"Connor," I heard someone say. "Wait up." I thought I recognized the voice, but I ignored it, instead quickening my pace. "Connor!" I had to get to the park. All I wanted was to get to my favorite tree and lay against it and empty my mom's Tylenol bottle. I had read that the Tylenol would be hella painful and would tear my liver apart, but I had already damaged that pretty badly, now hadn't I?

My shoulder was grabbed and jerked backward, and I felt my bag fall to the ground. Unable to process what was happening, I could do nothing but watch as the bottle and my note fell from the bag. Evan grabbed the paper, clearly assuming it was his, but his was in my pocket. I watched as he scanned the paper, watching his face as he realized that what he was holding was the wrong letter. First confused, then a look of comprehension dawning upon his face, finished with a look of horror and terror. He looked at me and I could tell he was struggling to find the words to speak to me.

Finally, he just whispered, "Connor…" Was that it? Did he really just read my suicide note and all he could think to say was my name? Damn, that even hurt me. But then-

"Connor, you said when you signed my cast, 'At least now we can both pretend we have friends', and I was thinking, what if we didn't pretend? Jared just hangs out with me so his parents will pay his car insurance, and I've never really seen you spending time with anyone. And I've been thinking about it all day, and I was really hopeful about it, so now it would be really terrible to have my hopes let down. I'm not trying to guilt trip you, I just really think that we have a potential for a good friendship. So could you at least wait a day or two and just spend some time with me? There's a really good movie I wanted to see. We could go see it today if you wanted."

I could do nothing but stare at him. He had seen in my own handwriting, in my own words, "Everyone in my life hates me and would be better off without me. No one has ever been my friend, and I don't blame them. I'm not even my own friend. Clearly, or I wouldn't have done this." It was hardly a suicide note as it was a note to myself explaining everything that was wrong with me. To steel my will, I suppose. But now, here was a person actually talking to me, and suddenly my will was falling away around me in layers. This idiot who broke his arm by falling out of a tree was trying to become my friend. He may have been an idiot, but he was clearly trying. There was something in his eyes to suggest that he could relate to me in some way. I glanced at his arm for a second, but then pushed the thought away. After all, who tries to kill themselves by falling out of a tree? Jumping off a building, I get, but jumping out of a tree? What the hell?

I realized I needed to stop staring at Evan and respond, so I looked at him and said, "Um… what- which movie?" Because you know what, what the hell. What's one more day of suffering? I had already endured eighteen years' worth.

Evan look shocked that I had actually agreed. "Um, I was- I was actually going to, uh, let you, um, let you decide."

I smiled and looked down, trying to hide the feeling of slight happiness I could feel bubbling up within me. Pushing my dark brown hair behind my left ear, I said, "Have you ever seen any of the Rocky movies?"

"The what?" Evan asked, looking confused.

The smile fell off my face. "The- the Rocky movies! You know, Rocky Balboa? Apollo Creed? Boxing?

"Um…no. Should I?"

"Yes!" I exclaimed. "Anyways, Creed 2 is in theaters and I say we go see that. I'm really good at sneaking into movies."

"Uh… sneaking in? Don't you have money?" Evan looked incredibly nervous. I couldn't help but laugh at the look on his face.

"Yeah, you probably wouldn't be too good at sneaking in. HEY ZOE!" I screamed across the parking lot. I saw my sister rest her head momentarily against the side of her car, then she spun around and marched over to me.

"What do you want Connor?" she hissed, looking ready to strangle me. Not that that was any different from normal.

"Do you have any money? Me and Evan are going to go see a movie." I looked at Evan, who was suddenly very interested in the ground, glancing up every few seconds to look at my sister. I felt a surge of protectiveness rush through me, but then figured that Evan wasn't a threat to my sister, who could definitely take care of herself.

"If it means you'll be out of my hair for a few hours, then here. Take thirty." She shoved the money at me and stalked off toward her car as soon as I had taken that.

I looked at Evan, who looked shocked. "Look, that's just what the Murphy family is like. Don't be too surprised if you see her actively try to murder me sometime in the future."

"I'm sure she wouldn't have said any of that if she had seen your note-"

"Oh, no, she definitely would've. She doesn't care about me. She… she wants to. But I'm a self-deployed time bomb liable to explode at any second, so I keep her away. So she doesn't get hurt in the explosion. You know what I mean?"

Evan looked after her, then glanced at me, before looking around until his eyes settled on the asshole from the cafeteria. "Yeah. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Come on, let's go. The theater's only a few blocks away, we can walk."

"You go to the theater? I've never seen you there."

"Oh, uh, no, I go to the bookstore a couple blocks down, then I sometimes go to the Mexican restaurant a block down in the other direction." Evan blushed and looked down, seemingly embarrassed by his love for the local bookstore.

We walked in silence to the theater, with Evan looking at me every few minutes with a look of heavy concern all over his face. I was almost starting to regret not going to the park today. Almost. I suppose dying tomorrow with one happy memory of having a sort of friend would make me die a less depressed boy. I certainly wouldn't be dying a happy man, but I can certainly do all I can to die less depressed.

In an effort to break the awkward silence, I say, "I'm sorry about earlier today. At lunch. I really shouldn't have shoved you. I took out the anger I was feeling toward the other guy on you. So I'm, uh, I'm sorry. And about the computer lab. I just…" And here I took a breath and paused. "I just really care about Zoe and I'm really protective of her. You wouldn't know it from how I treat her, but it's true. And… I did really worry that you were trying to make a fool out of me. I can be super paranoid sometimes. So. Yeah. I'm sorry."

"Oh, no! Don't worry about it! I was being stupid anyways. It's fine."

"Evan. It's not fine and you weren't being stupid. I'll still feel bad about it. I need you to tell me you forgive me, because whether you really do or not, at least then I won't be awake until three in the morning overthinking everything I did wrong today. I want to be able to get one last good night's sleep." I chuckled, then froze as Evan spun around toward me.

"Stop it! Just stop, okay?! Don't talk about you killing yourself like it's nothing! Okay? Because it's not nothing! Because I have actually sort of known you for half an hour and I can tell you that I would be devastated if you died. So please. Please don't Connor. If not for yourself and your own future, then for me. So I don't-" He broke off abruptly and looked down at his cast. So maybe I was right and he did try to kill himself by jumping out of a tree. But I figured I didn't know him well enough yet to ask.

"If you think a good movie is going to save my life, you're wrong." Suddenly pissed, I started walking again.

From behind me, I could barely hear Evan as he said, "I didn't think that. But I was hoping that maybe I could."

I stopped. I was paralyzed on the sidewalk. How could I possibly deny this kid the opportunity to help someone? I could at least stop making suicide jokes and let him think he was helping me.

"Okay. Let's just go to the movie and enjoy it, okay? And then we'll think past that. Deal?"

His voice was eager as he said, "Deal!"

We made it to the movie and I paid for the tickets, snacks, and drinks, which was around $25. I handed Evan the change as I picked up the drinks and my popcorn. Turning to Evan, I said, "Quick tip for life, popcorn with Sour Patch Kids mixed in are the greatest thing you will ever eat in your life." I turned back around, narrowly avoiding running into the door, and we settled into our seats.

"Here's your money back," whispered Evan.

"Nah, keep it. You think my family will miss five bucks?"

He opened his mouth to protest, but just then, the movie started. From that second on, Evan was enraptured by the whole thing. He only occasionally leaned over to ask me questions pertaining to the plot that were answered in previous movies, but other than that, his eyes never left the screen.

When the movie was finished, we stumbled out into the sunlight and Evan laughed with glee. "That was so much better than I thought it would be!"

Seeing his pure joy, I couldn't help but smile. "Yeah, just wait until you watch the other ones. You'll love them."

He looked up at me and paused, then slowly said, "Um… would you… maybe… want to, uh, go to the bookstore I was telling you about?"

I opened my mouth to refuse, figuring I should get back to previously scheduled plans before I got too attached to Evan, but instead found myself saying, "Yeah, I'd love to."

Love to‽ What kind of idiot used the word love in any context around someone he had just started bonding with‽

But Evan smiled up at me and I felt all my worried drain away as he laughed and grabbed my hand, pulling me enthusiastically along behind him.

And it was in that moment I knew: I would most certainly not be killing myself this week.

Just so y'all know, I do not know if one can kill themselves with Tylenol, it was just the first thing that came to mind, so I used it. And with the liver part, I just found that would be a sarcastic little quip. A question for you guys to answer in the reviews, should I make this gay or should they just be friends? Treebros or not Treebros? As ever, thanks for reading and I hope you come back for the future chapters!