Thanks for all the positive feedback! Here's Chapter 2! It's kinda short….sorry about that. Oh well. Now, read on!

Disclaimer: I do not own High School Musical

Worth the Ride

Chapter 2: Meeting

Troy and Gabriella looked at the person standing in front of them in shock. It was several moments before either of them found their voice.

Troy spoke first. "What the – oh my –what are –Wow."

"Excuse me?" Gabriella asked.

"It's just that –wow. I –I haven't seen you in what, 12 years? And then I visit my secret place in high school, and I see you there! It's just kind of…surprising."

"You do know that prettymuch the whole gang knows about this rooftop garden, right?"

"Yeah –but no one outside the group knows about it." Then, realizing that he was seeing Gabriella, his ex-wife, in the rooftop garden of his old high school, wondered what she was doing here anyways. "Um, Gabriella? If you don't mind me asking….What are you doing here?"

Looking at him pointedly, she replied, "I work here. I was taking a walk."

"Ahh. I bet you teach chemistry," Troy guessed.

" I used to."

"Used to? So what do you do now?"

"I'm the principal."

Troy's eyes widened in shock. "Really? That's amazing! Congratulations!"

"You're here for the all-captain conference, aren't you?" Gabriella asked Troy knowingly.

"I always knew you were smart," Troy told her.

"Troy, they've been talking about it on the news for only, oh I don't know, about a month."

"Really?" Troy asked.

"Mmhmm" Gabriella replied. "Let me guess. You got bored, and decided to get out of the hotel."

Troy stared at her in shock. "How did you -?"

"Troy. I can read you like a book," Gabriella cut him off, smiling.

Troy looked at Gabriella smiling, and couldn't help but smile back.

"So you know what's been going on here? Shar and Zeke got married, as Did Ryan and Kelsi?" she asked.

"Yeah, I do. I got pneumonia during Sharpay and Zeke's wedding, and during Ryan and Kelsi's marriage, my flight got cancelled…and the next one wasn't until the next day. My luck huh?" Troy half-smiled sheepishly.

"Or your bad luck."

Troy laughed. "You always did have a strange sense of humor."

"I know," Gabriella told him. She sighed, then looked at her watch. "Oh no! It's 5:30! I need to get home and make dinner," Gabriella started frantically. "Although in the mood Connie's in, she'll be glad I'm gone," she said, half to herself.

"Connie? Of course, Connie! How is she? I haven't seen her in thirteen years! Can I see her?" Troy blurted out.

"Wow Troy! Um, I would love for you to come see her, but to be frank…she isn't in her best mood right now. Plus she would take it as a shock to see her father for basically the first time. Actually, she doesn't like seeing anyone but her friends these days," Gabriella sighed. "But other than that, she's doing fine. Despite her being hormonal, she's always done really well in school."

"Like mother, like daughters, huh? I swear, your genes rubbed off on them or something; they're so smart. But I know what you mean; it's hard raising a moody teenager," Troy speculated.

"Of course it is. But how do you - oh my goodness, Lily! How is she? Is she ok? Does she eat? Does she do her homework? How well does she do in school?" Gabriella asked, her eyes wide with excitement.

"Great, great. She's a fine young lady. Reminds me of you, in fact. Except for the hair. She has pin-straight hair."

"That's kind of…random. Exact opposite of Connie though. Her curls are just like mine. Her eyes on the other hand. A sparkling blue. They're just like yours," Gabriella told him.

Troy nodded in acknowledgement, and both of them stayed silent for a little while longer before Troy asked the question that was on both of their minds.

"Gabriella…Did you ever tell Connie that she was a twin? Or who her father was? Is?" Troy asked hopefully.

"The twin thing - no. The dad thing - I told her that he had to move away because of his job and that I didn't want to," Gabriella winced. "Are you mad?"

Troy looked shocked. "Mad? Of course not! I told her basically the same thing. I just didn't mention the twin thing, and I told her that her mom didn't want to move."

Gabriella acknowledged this, and nodded. Both stayed silent for a few minutes, before Gabriella spoke. "We have to get them to meet, Troy."

Troy was shocked. "What?"

"Well, if not each other, then at least us. I haven't seen Lily for thirteen years. Thirteen years, Troy. Do you know how long that is for a mother? I brought Lily into this world, and I seriously don't like not being able to see her everyday. I love Connie, and I love Lily equally, even though I haven't seen her for 13 years."

"And I haven't seen Connie for 13 years," he said quietly.

After a while, Troy spoke again. "I have an idea."

"Yes?"

"We tell them that we met each other, and that we want to send them to each other. So you could get Lily for a week, and I could take Connie. And we wouldn't have to tell them about the whole 'twin thing.'"

"That's a great idea…except for the fact that our girls have their own bedrooms. And if they switched homes for a week, they're bound to find out that they have a twin," Gabriella said, as always, being sensible.

"We could keep the room's door closed…" Troy said, knowing it wouldn't help.

"That would be great…but they'd be bound to get into the room one way or another."

"We could tell them that we always wanted a teenage daughter. So we made a room…."

Gabriella looked at him thoughtfully. "That one is good….but I'm not sure if it's good enough."

"That's because it isn't good enough," Troy told Gabriella.

"Look Troy. I agree with you about meeting the girls. But it's just not possible," Gabriella mused.

"It might be."

"Maybe. Look, I seriously have to go make dinner. But we'll see if we can come up a solution. I'm assuming you have a new cell phone number?" She half-asked, half stated.

"Nope," he shook his head.

"Ok, then. See you around, Troy" Gabriella said softly and started to go. As she reached the top of the stairs, she turned around, and said thoughtfully, "Did it occur to you that we spilt up thirteen years ago, but yet we just had a decent conversation?"

"Yeah…weird, huh?"

Gabriella laughed, as did Troy.

"Talk to you later," Gabriella said, and left.

As they were alone, they both thought that maybe they - and their daughters - had missed out on a lot over the past thirteen years by not being with each other.

Eh, that seemed somewhat unrealistic to me. Oh well. Review, please!

Susmita B-) :D