What you know (Hamilton cast)

Forty-two

Sorry if I upset anyone, I hope I only helped instead.
If I did upset someone, know that I am better off dead, for everyone, including you.
-Kelsey Emmott.

My hand shakes as I hold it. I flip to the first drawing as Vanessa takes it and reads it. The first five drawings are good. They're of a lion, a boy, a flower, a baby, and then what we see in the stage. I remember a time, months ago, when I walked through the wings and saw Kelsey sitting there. In the middle. Everyone else had gone home. She sat with a sketchbook just drawing. When I approached her, her arm slid in front of her drawing.

"What are you still doing here?" I asked.

"No one's gonna judge me if no one is here." She said, smiling and closing her sketchbook.

"I'm here."

"True." She said, standing.

"And no one would judge you."

"Maybe not."

"Well, get a cab home, it's late." I said, looking to my pocket and opening my wallet, knowing she didn't have much money. When I looked up, she was gone. She must have finished it some other night or from memory. I flip through a few more. They're of the cast, New York, and occasionally, a drowning girl, a dirty child, a dead boy with a bullet wound, and one of a girl facing away, holding a gun to her head, and her limp arm by her side holding an apple.

Some of the drawings I can't make sense of, and some are a little chaotic, like she started to draw and then just scribbled over them. Towards the end, they are all sad or dreary. I close it back up and sigh, feeling no longer my pain but her pain. I look around the empty room. I hung up her three things last night and put the rest in the drawers in the closet. Anything else is on the floor of it. That is very few things. She comes here tomorrow. There are three knocks on the door. I walk to it and open it, expecting to see a familiar face when I see one that I came to know this morning.

Mark something, the owner of Kelsey's previous apartment complex.

"I'm here to drop off a few things she left behind."

"I thought we got everything."

"There were a few things under her bed that were still there. I'm very fond of Kelsey, she's lived there quite some time and was very kind and patient. In return for that, I want to make sure that she left nothing of any importance behind. He gives me a trash bag, apologizes about what happened. Once he leaves, I open it to find some rolled up artwork, a small box of supplies, and a photo album. I go to quiet Sebastian down when he wakes up from his nap and then find Vanessa in the room with Phillipa and Jazzy, taping something on the wall. It's a painting of New York.

"Is there anything she can't do?" Says Phillipa when she sees me.

"Speak French."

"Vault."

"Ski."

"Ride a unicycle."

"Breakdance."

"Relax."

"Eat."

"Sleep."

"Breath."

"She's managed to do that one." Phillpa says.

"Barely."

"Anyways, we brought books." I notice a stack of about six on the desk.

"Thanks, guys. Ready to go?"

"One sec. Let me get my shoes on." V says.

An hour later, I'm sitting by her bed again. All four of us. Her breaths are slow as she sleeps. She stirs awake around eleven at night. I'm glad we don't have a show tomorrow. I close my lab top, out of ideas for a song.

"We have to get you on a normal sleeping schedule." I say. She laughs. "How are you feeling?" She gives me an unconvincing thumbs up. "I-uh, found your note."

"Great." She says with a sigh. Pippa and Jazzy look surprised, not knowing she left a note. I can tell that she is in pain and trying to hide it when she rolls away, facing the window.

"Do you need anything?"

"Tapentadol." She says, quietly. Vanessa goes to get a nurse in the hall.

"You're in pain." When she doesn't respond, I walk to the other side of the bed. "Oh, Kelsey. It's gonna be okay." I say, stroking her hair. She shakes her head.

"I told you to stop helping me."

"We both know that the rest of the cast and I will never stop helping you. No matter what."
-
A/N- broken bones hurt😭