Scenes from Freshman Year presents: Gabriella/Ryan/Taylor/ Manhattan

Rated T but could go up to M

Summary: What happens when you put three very brokenhearted friends/ex friends in the same city around Thanksgiving? Nothing good, that is for sure. A Scenes from Freshman Year story

Post HSM3

This story is set in the same universe as my story Scenes from Freshman year. That story follows Chad and Sharpay during their first year of college. For a while, I wanted to write a story about what the other wildcats were doing at the same time. You do not need to read SFFY to understand this one. It might be more fun not to know what is going on in the other story. Everything you need to know will be mentioned in this story. This is going to be short, no more than a couple of chapters.

Main characters: Gabriella, Ryan, and Taylor

Possible Pairings: Gabriella/Ryan or Ryan/Taylor

Disclaimer: I do not own High School Musical.

Chapter One: Scene Setter

Ryan Evans always dreamed of being on Broadway. Unlike his sister, he didn't want to be an actor but rather a dancer. He knew from the age of five when they worked with the choreographer all the time that he was to be a dancer. When he got into Juilliard, he knew his dream would come true. He was upset about his sister not coming with him. They have always been together and it was strange to be apart for the first time.

At first things were easier because his girl friend Kelsey was with him in NYC. That was until his girlfriend broke up with him for no reason whatsoever. All she said was that she could not love him as more than a friend. Ryan felt as if she stabbed him in the heart with a knife. Even though she did not love him, he loved her.

At least he and Kelsey were still friends or were trying to be. They were still such good friends that he drove Kelsey and her roommate to JFK. If Ryan were not so focused on trying to drive through rush hour traffic, he would notice Kelsey holding Natasha's hand. Yet Ryan did not see this and was still completely unaware of the real reason why his relationship with Kelsey did not work out.

Ryan would talk to his sister or his best friend Chad about the breakup, if they were not preoccupied with making out. Ryan sister was currently dating Chad. Actually, it went beyond dating. Ryan and Chad's ex girlfriend Taylor referred to it as pre marriage. Ryan was positive that by the end of freshman year, he would have a brother in law. That or Ryan would be an Uncle.

There was no way he was going to tell his blissfully happy so in love sister about being dumped and being in love with someone who didn't love him. Instead, he commiserated with his friend Taylor who understood exactly what he was going through.

Taylor understood a broken heart perfectly, because Chad and Sharpay technically got together while Taylor was still dating Chad. What made it worse Taylor found out about the two before Chad was able to break the news gently. This resulted in a plasma television being smashed. When Kelsey broke up with Ryan, he threw away every single CD or DVD that contained anything Kelsey composed. He even threw away the sheet music.

Ryan blamed himself for Taylor's heart being broken. In an attempt to keep Sharpay safe at A of U, he manipulated things in a way that led to his sister hooking up with Chad. He felt so guilty that he invited Taylor for a shopping weekend in Manhattan during Thanksgiving break. He reserved a suite at the Gardens Hotel in midtown Manhattan for them. He would be treating her to shopping and a day trip to the best spa in New York. Ryan felt this would be the perfect way to make up everything to Taylor.

The other thing that Ryan was planning on doing was helping Taylor work things out with Gabriella. A few weeks ago, Gabriella and Taylor had the mother of all best friend breakups. Taylor will not talk to him about what happen and Gabriella has no idea why Taylor stopped calling.

If Ryan knew why Taylor stopped talking to Gabriella, he definitely would not be trying to get the two back together. Ryan didn't know that Gabriella humiliated Taylor by posting a clip of Taylor's ex boyfriend doing inappropriate things with Ryan sister on YouTube. The clip was made accidentally when Chad was still technically dating Taylor and somebody's spike Sharpay's drink at a party. Don't ask, it is a long dysfunctional story.

If Ryan knew that Gabriella was the one responsible for humiliating his sister and two of his good friends he would most likely push her out the window of a high-rise. However, none of Ryan's friends told him about Gabriella's involvement, because they didn't want him to be brought up on homicide charges.

Taylor McKessie was definitely not having a good year. She hated her school. She hated her roommate. She hated her former best friend. She also hated the fact that her boyfriend of over a year and a half fell in love with someone else. Most of the anger and pain had dissipated by this point. She and Chad had talked things out. Maybe at some point down the road they could be friends again. Talking to Ryan helped a lot. They definitely bonded over their mutual heartbreak.

There was also her Aunt Vanessa's stepdaughter Kim. Aunt Vanessa was not Taylor's real aunt, but rather of really good friend of her mother. Even though she really didn't know the girl that well at the time, Kim was the one who helped her the day she found out about her boyfriend falling in love with someone else. Now Taylor talked to Kim all the time.

Around the time that Gabriella completely ruined their friendship by posting a certain video on YouTube, Kim put a very dangerous idea into Taylor's mind.

"I don't know why Chad and Sharpay keep apologizing. It's not like they can do anything to make up for what happened." Taylor said to Kim on the phone.

"I'm sure keeping you from getting expelled for demolishing two dorm rooms when you found out about their relationship was a good start. They just feel bad about what happened and want to make it up to you. They did not plan on hurting you." Kim said trying to comfort her, but it did not help.

"I know they were not planning on it, but it still hurt. There's no way to be even for something like this." Taylor said with a sigh.

"You could always sleep with Ryan." Kim said with a laugh.

Taylor knew Kim meant it as a joke. Yet, she could not get the idea out of her mind. At the time, Ryan was still with Kelsey. There was no way Taylor was going to do to her friend what Sharpay did to her. Now that Ryan and Kelsey were no more, the ideal had a certain appeal. In a weird way, it made sense. However, Taylor could not bring herself to use Ryan like that.

Then a couple of weeks ago her brother sent her footage of the play that he co-wrote with Sharpay. Her evil 12-year-old Brother Jason did not warn her about the Chad/Sharpay make out scene at the end of the play. Unlike the previous video footage she witness, this time she could tell the two were very much in love. That is what hurt the most. Taylor was not upset because Sharpay had Chad. Taylor was upset because Sharpay had someone that truly loved her.

After being forced to watch Chad kiss Sharpay in a way that he never kissed her, she convinced herself that maybe hooking up with Ryan just to spite Sharpay wouldn't be such a bad idea. They were both very lonely after the breakups. It would just be a rebound thing for both of them. It would be a way for the two of them to work through the pain. At least that is how Taylor justified it in her mind when she started packing her black lace lingerie for her trip to see Ryan.

Taylor started her plan at the train station the Tuesday before thanksgiving when she kissed Ryan on the cheek when he hugged her. When they stopped for coffee on the way to the hotel, she started flirting with him and he flirted back. They spent the whole time talking about everything from his crazy roommate who played the Chad/Sharpay almost sex tape constantly to annoy Ryan to her plans to transfer to a school in the DC area. Things were going good that afternoon for Taylor until she saw the last person she wanted to see at the hotel.

Gabriella Montez had not been in a good mood sense her boyfriend broke up with her for no good reason last month. She didn't believe his excuse about not being able to be in a serious relationship at the moment. She knew that was a complete lie.

On the advice of her fellow sorority Sister Mercedes, she showed up at his dorm room every day for the first week after their breakup trying to convince him it was the wrong decision. She tried not to think about the fact that she visited him more in the week after the breakup then in the entire time since they started school.

Finally, he told her the real reason why he broke up with her. He was a little upset about her breaking into his computer and posting a file of Chad and Sharpay doing very naughty things to the Internet. It was just a joke. She had no idea why he was taking it so seriously. She should be the one upset for him having something like that on his computer in the first place. He was probably using the video file for private time.

The day after Troy return from his first away game of the season Gabriella decided to surprise Troy by showing up to his dorm room in nothing but a trench coat and stilettos. Mercedes told her it was a sure fire way to get Troy back. Troy's reaction to the whole thing was to leave her alone in his dorm room for 3 hours.

"I thought you said this would work." Gabriella yelled at her roommate after she returned home from her failed seduction attempt.

"How was I supposed to know your ex boyfriend was different than most guys we know. Some guys don't want things they can have easily. Some men like a challenge. If your ex thinks someone else wants you, maybe he'll come back." Mercedes said in an attempt to calm Gabriella down.

"What are you suggesting?"

"Make him jealous."

"Like that's going to work on Troy. The only time I've ever seen him the least bit jealous was when he caught me hanging out with my friend Ryan."

"So use Ryan."

"That's not going to work. He lives in Manhattan at the moment."

"Your mom lives in New York City right now. I bet you're going up for Thanksgiving in a couple of weeks."

"Yes and I already have plans to meet Ryan for dinner the Wednesday before Thanksgiving."

"So just turned dinner into something more and take a picture of it."

What Gabriella didn't know was Mercedes was purposely giving her bad advice. Mercedes had a very large crush on Gabriella's ex and wanted to ensure that Gabriella was out of the way.

What Mercedes and Gabriella did not know was that Troy was in a very serious relationship with Gabriella's predecessor and successor Kim. The same Kim that was now Taylor's new BFF.

Because Gabriella was completely ignorant of what was going on she decided to go to Manhattan with the full intent of seducing Ryan as Mercedes suggest. The most important part of her plan was getting to spend more time with Ryan. Using a really good sob story, she was able to convince Ryan to let her stay with him at his hotel suite. 15 minutes with her parading around in her most skimpy outfits, she would have the footage she needed to make Troy completely jealous. There was just one problem.

"What is she doing here?" Gabriella and Taylor yelled at the same time as they saw the other girl at the hotel. When the two girls started yelling at each other Ryan wondered if he should have listened to Chad and kept these two girls a part.

A/N: For everyone who is reading Scenes from Freshman Year, I have the draft of chapter 20 almost done and will post in a few days.