Afternote: I finished the second half of this chapter. I decided to add it as Chapter 3: PART 2. So please ignore all the messages below! And go read the second half!!!

Also, I just changed the name of this chapter from Sympathy to Guilt. I thought that fit the content better.

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Alright, so, this is not the entire chapter. Meaning: I will add more to this. But I just wanted to post it now so you guys wouldn't think I gave up on this story. :) So I'll probably have the rest up by the end of this week/weekend.

Thanx for reading!

And review!

-BeautifulDanger


Chapter Two: Guilt

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The next morning, Troy was rudely awakened.

Last night when Gabby and he ended their fruitless conversation, he broke down. His deeply entrenched dam, an endless body of heartache enclosed within, had suddenly cracked. He was powerless to stop it; he just gave in. And let the tears flow. It was the hardest he'd cried since … since he lost her. And slowly, as the well dried up, he dozed off.

He'd cried himself to sleep.

To be more specific, he cried himself into a very uncomfortable sleep on a flimsy, hard wood table in the middle of an ice cold kitchen at four o'clock in the snow-slashed morning. Then, when his seven-year-old alarm clock—the one he's had since he was thirteen—resounded quietly from the bedroom, it took him a full five minutes to orientate himself, and pull his head out of the fog. Slurping up the puddle of drool dripping from his lips, his droopy eyes fluttered open. Confused and irritated, he glanced over his surroundings, wondering what he was doing in the kitchen. And more importantly, why he wasn't in his nice, warm bed.

It was in that lost moment that his fingers reflexively twitched and he felt a surge of cold metal on his nerves. He glanced down to his arm that lay across the table, numb and tingling, and spotted the cell phone clutched in his hand.

Oh, yeah. He sighed, reliving everything from last night, and pushed himself out from the table. He had no time to mope about; he had to get ready for work.

If it wasn't one thing he slaved away at, it was the other.

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Gabriella honked.

Glancing one last time in the mirror, he grabbed his jacket, swung it over his arms, and headed for the door. But as he reached out, his hand hovered over the knob, poised mid-air. His stomach churned like a school-boy paralyzed by the butterflies in his belly. This was the first time in a long while that he'd witnessed Gabby's presence. He'd talked with her on the phone a few times before, but never actually seen her. But today, he would finally get his chance. And he didn't know why, but he was nervous about it.

Chastising himself for the silliness of it all, Troy finally just yanked open the door, and stepped into the strip of landing descending into a set of stairs. Closing the door behind him, he fumbled with his key to lock it, completely oblivious to the woman standing right behind him, watching his every move.

"Troy."

He jumped clean out of his skin and spun around. He came face-to-face with his strict, full-figured, black landlord: Taylor Mckessie. He let out a breath of air. Taylor arched a brow at his odd behavior.

"Hi. Sorry about last month's rent, I promise I'll have it—"

"Don't worry about it."

Troy was shocked. This was coming from the woman that came barricading into his apartment at three in the morning—he cursed himself later for forgetting to lock the door—just to demand the five dollars he'd accidentally left off the rent. This from the woman who revoked his washer/dryer privileges because of a complaint from an elderly neighbor that found his misplaced boxer shorts and kindly tacked them to his door. And now, she was telling him not to worry about his overdue expenses?

Flabbergasted, Troy stared at her with his mouth hanging open, eyes dashing side-to-side in a confused manner.

"That's not what I'm here for," Taylor continued when it was apparent that Troy had been rendered mute.

"Oh," he whispered. Well, he thought, this could either mean something really good or really bad. Troy released the knob he was squeezing and shoved his hands in his pockets. Gabby honked the horn again.

"Last night, I received a few complaints that your neighbors heard a very … intense crying throughout the evening, and from what I could decipher, it was coming from your apartment," she relayed to him professionally.

Okay, someone needed a serious slap in the face. What, now he was not even allowed to cry? This was ridiculous, not to mention humiliating! Troy's face hardened dramatically.

"Look, Ms. Mckessie, I don't know how or who thought they could just—"

"Troy," she said over him, so that he stopped his speech. "I … I just wanted to say … that I'm here … if you need to talk."

Troy blinked, his jaw clenched. She was offering him her sympathy.

"There is nothing to talk about."

And he threw it in her face.

He dashed down the stairs, and out onto the sidewalk, not even bothering to glance back at the dejected expression laying heavily on his landlord's face.

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Most boys my age would be scared of this. Terrified, even. But I wasn't. I was jumping out of my skin in anticipation. The excitement swelled in my chest, and I could barely contain my smile. It was seething through the seams of my straight-lined lips. Because I knew. I knew she was the one.

Shar, my exceedingly intuitive girl, caught on right away.

We sat in the front seats of my car, with the top down, watching the sun slowly dip into the lake. We hadn't done this in a while, and now with the suppressed smile on my features, she knew something was up. Finally, she looked at me with a knowing grin.

"I will pry this out of you, no matter how hard you try to pretend you don't have something up your sleeve," she said with a smile, rolling her eyes. A pause and then, she finished with, "So which will it be: …the easy way or the hard?"

"That depends on how much you want to know," I said with a flirty grin, cocking a brow.

"Hmmm, I guess then I'll just find something else to occupy my time," she said, sticking her nose in the air as she turned her face to the wind, blocking me from sight. I laughed and nudged her arm.

"Oh come on, I know you wanna know." She refused to look at me, a smug smile playing on her lips.

"No, but it seems you desperately want to tell me." Sighing, I turned away from her, defeated.

"Well, I guess it's just you and me then, Troy." I said to myself.

In a much deeper voice I began, "So what is this evil trick you have up your sleeve?" Then I answered in my normal tone, carrying on this one-sided conversation with me and Troy 2, while Shar watched amused.

"Oh, no trick. No sleeve. I was just thinking about the future."

"Ah. What about the future, Troy?"

"Well, Troy, I…," I took a deep breath and stared into Shar's hazel eyes, "…I was hoping I wouldn't have to live alone anymore."

Shar's eyes glistened and softened into a sad, sorry expression. She sighed and lowered her face into her hands, shaking her head in dismay.

"Troy, please don't do this to me…"

Sharpay Evans was my good girl. She took my sad story of a life and turned it into something worthwhile. I couldn't care less about my existence until she came along and turned all I knew upside down, and flipping my thoughts right-side up. Shar acted out a cliché and made a bad boy go good. She had morals. She had mercy. And kindness. And I had nothing. But I learned from her example.

She thought she knew what I was asking.

She thought I just wanted us to move in with each other.

But she completely underestimated her hard work.

She underestimated me.

Before she could say anymore, I pulled out a copper coil I bent into a ring shape in my Dad's mechanic shop, gently took her hand and slipped it onto her finger. Shar sniffled and looked up, finding a smile suffocating every other feature on my face and an engagement ring on her thin finger. She started crying. But they were tears of joy.

"Sharpay Amanda Evans, will you marry me?" I lifted her fingers to my lips and kissed them softly.

She nodded profusely, too drenched in tears to even speak.

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The cold morning air hit Troy hard.

It was as if the wind slapped him across the face, sucking all breath and existence from his lungs. Quickly, as he exited the apartment building and spotted Gabriella's silver mini-van, Troy tugged his thin jacket closer to his body and shoved his bare hands into his pockets.

[For the second half, go to Chapter 3: PART 2!]


Please review. They encourage me to keep writing. And I know you want to read more of this. But I could be wrong. Of course, I'll never know unless ... you review! :)

-BD