Memory
Our chance meeting in that little diner at the corner of the street across the theater was very memorable, but it wasn't what you'd call romantic.
Usually when rehearsals don't go so well I'd sneak out for a while and go to this little diner at the end of the street across the theater and order the most scrumptious turkey sandwich this side of New York to chase away the negative energy that gives me wrinkles. Vain, I know. The sandwich gets the work done and in fifteen minutes tops I'm back in the theater, rehearsing like I wasn't yelled at moments ago.
That day though, I didn't go to the diner to eat my problems away. I went there, like a normal person, to have dinner. Rehearsals ran late, I was tired and I was hungry. So I sat down at my favorite booth and nodded to Nora, she nodded back. Nora knew me so well I didn't have to go through the normal patron routine of waving my hand for attention, scrutinize the menu for ten minutes and then ordering the first dish that my eyes landed on, nine minutes ago.
My sandwich came and I ate in bliss while reading a Cosmo magazine unaware of the world around me. When I was done, I looked up to signal to Nora that I needed my bill. She wasn't anywhere in sight so I shrieked in surprise when she suddenly materialized on my left.
"Need anythin' else, honey?" she asked me in a sweet voice.
"Oh… Nora! I didn't see you there…" I was still gasping copious amounts of air from shock and trying to calm my wildly pounding heart with my hand so I was stuttering like an idiot.
"I need my…" before I could finish, I was rudely interrupted.
"Excuse me," a horribly familiar voice, which sounded sexy and irritated, said behind me, "Not to be rude or anything, but I was ordering my meal… first."
I knew Nora favored me as a patron, along with a few others, but something in the man's voice made me just as irritated as he was. I also knew that defending Nora's mistake of leaving her customer in mid-order would also be a mistake, on my part, morally. But I still turned around.
"Well excuse you… you… Troy?" I stammered in shock as I stared right into the face of the man who once haunted my dreams and fantasies during highschool. He raised an eyebrow and gave me a cocky smile in return.
"Excuse me what, Evans?" I could hear the tremendous amounts of amusement oozing from his voice and he must have never seen me stammer ever before. Come to think of it, he hasn't.
"Well excuse me, Bolton, but I'm a regular here. Ergo, Nora knows me better than you. Rough translation: who are you to try and change that?" I snapped at him feeling victorious. That feeling didn't last long when I happened to glance at Nora and saw her guilty expression.
"Another regular." Troy told me smugly folding his hands over his chest, the smile never leaving his face. We both looked expectantly at Nora.
"You see… honey… I knew you needed your uh, bill." I noticed the blush creeping into her face, "So I wanted to speed things up a little so I could go back… and…" she couldn't continue. I got the point anyway.
"I'll just leave my payment here," I opened my purse and got my wallet, got the exact amount I needed and put it on the table, "And I'll put my plate over it so nobody will notice and be tempted." I placed the bills under the plate and stood up.
"Night Nora," she nodded, "… and Troy." Troy nodded and waved.
I strode out onto the night and I was looking around for a cab when I suddenly felt very chilly. New York had a different climate from Albuquerque and over the years I had gotten quite used to the biting chill it offers but tonight was just different. It wasn't even winter yet. That's when I realized that I left my scarf and overcoat back inside the diner. And I realized that after hailing a taxi who drove with its windows partially open because it was "stuck." I got down in front of my apartment and automatically felt for my keys. Another realization dawned on me when I remembered that I usually place my apartment keys inside my overcoat. I didn't have my spare because my niece accidentally flushed it in the toilet and so it was, I was officially having the crappiest night of my life. I sat down on the steps to my apartment and pondered on going back to the diner when a taxi pulled up right in front of me.
"Joe (Nora's husband) makes the most fantastic hamburgers this side of New York. They get better every day! Look I even got a scarf and an overcoat for it, but I don't really know what to do with them. They aren't my size, maybe you'd like them?" I looked up and stared at my overcoat and scarf.
"Well, aren't you going to slowly take them from my hands, look meaningfully up at me and then suddenly hug me like you're life depended on it?" his big, cheesy grin didn't melt my heart that night, but it usually did afterwards.
"You sure are cocky tonight Bolton. Think you're gonna get laid?" I told him tartly and grabbed my overcoat and scarf. I hurriedly fished the pocket for my keys and when I got them turned around and marched up to my apartment. I didn't mean to be so cold hearted so I stopped and turned around again in time to see Troy walking away. When did I get to be so stupid?
"Troy!" I wasn't supposed to be yelling, it's not good for my voice.
"Troy!" yelling wasn't doing me any good, so I decided that running after him might be a better decision.
"Troy!" I yelled for the third time while running in three inch heels.
What happened next was all a blur to me because the next, vivid, thing I remember Troy was holding me up looking very worried.
"Are you okay?" he asked me carefully, maybe afraid I'd gone insane. I admit, maybe I was already insane, at that point.
"Do I look disfigured or anything?" I asked, standing up to see if I got wounded or anything.
"No, but you were really running way too fast for a normal human being." Troy chuckled and I frowned at him.
"Hey, lighten up," he said and it made me smile. It made me laugh, in fact.
"I'm really sorry I've been all bitchy tonight…"
"I'm used to it. Four years of training back in highschool."
"Shut up, Troy."
"Nah, you shut up, Pay."
He called me Pay. Nobody has ever called me that before. It was always Shar or Pay-pay but never, just, Pay. I smiled at him.
"So Bolton, why did they give you my overcoat?" I asked him playfully. We were walking back to my apartment and it was quite a long walk. I sprinted four blocks in three inch heels, I couldn't believe it.
"They didn't. You left in a hurry you forgot them so I told Nora I'll skip dinner and followed you out. Only when I opened the door you were speeding away in a cab. Took the next one that came and followed you here… to this got forsaken place on the West Side." I glanced at him.
"What's wrong with being here?" I asked testily, he shrugged.
"I always took you for that girl who owns a penthouse on the East Side and comes with her own army of personal assistants." This time I laughed and shook my head.
"Glad to know I surprised you for not being that girl…"
"Actually, I'm not surprised at all. I like it! I like the fact you proved me wrong."
"And so what if I proved you wrong Troy Bolton? Does it make a difference in your otherwise perfect life?"
"It does Pay… it does," he smiled and I tried not to look into his eyes. I think I'll melt into goo if I did. At this point we were already standing at the entrance to my apartment.
"How big is the impact?"
"For a guy like me…? I guess a whole lot, considering the fact that I feel alive again."
"What does that mean?" I really didn't know what he wanted to imply.
"Let's just say I was gonna tell you how much I like you back in highschool but I never got the chance but I never got over you and meeting you here and standing right in front of you now seems like a miracle. A scene I've only played in my mind."
"What about Gabriella?"
"What about her?"
"Doesn't she like matter… anymore?"
"No," he said, "She doesn't matter anymore…"
She doesn't matter anymore…
She doesn't matter anymore…
I don't matter anymore…
"I don't matter anymore!" the high pitched nasal scream woke me up and I looked around in the light of dawn to find out the source of the horrible voice. I felt Troy stirring beside me then he tensed.
"You don't go around sleeping with that slut and then tell me you want a divorce Troy Bolton!"
"Gabriella calm down! You've been drinking again!"
"NO! I WILL NOT CALM DOWN GOD DAMN YOU!" I couldn't see clearly but I could hear Troy wrestling with his ex-wife. A shot rang out and Troy was sprawled on the floor, wheezing. I looked at the deranged mess standing unsteadily that was Gabriella. She looked back at me.
There is a time, they say, that when you are about to die your life flashes before your eyes. Memories flood your mind and you remember all the good things that happen in your life. There were a lot of memories that I've treasured through the years but never one as poignant nor as treasured as when I met Troy that night at the diner.
He asked me out that after telling me Gabriella didn't matter anymore. He asked me out again the next night and then the next night. It didn't take me long to find out that after college he married Gabriella. They were happy for the first couple of years. She bore him a son but he died and he said they started drifting apart. She started drinking and he tried to fix their marriage but there was nothing he could do about it.
By the time we met, he came from a meeting with a suicide doctor. I was shocked at the gravity of his problems so when I remembered that seeing me "made him feel alive again" I understood exactly what he wanted to say. The thing about telling me he liked me back in highschool, was true, but he didn't have the heart yet to be totally honest. We had been seeing each other for a few months, and I knew that it was wrong but the time we spent together was so magical, so incredibly awesome I didn't want it to end.
When he told me he had divorced Gabriella I felt happy for him. He never looked so free. We spent the first night of his freedom in my apartment. Then Gabriella came banging on the door.
"I matter in this world, Evans. Only I, matter in this world." and itt was the last thing I heard.