"Isn't it fabulous?"

"It's anything but fabulous."

"Nonsense. I planned this party for you. You will like it, Troy Bolton," the girl scoffed, offended. How dare Troy – well, anyone, not appreciate the fine work of Sharpay Evans? As soon as she heard through the grape vine at East High that it was the basketball captain's birthday, she immediately assigned herself the job of planning his party. After all, they were friends now since the whole midsummer's-night-talent-show fiasco.

The pair was situated in front of Troy's living room. He gawked at the sight of it. It looked like it had been decorated for a thirteen year old girl's birthday, and he expected the rest of the house was decorated in the same manner. No wonder Ryan never invited people over to parties at his house. Surveying the room again, he would've expected his mom to do a less embarrassing job.

Hot pink streamers were strung everywhere. Coral colored paper plates and cups were neatly stacked at a refreshments table alongside…pink lemonade. Helium-filled metallic balloons of a variety of colors were tied to anything that would hold them down. And glitter. There was glitter in Troy Bolton's house. That would have to go. Everything would have to go.

Sharpay smiled haughtily. "Never in my life have I planned a birthday party that people would actually want to arrive at. Since my birthday isn't for another five months, I took the liberty of arranging yours," she proudly continued, "you can thank me later."

Troy grunted. He wanted to kill the blond, but he couldn't get blood all over her hard work, now could he? Contrary to other soon-to-be eighteen year olds, he wanted a small get-together with close friends. 'Get-together' meaning date. And 'close friends' being Gabriella. But being the nice person she was, Sharpay had already invited over a bunch of schoolmates that wouldn't give him any time to himself.

"You're coming to the party, right?"

"I want to be there when everyone is commenting on what a good job I've done."

He wondered if she was serious or just trying to annoy him. Troy desperately hoped it was the latter. He thought everyone knew that pink, senior boys and birthday parties didn't mix very well.

"Then I think you should go uh...fix up. Get ready for it because girls take all that time, right?"

"You better not be implying that I look ugly now, but you've got a point. I'll be back in a couple hours for the party." She waved. "Tootles."

She strutted out of the room and he heard the faint sound of a door closing. Troy rubbed his hands together. He had three hours to dispose of all the pink and glitter. And after that he'd have to at least make his house presentable for the guests. Troy, the basketball captain, did have a reputation to live up to. He figured he'd have lost half his dignity when arriving at a Hannah Montana concert several months ago with Gabriella. He couldn't afford to have a Sharpay-decorated eighteenth birthday party. He'd never live through it.

His parents wouldn't be coming home until tomorrow afternoon as they were visiting Troy's aunt that was expecting a baby any day now. They apologized for missing their only son's birthday, but his parents knew he'd appreciate the time alone he'd get with his girlfriend.

Quickly pulling out a garbage bag to collect all of the pink glittery items, Troy searched his mind for an excuse for Sharpay about their absence from the party. How she worked that fast at setting up, he didn't know. But he could only wish she were here to help him tidy up. Troy could've called over some friends, but they wouldn't be able to help while laughing so hard at the sight of the Bolton's house they were practically on the floor.

The door bell rang.

Troy was surprised he could hear it over the loud music blasting from his living room. In preparation for this evening's events, he had blocked off the entrance to the stairs as he didn't want anyone in his parents' room or his room under the influence of alcohol. He opened the door and his expression brightened when he saw who had been behind it.

"Happy Birthday, Troy!" A petite brunette threw her arms around him and planted a soft kiss on his lips. Stunned and forgetting where he was he wrapped his arms around her waist before being interrupted by an amused voice. "You guys do know that I'm here too, and standing outside, I am quite cold."

"Sorry about that, Taylor." Troy grinned as he and Gabriella parted to let the African-American girl enter the house.

She handed Troy two wrapped presents and he accepted them gratefully. "One's from Gabriella. Happy Birthday," Taylor chirped before sauntering off into the crowd of dancing people, presumably to find Chad.

Troy turned his attention back to the girl in his arms. She was dressed pretty casually, receiving a last minute invitation from an intentionally-forgetful Sharpay. He himself wasn't dressed in proper party attire either, having no time to change after the clean-up and preparation. He noted that she looked pretty – no, gorgeous anyways.

Troy had called Ryan in advance and explained his position with Sharpay. He didn't have the experience of lying to her and was unable to think of an explanation. Surprisingly, Ryan handled it. They had come early, being the fifth and sixth guests. With Ryan's talent, Sharpay seemed unfazed by the pink-less house.

A few moments later, Troy let out a heavy sigh as someone (who he recognized from the drama club) bumped into him, spilling her drink. Already intoxicated, all she did was put a hand to her mouth giggle and stumble away. Gabriella followed him upstairs where he changed his shirt. Sensing his discomfort, she hugged him tightly. "Something wrong, birthday boy?"

"I never wanted this...the party, the music and the people. It was all Sharpay's doing." He shrugged, "All I wanted was some alone time with you." Troy collapsed on his bed and covered his face with his hands letting out a muffled groan. He started to retell the story of what happened prior to her arrival, "She came over here and just started to throw pink stuff all over my living room. She had invited all these people unbeknownst to me. So I had to clean up the pink and set up for the party. I'm not in the mood to go back down there."

She squeezed his hand tightly. "You want to get away, right?" He nodded. "Then come with me." She attempted to pull him up.

"I can't leave my own house, Gabi."

"You can and you will. I won't have you being miserable and moping on your own birthday. It should be special," she insisted.

"Where will we go?"

"Anywhere."

She dragged a reluctant Troy out of his room. Politely asking Ryan to supervise everything, she continued to drag him until stopping at a place Troy visited everyday. He looked, dumbfounded, at his surroundings. He looked around again; there was nothing special about it, nothing to do here.

"You want to hang out on my driveway?"

"I thought becoming a year older made people smarter." Gabriella laughed. "Get in the car; we're getting out of here." He proceeded to follow her instructions.

"Where do you want to go?"

His stomach growled.

She laughed again and Troy grinned, loving the sound of her voice. "Do you just want to get pizza and crash at your place?" he asked.

"Sure," she agreed.

After a pizza-and-movie-filled hour and a half, Gabriella motioned to Troy to come with her upstairs. "I want to show you something. I found it last week, but it's been a while since you've been over and now I can finally show you." She hastily ran to her room with Troy following suit. They arrived at her bedroom which was, of course, always neat. Gabriella threw open the French doors and smiled.

"Gabriella, I have seen your balcony before, remember?"

"No, not my balcony. I've figured out a way to get up onto the roof. It's quite comfortable up there, a perfect place to come and think. Also, we seem to have a thing for roofs. There aren't any flowers, and there's no bench, but it's pretty amazing." Troy watched as his girlfriend heaved herself up on the top of her house, using the railing of her balcony to help her. Much to Troy's dismay, Gabriella hadn't decided to wear a skirt that day. He was surprised at how strong and brave she was as he peered at her from bellow.

"How'd you find it? Is it customary for you to just clamber up on roofs of your houses? Are you a singer, dancer, freaky math girl and Santa Claus? I don't think we should be up there. Too dangerous." He shook his head as she patted the space next to her.

Troy hesitantly looked at an impatient Gabriella. "I can't climb," he stated, but she could clearly tell he was nervous. "You've scaled my tree before, Troy. I've done this many times. It's perfectly safe, and there's this breathtaking view…" she trailed off from her perch on her house's roof. She glanced down at him.

"But that was a tree. And it's not like I stayed up on it for a while. It only took a few seconds."

"Take a risk. Remember the concert?" She asked, bringing up the traumatic memories, hoping to prove a point.

"Yes. And how exactly did I benefit from Hannah Montana?"

She didn't reply, or rather, ignored him as she stared up at the sky, sighing. He was still fiddling with the rails of her balcony, debating whether or not to risk his life and possibly get rewarded by his girlfriend or have a safe roof-climbing free birthday.

He chose the first option and hoisted himself up beside Gabriella. He looked down, spotting the grass that seemed oh so far away and gulped. "If I fall and die today, I just want to tell you that I love you, Gabriella."

There was silence.

Honestly, he was expecting a laugh or a giggle…or something other than silence. It was a joke. He had wanted to lighten the situation, make himself feel more comfortable by telling attempting to say something humorous. Oh, God, he wasn't funny, was he? Troy mentally kicked himself. He was so sure that Gabriella was going to dump him on his birthday, realizing she had an embarrassingly not-funny boyfriend.

"Gabriella?"

"I –"

"I'm so sorry. I will never try to be funny again. That was a bad one wasn't it? Please don't dump me. At least wait until tomorrow – when it's not my birthday. If you thought I was serious, I wasn't. I joked about the falling and dying part. I'm not that bad of a climber, it's just that –"

"I love you, too, Troy."

He stared at her. Gabriella had her random moments, but she had just blurted out 'I love you' to him. No wait, she had said 'I love you, too' that meant he had said it first.

"Crap, I didn't mean that."

She looked taken aback. Her eyes sparkled with tears. "So…y-you don't love me?"

"Crap, I didn't mean what I said like that. I meant …well, I do love you, but if you're uncomfortable or anything, I'm sorry. What I said didn't register in my mind, and I thought I said it at the wrong time, and if I did say it at the wrong time – "

Repeating her actions from before, she interrupted his ramble again, grinning. "I did say it back, Troy. You don't have to worry."

No other words were exchanged as the couple leaned against each other, both smiling to themselves now that they've both admitted their true feelings.

Troy broke the quiet by whispering, "In that case, this has been the best birthday I've ever had."