And so it continued for the next few weeks. Taylor, Chad, and Troy did all they could to make Gabriella feel welcome. They offered her help, offered to introduce her to people, even invited her to go to some school activities with them. Each time, Gabriella politely declined.

"No, thank you. I'll be fine." Was the automatic response she gave. She understood that they were only trying to be nice. But, it wasn't fair to them. She knew she would never be able to be close friends with them, as much as she craved it, and she wasn't even sure if she'd be staying in Albuquerque for long, even if her mother insisted that this would be their final destination for a while. She was just convinced that a friendship with her would only lead to hurt for one or both parties involved. It's not fair of me to put all my problems on another person, she reminded herself for what seemed to be the millionth time. She felt bad for rebutting their attempts to befriend her, but it was what was best.

One day in October, Gabriella sat in homeroom, eagerly awaiting the bell. The sooner the day starts, the sooner it's over, she told herself. She spied Taylor walking over with a determined look and she quickly tried to busy herself with homework. Taylor sat down next to her and leaned towards her.

"Am I bothering you?" She asked bluntly.

"I-I'm sorry? What?"

"You know, like, am I annoying you?" Seeing Gabriella's confused look, Taylor continued. "It just seems like you really don't want me to talk to you. I mean, I want to be your friend, but I... I also don't want to make you mad. So if you want me to stop trying, I will."

Gabriella sat there, stunned. She had to admit, Taylor was probably the most persistent girl she's ever met in high school. Usually, people stopped trying long before this. For some reason, Gabriella didn't want her to stop. She wasn't saying she was ready to have sleepovers with her, but she liked their morning chats, in a way. So, for a brief moment, Gabriella's wall slipped.

"No! I mean, no...you don't annoy me. Or bother me. Or anything like that."

"Well, then what is it? You never want to hang out, in or out of school, you don't want to join the Scholastic Decathalon, even though I've seen your test scores in Physics, and you would be an amazing asset to the team, and you never really encourage conversations. I'm just not sure I understand." She said, not unkindly.

"I'm just...I'm not very good with friends." Gabriella said quietly. She had never told that to anyone except herself. Instead of looking at her like she was crazy, like Gabriella expected, Taylor just nodded.

"Okay, well, I'm not going to pressure you into being friends with me. But, I'm not going to give up, either." She said confidently, smiling. Gabriella returned the smile, and the conversation quickly turned to Physics homework.

From that moment on, Gabriella subconsciously made more of an effort to talk to Taylor, Chad, and Troy. It wasn't as if she all of a sudden was a chatterbox, it was much more subtler than that. She would lean over and correct an answer of Troy's when he did homework in homeroom, or she would sit in Chad's new homeroom seat every now and then, encouraging the nickname he had for her, "Seat-Stealer Montez." She'd giggle a little louder when Troy would put a 'Kick Me' sign on Chad, waiting along with everyone else for him to find out. Every now and then she could swear that she'd look up and Troy would be staring at her, analyzing her. She brushed it off as her imagination. Because, even though she wouldn't admit it, Troy Bolton's blue, analyzing eyes, were the most beautiful she'd ever seen.

About a week after Gabriella's confession to Taylor, something strange happened. She was eating lunch alone in the cafeteria, which was not something strange at all, but all of a sudden she was startled out of her daydreaming by a voice next to her ear.

"Hey there," Troy Bolton greeted as he leaned down next to Gabriella Montez at lunch one day. "You wouldn't happen to want to come eat lunch with me and some of the others, would you?" He asked as he motioned with his towards a table full of laughing and talking jocks, cheerleaders, even Taylor was over there, giggling at Chad for reasons unknown.

"Oh!" Gabriella said, surprised. Troy was always nice to her in homeroom, and even smiled at her in the halls, but never really went out of his way to talk to her otherwise. "Well, no thank you. That's really nice and all, but..."

"Gotcha. Well, no problem, I'm just going to go get lunch now." Troy said, backing up. Gabriella nodded, and returned to staring blankly at her Trigonometry book that lay open on the table in front of her. Not a minute later, someone slid into the seat next to her.

She looked up only to be completely shocked to see Troy Bolton making himself comfortable at her table, opening up his carton of milk.

"Umm..." she started, confused.

"Well," he said, interpreting her confused look correctly. "You said you weren't going to come sit with me, so I decided to come sit with you."

"But...won't they..." she gestured vaguely to his usual table, where a few people had taken notice of where he was sitting.

"Won't they what?" Troy questioned. "Be completely jealous that I'm the first one to eat lunch with the elusive Gabriella Montez? Yup, probably."

Gabriella let out a bark of laughter at his joke. "I'm sure..." she muttered.

After they ate in silence for a few minutes, Gabriella had to ask.

"Why exactly are you...here?" She blurted out finally.

"Because you are." He responded quickly, expecting the question. "And so far you've completely blown me off in homeroom, where you are forced to sit there for ten minutes, stationary, and I thought maybe it'd be fun if we had a little more room to work with. Like, once I ask something personal, maybe this time you could make a run for it instead of rummaging in your backpack."

She stared at him, her jaw dropped in shock. He took this opportunity to lean over and close her mouth with a finger.

"You'll catch flies, with your mouth open like that." He joked. "And besides, don't look so surprised. You think I haven't noticed that whenever anyone asks you something remotely personal, you totally avoid the subject? Or the way that you don't want to offend Taylor after she probably gave you some schtick designed to make you feel guilty that you don't want to be friends with her? Hey, hey, don't be mad," he said, noticing the dark cloud that passed over Gabriella's features. "She just wants to make everyone happy, she didn't mean anything by it. But anyway, what I'm saying is that I just want to get to know you. And I know you've made it completely clear that you, well, don't want to get to know me, but I have to try, right?" He finished with a nervous smile, completely and unknowingly melting Gabriella's heart.

Gabriella smiled and played with some of the food on her plate, twirling pasta around her fork, letting it go, and twirling it again. Just when Troy thought she wasn't going to respond to him, she turned.

"I'm not very good with friends." She repeated, the same thing she had said to Taylor previously. Unlike Taylor, though, Troy didn't let the subject go.

"How many friends have you had?" He asked, catching her off guard. She sat there, giving him a searching look, trying to read his motives.

"Not many." She responded. She refused to say 'none.' That was too lame for ever her.

"You don't know until you try, Gabi." She looked up sharply at the nickname. "I-I'm sorry. I don't know why I just called you that, it just slipped out, I didn't mean to offend you." He apologized.

"No, it's okay." She responded slowly. "I just haven't heard it in a long time..."

"Well, listen,...Gabi," he said, pausing to see if the nickname was okay. When she didn't ask that he stop calling her that, he continued. "I want to get to know you. I know that this is probably not what you want to hear, and I don't care. Until you give me a reason to not want to, I'm going to sit with you every day at lunch. And I know that you don't feel comfortable talking about yourself, so we'll work up to that. But for now, I'm just going to answer your questions. Eventually, should my plan work out, you'll get so fed up with my voice that you'll want to share some of your own fun facts."

Gabriella laughed at his plan. He seemed fairly determined to get to know her. So, for the rest of the lunch period, she did just as he requested. Of course, she wasn't about to let him think that she was interested in him, so she resulted to generic questions. By the end of the lunch period, Gabriella was able to name all the different cliques at East High, along with the teachers, their subjects, and how to get to every mall in a forty mile radius.

Too soon for both of them, the bell rang, signaling the end of lunch. As they gathered their stuff, Gabriella snuck Troy a look, and a questioned escaped her lips before she could second guess it.

"Why?"

"Why what?" He asked.

"Why do you want to get to know me?" Her soft voice was almost drowned out by the shuffle in the cafeteria.

"Because you're not like other girls, Gabriella Montez. Not at all." Smiling at the softened look in Gabi's eyes, he continued. "And I know for a fact that you knew I was the one who put a 'Kick Me' sign on Chad, but you didn't breathe a word."

At this, Gabriella laughed, and Troy knew he was a goner.

-----

Troy didn't know what overcame him when he went to go sit with Gabriella at lunch. He knew he was drawn to her, but usually he wasn't so...proactive. His little stunt at lunch wasn't unnoticed by his friends.

As he made his way to Anatomy after his enjoyable lunch with Gabriella, he was blind sided by his two best friends, Chad and Taylor.

"What'd she say?!" Taylor screeched in his ear, instantly falling into step with Troy. Chad hurriedly caught up and seemed just as interested.

"Nothing, guys, really." Troy mumbled, but couldn't seem to get the small smile on his face to go away.

"Mmmhmm, sure, nothing." Chad said, giving him a knowing look. He clearly didn't believe a word Troy was saying. "You sat with her, I'm pretty sure I even saw a genuine smile on her face, and you say nothing?"

"She doesn't really smile a lot, does she?" Troy asked, mostly to himself.

"She does when you're around." Taylor interjected helpfully. She knew Gabriella had all the potential to be an amazing friend, student, and all around person. She just needed a little help, and if that person could be Troy, all the better.

-----

Gabriella and Troy continued eating lunch together every day for the rest of the week. Gabriella never tired of learning more about the boy sitting in front of her, even though she knew that he must be getting sick of answering her incessant questions.

"Okay, so," Troy began as they sat down at their usual lunch table, somewhat secluded in the back of the cafeteria. "I decided to change things up - if you're amenable, of course."

Gabriella tossed him a confused and somewhat apprehensive glance.

"I am going crazy not knowing anything about you, so," he hurried on, seeing Gabriella's hesitancy, "I think our questions should be able to go both ways. Now, I know you're not a huge fan of talking about yourself, so how about, I can only ask you the questions that you've asked me. That way, you can choose just how personal or impersonal you want to make it."

Gabriella mulled this over in her head. He was being so sweet to her, all the time, she did really feel bad that she wasn't giving him anything to go on. But, she was still really reluctant to talk about herself. She didn't understand why friendships had to get so...deep! She knew it was silly as soon as she thought it - That's what relationships are, stupid, she told herself. They're supposed to be meaningful, and you're supposed to be able to share things. It's supposed to be a support system. All these "supposed to be's" were becoming Gabriella's enemies. She thought she was doing okay without all the friendships, but Troy was the first person to actually make her want more. More than just a nod in the hallway or polite chatter in homeroom. He made her want to spill her secrets, to confide in him. He made her want to believe that real friendships do occur. Coming to that realization, Gabriella let a smile overtake her face.

"Deal."

Although she never really asked anything too deep, Troy found that their question game was a great way to get to know her. Often times, a seemingly innocuous question would lead to a bigger conversation, or even a debate at times.

"Favorite book." Gabriella tossed out, always curious as to what Troy's answer would be. He continuously surprised her, turning out to be so much more than what everyone thought of him. Troy Bolton was shaping up to be just as complex as she was.

"The Great Gatsby." Troy tossed out nonchalantly.

"What!" Gabriella exclaimed. "I never would've guessed!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know, it's amazing, Troy Bolton can read." He sighed. Gabriella was amazing, she really was, but he supposed not everyone was immune to stereotypical judging.

Noticing the slightly dejected look in Troy's eyes, Gabriella put a hand on his arm lightly.

"Hey," she said softly, "I didn't mean it like that. I know there's more to you than meets the eye."

"I know," Troy said, "It's just that people here seem to think that just because I play basketball, it means I can't think. Like, Sports Illustrated is all I can read. I'm just that dumb jock."

"Well," Gabriella started, unsure if she should continue. She took a deep breath for courage and tried again.

"It's not like you really discourage that stereotype, Troy." He looked up at this, confused. "Don't get me wrong! I know that you're this smart, caring, awesome guy, but...not many other people do. It's just that you don't really participate in class, and you don't really show an interest in anything other than basketball. I'm not saying that's an excuse for anyone to think you're...dumb, or anything, but...I don't know." She trailed off. "It's just something to think about." She finished quietly.

"No, you're right." Troy said after a moment of silence had passed between them. "I don't really make much of an effort to show people more of me. I guess... I don't know." He paused. "You know, you make me learn more about myself than you some days."

Gabriella grinned at that, gathering up her belongings as the bell rang. Just as she was about to leave, Troy put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.

"What's your favorite book?"

Gabriella blushed slightly, then gave Troy a look he couldn't place.

"The Great Gatsby."