks too stiff and neat for Jared. Equally unfitting is the deeply aged look in his eyes.)

JARED: Heidi?

(She looks up at him and they stare at each other for a beat, before she gets up and wraps her arms around him. He clings back just as tightly.)

JARED: Ready?

(Heidi breaks away, nodding before they both exit stage right. Cut to black)

Scene 3 [Int. Evan and Connor's rooms]

(The set has shifted so that Evan's bed is tucked further off to the side rather than centre stage. The spotlight over it is off, the only light is illuminating another bed shown on the other side, completely stripped down to its mattress. A few cardboard boxes sit around and on it, along with miscellaneous items, mostly books and clothes. A child-sized Spiderman costume is seen hanging out of one of the boxes. A maroon sweater lies sprawled out on the bed, right in the middle.)

(Cynthia enters and starts absently examining a few items before her eyes fall on the sweater. She picks it up as gently as if it were Connor himself.)

IN THE BEDROOM DOWN THE HALL

CYNTHIA

You never liked this sweater.

You said it never really fit you right

And it itched too much.

But I think I'll keep it,

I should keep it.

Cause it still makes me think of you

And that little boy I knew

In the bedroom down the hall.

(The spotlight over her dims and another one turns on over Evan's bed. Heidi enters the opposite direction Cynthia did. She stays standing, her eyes and mind off somewhere else.)

HEIDI

In the bedroom down the hall,

I got your Ninja Turtle night-lights for protection.

You used to say they kept the bad guys far away.

Remember?

In the bedroom down the hall,

I surprised you with that comic book collection.

Next Halloween,

I dressed you up like Wolverine.

Remember?

With glow stars on the ceiling

You could count instead of sheep.

(The panels above her head start glowing with pale green glow stars)

I always knew which song to sing

To get you right to sleep.

Anything to make you happy,

Anything at all.

Anything for my boy in the bedroom down the hall.

(The spotlight dims over her and re-illuminates over Cynthia's side. She stands up and walks around the room, remembering).

CYNTHIA

In the bedroom down the hall,

We went to battle every evening after dinner.

I thought I knew some way that I'd get through to you.

Remember?

In the bedroom down the hall,

We fought a war where no one walked away a winner

'Cause every day you pulled a little more away.

Remember?

Saw the counsellors and the clinics

And the cures a mother tries,

Cause maybe they could take away that anger in your eyes.

(Both spotlights are shining now)

CYNTHIA AND HEIDI

Anything to make you happy,

Anything at all.

Anything for my boy in the bedroom down the hall.

(The overhead panels illuminate)

CYNTHIA

Though you try

(The panels show pre-recorded clips of Evan and Connor above their respective bedrooms, showing clips from throughout the musical. Evan conversing with Heidi at the start of the show, Cynthia cajoling Connor at the dinner table.)

HEIDI

You try

CYNTHIA & HEIDI

To give your kid the world

Give 'em everything you've got

(Evan's You Will Be Found Speech, the virality of the Connor Project)

CYNTHIA

What if I

Gave all I could?

And I thought it was enough

But I find that

It was not

HEIDI

What if I

Gave all I could?

And I thought it was enough

It was not

(Evan being hit by a car, Connor storming off clutching a pill bottle)

CYNTHIA

Did I let you down?

HEIDI

What else could I do?

CYNTHIA & HEIDI

Everything I ever did

I did it all for you

(More lights start to come on behind the black mesh nearer the back of the stage. The lights slowly brighten to reveal the obscured forms of Connor and Evan in matching dark grey hoodies. Shoulders slumped, their faces blank with misery.)

Anything to make you happy

Anything at all

Anything for my boy in the bedroom down the hall

(The light showing Connor's ghost abruptly turns off. Evan's ghost's spotlight slowly dims out a split-second later, shortly followed by the spotlight on Heidi in his room.)

CYNTHIA

In the bedroom down the hall,

I think I'll wait another day to pack these boxes

'Cause once I'm through,

I'm left with just one thing to do ...

(Cynthia gets up and makes to leave, the old sweater still tucked under her arm, before turning around to look at the room once more.)

CYNTHIA

... remember.

(She exits.

The stage lights fade to black.)

END

Alright, I'm definitely far from the first or last person to consider/write an AU where Evan kills himself after Words Fail, because, let's face it, that song reads like a suicide note and you can never un-hear that once you know it. But I do think that the route they went in the show - with Evan finding the strength to go on with the help of his mother - was the better route. The whole message of the show was that you will be found and you will rise again with the help of your loved ones even when you're at your lowest low. Heidi found Evan and saw how broken he was and promised to always be there for him. If Evan had killed himself, that would slap the whole message right in the face.

Even so, it would NOT be a far stretch AT ALL to believe that Evan was considering suicide again after/during Words Fail, hence why that scene in the road was inserted into the book that I re-appropriated here.