Chapter 3: Mark

"Do you know what's wrong with me?" I had asked Chad the next day after explaining everything about the weird situation I had found myself in. Of coarse, I left out Sharpay's name. I admit, Chad probably wasn't the best person to talk to about this. But I didn't know whom else to turn to. I didn't feel comfortable talking to Gabriella or Taylor about it. I couldn't tell Troy. I had in my mind that he was somehow linked to this. And I certainly couldn't talk to Sharpay about it. The only person left was Chad.

"There's nothing wrong with you," Chad laughed, making me feel uneasy. "You just have a crush."

"What!" I cried in total shock. Did he just say what I thought he said? "Are you sure?"

"From what I can tell, yes," Chad replied. He was a little freaked out at my reaction and kept giving me a weird look. "Maybe even more."

I fell back into a chair, my eyes opened wide. "This cannot be happening to me," I said, more to myself than to Chad.

Chad just looked at me like I was crazy. "What's wrong with you?" he exclaimed. "Haven't you ever had a crush before?"

"Yes! I've had one or two," I said defensively. I sighed. How could I explain this to him? "It's not that. It's just that- this is a different situation than most people have."

Chad's look of shock turned into confusion. "How is it different?" Without even waiting for a reply, he asked another question. "Who is your crush?"

I turned silent and turned away. After about a minute I looked back at Chad. "Just trust me on this when I say I really can't tell you."

Chad nodded slowly. "Ok." He glanced at the clock. "I gotta go. See you tomorrow at school."

"Yeah," I mumbled as Chad left.

I was really stressed out the next morning. I sat at the kitchen table with my parents, waiting for Sharpay to finish getting ready. I had to think of something to get my mind off of things, so I started to roll my tongue. M parents noticed this and gave me a confused look. I stopped and looked at them with the same expression.

"What?" I asked them.

"You can roll your tongue," my dad pointed out.

"So?" I was totally lost. Where was this going? Hadn't they seen me roll my tongue before? What was the big deal?

"Neither your dad or I can," my mom explained.

"And tongue rolling is a dominant gene," Dad continued. "Therefor if two parents can't roll their tongues, none of their offsprings are able to."

"Oh," I nodded, slowly taking everything in. "Well, that's really weird."

Before any of use could say anything else, Sharpay came walking into the kitchen. I flinched when I saw her.

"Come on, Ryan, let's go," she said cheerfully, pulling me up from my chair. I sighed softly and followed her out the door.

When we got to school I managed to slip away from Sharpay. I wanted some time to think alone before class started. I soon found out that wasn't going to happen. Someone standing by some lockers caught my eye. He was a boy my age named Marc. But what I found interesting was that he kept trying to roll his tongue, failing every time.

I curiously strolled over to him. "Hey," I began. "You can't roll your tongue?"

Mark stopped trying. "Yeah," he sighed. "And both my parents and grandparents can't. I know that it's possible that I'm not able to, but it's still weird."

I nodded. "I know what you mean. I can roll my tongue and my parents can't."

Mark suddenly got a mischievous look on his face that scared me a bit. "You don't think-"

"No," I cut him off, knowing what he was thinking. "That is highly unlikely."

Mark didn't look satisfied with my answer. "Aw, come on! It's still possible."

I simply rolled my eyes in reply. "Let's just ask Gabriella about this, ok? She knows a lot about genetics."

"Ok," Mark gave a small nod. "I'll come find you during free period. We can talk to her then."