Well, here's the first chapter! I hope you guys enjoy! Obviously, it's going to take while for the story to develop, but I really hope you all enjoy what I have so far! Read, review, and enjoy:)

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Troy stared at the clock on the wall, watching as the seconds ticked by painfully slowly instead of listening to the latest of Ms. Darbus’ never-ending speeches about the profound impact the theater had had on the world. There were exactly 88 seconds left until the final bell of the day would ring when he felt curious fingertips drum lightly across his shoulder blades. He let himself smile slightly as his attention was drawn back to the classroom around him and off of the pondering of the nature of passing time. Gabriella knew exactly when he was spacing out and that had become her way of snapping him out of his own private reverie that tended to haunt him in this class particularly.

It was a drama course that he had let Gabriella talk him into because it would not only take care of his Fine Arts requirement, but would also allow them to actually have a class together every day. And so, he had relented and given in to knowing that each one of his days would end with the almost incoherent babbling of Ms. Darbus, resident spinster and nut job.

The only other people in the class he really knew were Sharpay, Ryan, and Kelsi, and even though he’d broken through his well-groomed jock exterior during his stint as lead in the Winter Musical the previous year, he had still gotten a lot of ribbing from his friends about taking a drama class. Chad had asked him repeatedly why he couldn’t just take an art class and be done with it, but Troy thought that spending more time with Gabriella more than justified his cause. It wasn’t as if they got to spend a lot of time together outside of school, what with the activities they were both over-involved in and the fact that their parents weren’t too keen on the idea of them being alone together too much. Their parents weren’t stupid and knew what would happen if they went unsupervised for too long, but their overprotective stance hadn’t stopped Troy and Gabriella from enjoying many steamy, but far too brief trysts in random school closets after hours or in the backseat of his car more times than he could count. They still hadn’t really done it “properly,” as Gabriella had told him many times, but there wasn’t much they could do about it. Troy always just told her that they’d have to wait until the time was right, and she insisted that it be at Prom.

As the bell finally rang, Troy exhaled a huge sigh of relief and reached down to grab his messenger bag off the floor so he could shove his desk’s contents into it before escaping the building for an entire weekend.

“It’s the weekend,” Gabriella smiled from behind him, reaching for his hand as soon as his bag was securely in place.

“Thank god,” Troy murmured, not really wanting Ms. Darbus to hear what he was about to say, “I definitely need a two day break from this class.”

“It’s notthat bad, is it?” she asked him as they made their way out of the room.

“It’s worse,” Troy told her, “I mean seriously, Gabi. Out of all the classes in the coursebook, you had to pick this one for us to take together? We can’t even talk or have fun during it.” She smiled and rolled her eyes at his whininess.

“It’s been one week, Troy. Once we start actually doing scenes it’ll get better, I promise,” she said before releasing his hand, “I’m going to go get what I need for the weekend and then I’ll meet you at your locker, okay?” He nodded in agreement before heading for his own locker, mentally going through the checklist of his classes to figure out what he needed to bring home with him. His thoughts drifted to the still very empty planner that every student had been given at the beginning of the year, but it was sitting at the bottom of his locker, since they were just starting the second semester, he really didn’t think it would ever see a word written on its pages. Organization was not Troy’s forte, not that he particularly cared what anyone else thought of his neatness. As long as he knew where everything was and he always got his work done, he didn’t really see what business it was of anyone else’s how he went about remember things.

Once he had all of the notebooks and textbooks he needed to do his homework, he toed his locker shut and leaned up against it, waiting for Gabriella to return.

“You didn’t get any drool on the desk top today, did you, Bolton?” Sharpay asked him as she walked up to her locker, a painfully close five lockers away from his own.

“I wasn’t sleeping, for your information,” Troy said, “And I don’t drool when I sleep.”

“That’s not what Gabriella told me,” Sharpay said teasingly, causing Troy to roll his eyes. He almost told Sharpay that Gabriella would have no idea whether or not he drooled when he slept, but he decided to just go ahead and let Sharpay think whatever she liked. If it was her prerogative to think that he and Gabriella had spent the night together, then he’d let her go on thinking it. It was better than the sweaty, too-fast reality of it all, not that he was in any way complaining about his sex life. It was much better than his friends’, and he got laid on a regular basis. And, he knew plenty about Sharpay’s sex life since she was dating Zeke and Zeke was never too modest spare them the details of a particularly good night. Troy knew that he was also guilty of sharing too much sometimes, but he just justified it by telling himself that he was a guy and it was just what guys did. That, and he knew that none of his friends would ever repeat what got said to anyone else.

“Whatever,” Troy answered somewhat snidely, definitely not in the mood for Sharpay’s typical verbal bile. Even though it could actually be said that they even had a friendship now thanks to their talk during the previous summer and the beginning of the school year, there were still times when he just couldn’t handle her.

“No need to get snippy with me. I was just giving you a hard time,” she laughed, his efforts to be rude obviously lost on her, “Have a nice weekend, Troy.” He just gave her a weak smile and nodded at her before watching her walk away out of the corner of his eye. She met up with Ryan a few steps later and before scolding him about something, they headed for the front doors. Troy just shook his head and checked his watch. Gabriella had a tendency of getting a little distracted and completely losing track of time. He was sure that she’d found Taylor and they were talking about the latest guy that she was dating or something. Ever since Chad and Taylor had broken up, Taylor had become quite the hot commodity in school and Chad had been just half-heartedly dating lately, not for a lack of interest, but more for a desire to just enjoy the rest of his senior year. The break-up hadn’t been bad, they had both just realized that they were better off as friends because they chemistry they’d both been so hoping for had not been there when it came down to it.

Just as Troy was about to give up and go looking for Gabriella when she finally rounded the corner with Taylor and Kelsi in tow.

“Hi baby,” she smiled sweetly, obviously unaware of the fact that most of the building was now empty and that she’d left him standing there for a good ten minutes waiting for her, “Do you mind giving the girls a ride?” Troy shook his head, grabbed her hand, and headed for the door. He really didn’t mind giving them a ride home, but he had been dating Gabi long enough to know that this really meant that he was getting roped into some sort of master plan for the evening when all he wanted to do was veg out and watch a movie with her. Alone.

“So, what are you two planning to do tonight?” Taylor asked them, and Troy could feel the scripted tone of her voice already.

“Obviously whatever you guys already planned,” he muttered before using his remote to unlock his new car, which he had saved up for to replace the truck his dad had fixed up for him. It wasn’t big or fancy, but it was his and he was still working a part-time job to make payments on it.

“Oh, it’ll be fun, Troy, don’t sound like that,” Gabriella smiled before climbing in the passenger’s seat, “We just thought that it would be fun if we went to Tony’s and hung out so we could all meet Taylor’s new boyfriend Jake! And we already invited the rest of the guys and they said they’d be there, so don’t get all worried about spending the whole night with the girls.”

“I didn’t say a word,” Troy stated, forcing a smile in her direction as his prospect of a quiet evening was suddenly replaced by a loud, raucous evening at the local pizza place and arcade that somehow became a crazy high school hangout on weekend nights.

“Great! You guys are going to love him. He goes to North High and-“

“He goes toNorth?” Troy asked incredulously, “Lame.”

“Troy, you can not dismiss my new boyfriend just because he goes to a different high school,” Taylor sassed.

“Um, actually, I can dismiss him for whatever reason I want,” Troy teased, prompting Taylor to lightly punch him in the back.

“You’re such a pig,” Taylor sighed.

“No one says that anymore, Taylor,” Troy laughed, “Call me an asshole, or a jerk, or-“

“A dickhead?” Gabriella chimed in. Troy grinned over at her and reached over to squeeze her hand. The rest of the drive was mostly uneventful and they all agreed to meet at Tony’s at 8. Troy decided to make the most of his time before then and threw in a movie before crashing on his bed for a nap.

His cell phone alarm woke him up at 7, so he had time to change clothes and make sure all the sleep lines were gone from his face before he had to leave. He picked up Gabriella at 7:45 and when they got to Tony’s everyone was already there with several tables pushed together.

“Who’s that girl with Chad?” Gabriella asked, and Troy shrugged. He had absolutely no idea who she was, so they headed straight over to find out.

“Oh! Hey guys,” Chad said, “This is Becca.”

“Hi Becca!” Gabriella said cheerily, reaching out to shake her hand. Troy just cocked an eyebrow at Chad and lightly shook his head. He knew damn well that Chad had brought a date to dinner just so that he wouldn’t have to show up alone when Taylor was coming to show off her new guy. But Troy really couldn’t blame Chad for picking Becca. She was definitely good ammunition against Taylor’s Jake who looked like he played football and stood a good head taller than both Chad and Troy.

“Oh, I see you guys met Chad’s new lady friend,” Sharpay said from across the table.

“Shit, Sharpay. Do you really love making other people uncomfortable that much?” Troy asked her. She pretended to think about it for a second.

“Yeah, I really do,” she smiled, pushing her perfectly styled hair behind her shoulder before turning her attention back to Zeke who was studying the menu like it was a holy document of some kind. Troy couldn’t help but notice the way she let her fingertips lightly trail over his forearm, and he abruptly reached for Gabriella’s hand and pulled her close.

“We should go claim some seats,” she said looking up at him questioningly. He agreed and they headed off for the other end of the table where some seats still remained. “What was that all about?”

“I just wanted you closer to me, is that such a crime?” he asked. She smiled at him and scooted her chair closer to his, placing a hand teasingly on his thigh. “Gabi…”

“What? I just wanted to be closer to you, is that such a crime?” she teased.

He dropped his voice down to a whisper and leaned over so his mouth was right next to her ear. “If you don’t stop moving your hand, it might be.” She just laughed lightly and removed her hand, putting herself at a safe distance once again. Taylor and Jake sat down right across from Troy and Gabriella.

“Troy, this is Jake,” Taylor said proudly, beaming up at him. Jake extended a hand across the table and Troy hesitantly shook his hand, suddenly very aware how much bigger Jake’s hands were than his.

“Do you guys want to split a pizza?” Jake asked them.

“Yeah, sure!” Troy said, and with that the evening was underway. Jake was actually a really cool guy, enough of a brainiac to keep Taylor and Gabriella interested and enough of a jock to engage Troy in conversation as well. After everyone had finished eating, people started mingling a little more. Troy found himself talking with Chad and Becca for quite awhile before Sharpay and Kelsi came up.

“So Becca, we haven’t scared you away, have we?” Sharpay asked.

“Oh no, not at all. You’re much more subdued than most of my friends,” Becca laughed.

“Yikes, remind me not to meet your friends,” Chad laughed.

“You’d better be kidding,” Becca frowned at him.

“Oh, I am, don’t worry,” Chad said, bravely putting his arm around her waist. Sharpay pulled on Troy’s sleeve until he got the hint and the three of them walked away to give them a little privacy.

“They’re awful cozy already,” Kelsi commented with a smile.

“There seems to be a lot of that going around,” Troy said, noticing Taylor holding Jake’s hand while they talked to Jason and Zeke.

“Oh whatever, Becca seems really nice and all, but it’s pretty obviously that Chad brought her along so he wouldn’t feel awkward being here alone when Taylor has a new boyfriend, even though they’ve been broken up for like five months.”

“Sharpay Evans, ever the cynic,” Troy laughed.

“Not a cynic, just honest,” Sharpay shrugged, “Oh Jesus, Zeke’s talking to the chef. I have to go save him from himself. See you guys in a bit!” She squeezed Troy’s arm dramatically while she said that before walking towards the kitchen. Gabriella walked over shaking her head.

“Will she ever give up?” she asked Kelsi.

“I’m not getting in the middle of it!” Kelsi laughed, throwing up her hands before going to stand by Jason.

“What are you talking about?” Troy asked her once they were alone.

“She’s still trying to hit on you! When is she going to give up?” Gabriella whispered. Troy couldn’t help it as he laughed at her.

“You’re crazy! That’s all over now!” he said, still laughing.

“Don’t laugh at me, Troy! This is serious!” Gabriella said, still whispering, but also stomping her foot lightly in frustration. He grabbed her shoulders and turned her around to show her Sharpay and Zeke kissing in a secluded corner of the restaurant.

“See? Over,” Troy stated. She huffed lightly and turned around before smoothing the front of his shirt absently.

“I can’t help it that I get kind of jealous. You’re just so hot I go a little crazy when I think of another girl stealing you away,” Gabriella said, stepping up to him and wrapping her arms around his waist.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he told her, kissing her forehead and hugging her tightly.