AN: This story was originally published from February to September 2019, but I've decided to post this rewrite as a completely new story because I wanted to preserve the original for anyone who might want to reread it at a later date. It was crazy ride, absolute BANANAS and it will only get more intense with this version. A lot of original content has been persevered, but I intend to add lots of new mystery and complexity. So sit back, grab your tea/coffee/wine and enjoy!

Gliding through the Los Angeles smog, her palms sweating and knees shaking, Gabriella remembered her breathing exercises. She was nearly an expert with all the recent practice: inhale for four, hold for four, exhale for four. Whenever the new job anxiety soured her stomach, she concentrated on her breath and exhaled all the worry away in specially assigned four-second increments.

The woman's name was Sharpay Evans, and according to the ad Gabriella found a week ago, she was in desperate need of a personal assistant, although she couldn't figure out what for. A quick Google search showed that her father, Vance Evans, was the founder of numerous golf courses across the US. She lived the complete trust fund lifestyle - her Instagram full of beautiful landscapes and happy faces, each one more joyous and awestruck than the next. A family reunion in Paris, a fashion show in London, skiing in Aspen. Intrigued by the woman in pink and whatever her needs could possibly be, Gabriella sent an application.

It rained so hard the next day that Gabriella nearly missed the vibrating phone over sound of fat droplets splattering on her window. "Hello?"

"Is this Gabriella?"

"Yes, who is calling?"

There was an excited gasp on the line like she had reunited with an old friend. "It's Sharpay Evans!" Gabriella felt stuck on a delay, unable to process everything as fast as Sharpay excitedly rambled. "I read your application and I just love you! When's the soonest you can start? I'm actually dying to meet you!"

Some arrangements later and now Gabriella was landing in Los Angeles on the Evans' private jet, her stomach tightened to a knot with anticipation. The stairs opened, and Sharpay called out from the tarmac, "Welcome to L.A.!" She greeted Gabriella with a tight hug, a generous welcome basket overflowing with expensive lotions and candies, and the keys to a brand-new work car.

The first time Sharpay asked her to book pedicures for two, Gabriella mistakenly assumed the other seat was for a friend and neglected to shave her legs. At the appointment when Gabriella discovered the other seat was for her, she was embarrassed and touched by Sharpay's generosity. And it continued like this for months, everything Sharpay asked for came with a little something extra for Gabriella. A small clutch to pair with her designer tote, a tall coffee to match her venti latte, a guest room next to her master bedroom.

A month later as they shared a market price charcuterie board at one of Los Angeles' finest lunch spots, it suddenly occurred to her – the real reason Sharpay wanted an assistant. She was searching for companionship, not someone to manage her calendar app. Sharpay hired a best friend. Part of Gabriella was grateful; she lived in a beautiful mansion, had an easy enough job, and made good money from it. But the guilt became too strong. She knew taking Sharpay's money in exchange for a friendship was horribly wrong. A brief month after she started, Gabriella slid a personal letter of resignation beneath Sharpay's door and returned to Albuquerque with a farewell promise to keep in touch.

Four Years Later

"I need you to visit me here in Italy to see if I should marry him or not."

As ridiculous as the request was, Gabriella wasn't surprised. Only Sharpay would suggest something so absurd with the confidence of total rationality. "I have work," she responded.

"Take a vacation," Sharpay nonchalantly suggested.

"It's not that easy."

Sharpay rolled her eyes and impatiently sighed, leaning away from the camera until the bedazzled Princess across her camisole came into view. It was only two in the morning over there and Gabriella wondered not for the first time if Sharpay actually owned anything that wasn't hot pink or covered in rhinestones. "It'll only be a month," Sharpay said.

"That's a long time to be away from work."

"I thought you were leaving that job anyways."

"I'm still thinking about it. They haven't paid me for last month, but I don't want to provoke the wife. She seems a little…I don't know, I just have a weird feeling about her." A loud ring from Sharpay's end rattled the old speaker on Gabriella's laptop.

Sharpay lifted her sparkling, jewel-encased phone and said, "Hold that thought." She rose from the couch and stepped out of frame, showing the healthy ends of her blonde hair and long, tan legs. The image was enough to make Gabriella self-conscious as she hunched over her laptop in a tattered T-shirt and shapeless sweatpants.

Sharpay reappeared behind the couch and said to the camera, "You're in luck. I have to run so I'm granting you one more day to decide. You could spend the next month wiping snot off those spoiled brats' noses, or you could have the time of your life with your best friend in Positano. Choose wisely. Ciao!"

In an instant the screen flashed black. Gabriella sat unmoved, her exhausted reflection staring back at her as the two sat alone together on her tiny twin bed. She closed the laptop and set it on her bedside table with its shorter leg haphazardly balanced on an old coaster on the floor. The covers were fresh and cool as she pulled them up, then blankly staring at the dark ceiling, she thought of Sharpay's news.

The girl really had it all. She lived in paradise where she drove luxury cars, wore designer clothes, and found a handsome heir who wanted to marry her. But Gabriella wasn't envious of that, at least, not exactly. She didn't want everything Sharpay had. She could do without the cars and the clothes and probably the man for a little while. But what bugged her more than anything was that Sharpay had everything Sharpay ever wanted, but Gabriella was working so hard to be nowhere closer to reaching her own goals. She hadn't graduated college, hadn't found a well-paying job, and hadn't permanently moved out of her hometown.

She told herself that nothing could be resolved at this hour and worrying about it would only eat into her precious sleep time. So she clenched the covers up to her chin, closed her eyes, and inhaled through her nose.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Startled awake by a series of loud bells and dings, the alarm on her phone showed the time as five in the morning. Even the sun wasn't up yet, but Gabriella reluctantly dragged herself into the bathroom for an ice-cold shower when memories of the beach she'd seen through Skype resurfaced. Sharpay had done great work planting the idea, and it only kept growing more desirable during rush hour. But once she reunited with the kids, the thought of abandoning them for a whole month seemed impossible. She nannied four of them: Michael, Jasmine, Penelope, and Lucas. Michael and Jasmine were talkative, energetic four-year-old twins who entertained each other with tag, nursery rhymes, and sharing Mr. Potato Head toys. Penelope and Lucas, the next set of twins, were only toddlers whose adorable imitations of adult speech were still incoherent babbles. They truly weren't any more snot-nosed than any other kids, even if they were born into a ridiculously affluent and privileged family.

There was so much to do today with potty training, cooking, cleaning, and playing that Gabriella finally realized the time at half past six, meaning Mrs. Collins had snuck in an hour ago. She grabbed her bag, hugged the four of them goodbye, then tracked down Mrs. Collins to her bedroom.

Gabriella knocked and Mrs. Collins opened her door, startled by the only other adult she should expect to be in her home. "Gabriella," she said, "what are you still doing here?"

Gabriella put on a casual, unhurried tone as she said, "Sorry to overstay, but I wanted to know when I'm getting paid." Karen Collins opened her mouth when a loud bell interrupted. She took her phone out of her pocket and held it up between she and Gabriella. Uninterested and unconcerned by Gabriella's question, Karen began texting, and the little clicks of her touchscreen keyboard filling the awkward silence. "Karen?"

She finally looked at Gabriella with a smile, and for a moment, Gabriella saw understanding. She trusted those kind grey eyes of hers, connecting the two of them through her sympathy. It was a look that convinced Gabriella she had been in the wrong, that her judgements were unfounded and her opinions too harsh. Karen was a good woman, really. She would never hurt Gabriella. Especially not with such a nice smile on her face.

Karen maintained her kind tone and expression as she said, "Thomas should have sorted that out." She lovingly patted Gabriella on the shoulder as she stepped around her.

Gabriella wished she could drop it, wished that she didn't need to be so insistent. Karen was so nice and so understanding, but Gabriella was already a month late on rent. She had no other choice but to press. "I'm sorry, but he didn't. It's been almost six weeks since I was paid."

"Six weeks?" Karen turned and approached Gabriella again, arms crossed over her chest and a suspicious frown on her face. "No, we only owe you for the last cycle and this week. So three weeks."

Gabriella insisted, "Mrs. Collins, I know when the last time I got paid was. I can show you on my bank account."

"That wouldn't be of any use since we pay you in cash."

"But I always deposit it the next day, as you will see on my statements. I have no reason to lie about this. I just want what's owed to me."

"Of course, dear. I wouldn't accuse you of such a thing. You're not a swindler. You're just mistaken." In her third attempt to dismiss Gabriella, Karen turned around and walked away again.

"Excuse me, Mrs. Collins."

"Gabriella," Karen spun to face her and said, "my dear, it's late. I'd like to spend some time with my children before their bedtime if you don't mind." She rested a hand on Gabriella's shoulder, and the trance lifted. Gabriella saw through the fake smile. She saw the truth then. She wasn't being understood, she was being lied to. Karen didn't care, maybe never cared, and now she just wanted her gone.

"I want you to spend time with them, too," Gabriella said, "but I hope you can sympathize with the fact that I have rent and bills and groceries that I need to keep up with."

Karen took her hands off her and the air suddenly felt bitterly cold. "It's only been a few weeks' delay. If you didn't have the savings to cover a few weeks that's no one else's fault but your own."

Karen turned her back on her, and Gabriella decided that would be the last time. The anger burned under her skin from her locked jaw to her clenched fists. She snapped, "Write me a check if you need to. I don't care anymore. You are overdue and either you pay me today or I quit."

Karen's blonde bob flared as she spun to face Gabriella. "Excuse me?" she yelled. "What is wrong with you? I've never in my life heard such vile attitude in my life!"

Gabriella's dropped her voice, deep with threat and urgency. "Get your fancy designer purse back in here, take out your checkbook, and pay me the remaining balance or I quit."

"I will not tolerate your hostile demands, Gabriella!" She closed the space between them as the maniacal smile grew across her face. With a daring, mocking voice Karen said, "You should have thought long and hard before biting the hand that feeds you."

"Maybe if you listened to me complaining about my missing paychecks the past month, you wouldn't get bit. Where's my money?"

"You're not seeing any of it for a long while. Maybe that'll teach you a thing or two about manners. And if you couldn't tell already, you're fired!"

It took every ounce of self-discipline to refrain from spitting on her, from calling her every expletive she could think of, from doing something she'd truly regret. Against every urge to do something she either wasn't brave or stupid enough to do, Gabriella left. She slammed her car door shut and started the engine, screeching out into the street and aggressively weaving through the slower traffic on the highway. She yelled a combination of cuss words and hateful names into her windshield until it started to fog over, each one raising her anxiety and leaving her no closer to defeating the monster she uncovered tonight.

"She's a fucking sociopath – a psycho bitch! I swear to God that monster took sadistic pleasure in the whole situation. Can you believe someone would be so cold and so vile?" Sharpay held up her hands to check her nails, unphased and even bored of Gabriella's story. Granted, Gabriella was on her third reiteration, but she finally felt she was getting to the heart of her fury. "God! I want to sue her up the ass."

Sharpay dragged the nail file across an imperfect end and said, "Well, as I offered before, I can get you a lawyer."

It was a tempting offer. Mr. Collins was a lawyer, but that made it even more perfect. Sharpay could connect Gabriella with a whole legal counsel if needed, meaning she could fight and win on the Collins' home territory. "Are you sure?" Gabriella asked. "I don't know how I could ever pay you back."

Sharpay shook her head. "Don't worry about it."

"Thanks, Shar."

A mischievous smirk made a brief appearance on Sharpay's glossy lips before she continued, "Although, there is one teeny tiny thingy you could do for me."

Whatever it was, it didn't seem so teeny tiny from the look of that vanishing smile. Gabriella instinctively leaned away from the phone, guarded and concerned. Against her hesitations, she asked, "What is it?"

"It might be positively torturous for such a busy body like you, but Gabriella, please, I'm begging you to get your cute little butt on a plane, sip champagne all the way to Italy, and come relax on the beach with me! I know, it sounds like so much hard labor! We'll go shopping and drink wine and go to parties and pile on the yacht. There'll be fancy art shows and symphonies. I'm inviting so many people!"

Sharpay's sarcasm aside, it would be torturous. Gabriella had met many of Sharpay's friends before as personal assistant and feared the type she attracted. There were Lea and Emma, a set of fraternal twins, one strawberry blonde and one ginger, who ignored everything Gabriella said like she was nothing more than the invisible help. Jackie, a pretty woman of Asian descent with healthy black hair down to her waist and a surgery-defined jawline, showed her hideous inside when she attempted to grab Gabriella's attention to clean her dog's accident by snapping her fingers. Sharpay reprimanded her, and Jackie stuck to calling out "you!" as she never bothered learning Gabriella's name. Then there was Tiara, Sharpay's second best friend. She was the antithesis of Sharpay's best qualities. She was more arrogant than confident, more selfish than carefree, and more greedy than charitable. If Sharpay's was light, then Tiara was a repulsive negativity. Even worse, Gabriella knew the feeling was mutual.

"You know that's not my scene," Gabriella said.

"Don't you know how long I've been waiting to show you my new life?" Sharpay whined, "But you're always busy. You promised me you'd visit here when I moved away, and it's already been a year. With all this marriage talk Rinaldo has suddenly become obsessed with, I need you here more than ever. Please Gabriella. It's all I want."

Gabriella was tugged in each direction, all the excuses to stay home and the reasons to leave pulling her apart. It was such a generous offer, and likely due to the fact that the pair hadn't been face-to-face in over a year. Maybe Positano wouldn't be so bad. She could waste her days on the same beach she'd longingly watched in their Skype calls, and get a nice new tan to compete with Sharpay's. This vacation obviously wouldn't put her any closer to her goals, but neither was anything she did at home. Maybe a break from it all would be the reset she needed. She'd been tempted to go plenty of times before, and now that she didn't have a job and soon no apartment, there really was no excuse. She folded. "Fine."

Sharpay screamed at the top of her lungs and giddily bounced up and down on her couch. "It's going to be so much fun!" She clapped her hands excitedly and cheered, "You're finally coming!"

With a bunch of outfit changes and bikinis packed, Gabriella boarded the next flight to Naples. After a disorienting moment in the city with an out of date Italian to English dictionary, she found the train station and set off to Positano. It was easy enough to find a cab, the universal wave into the street worked as well as it did stateside. When they turned around the hillside and Gabriella caught flashing glimpses of the city between the old buildings, her heart skipped a beat. The endless water, sailboats, and beautiful houses seemingly stacked up the cliffside belonged to the movies. She never would have thought this could ever be her reality, especially for an entire month.

By the time her cab arrived in their neighborhood, the setting sun had coated the town in a dim, orange glow. By the guidance of the surreal light, she dragged her stubborn suitcase across the steppingstones, through the pebbles, and along the tile beneath the arches on the porch. She knocked on the door and bounced in place, too excited to keep herself still.

A pink oval obscured by the glass in the door grew clearer as Sharpay approached. Barely a second had passed between the click of the lock and Sharpay's slamming embrace.

Sharpay squealed and leaned away, patting the concealer beneath her eyes and blinking back happy tears. "Oh my God."

"Oh my God," Gabriella parroted with a tearful laugh.

"You have no idea how badly I've wanted to see you again," Sharpay cried.

"I'm sorry I didn't come sooner."

"But you're here now!" Sharpay cheered, "You're here!"

They hugged again before discussing the travel and fangirling over the view, rambling from one idea to the next in an excited frenzy. Gabriella slowed her frantic speech when she noticed a tall, tanned man join Sharpay's side. He had dark brown hair and a prominent yet crooked nose. His physique was muscular, and his eyes were a deep, handsome brown.

"You must be Rinaldo," she said. "It's so nice to finally meet you!"

He kissed each of Gabriella's cheeks and smiled warmly at her without uttering a word.

Sharpay constricted her arm around his and said, "He's a little shy at first." She stole a peck before grabbing Gabriella's hands and offered, "Let me show you around the house! Rinaldo, grab her suitcase. This is the foyer, and over here is the staircase. As you can see it's super narrow. I learned the building regulations are way different than the US." Sharpay took Gabriella through the hallway running over the foyer and led her to the door at the very end. "This is where you'll be staying, but there's a bit of a hiccup." Sharpay nervously cleared her throat and explained, "We overextended our invitations so one of Rinaldo's guy friends will have to bunk with you. Hope that won't be a problem."

Gabriella looked at Sharpay with a stoic gaze, unsure how to tell if she was serious or not.

Sharpay laughed, "Just kidding. But wouldn't that be so much fun?" She took her into the other guest rooms and opened a couple windows to show her the view, the backyard barely large enough for their small pool, a patio, and a shed before the ground plummeted to the street below. But beyond the neighbors and streets was an endless sea glistening with moonlight. "Isn't it fabulous?"

"It's paradise!" Gabriella said, listening to the delicate sound of waves crawling onto the shore. "It fits you perfectly."

Sharpay grasped her hand and lead her down the narrow staircase and into kitchen where all her and Rinaldo's friends were gathered. "Everyone!" Sharpay announced, snatching the whole room's attention. "Let me introduce you all to my best friend, Gabriella Montez." Gabriella glanced around the kitchen, her eyes pulled to the faces she recognized first – Tiara, Emma, Jackie, and Lea. Sharpay spoke about how they met and her nannying gig as Gabriella looked to the other faces around the room. Most were like Rinaldo – tan, muscular, brown eyes, and some even had his crooked nose. But the last man she found, blue-eyed with short, light brown hair, wore an unmistakably horrified expression. A tense second passed before she recognized him too, then her stomach dropped, and her expression morphed to mirror the terror in his.

Gabriella stared at the alfredo cascading over the twirls of fettucine mountain, not wanting so much as a bite. She felt Sharpay's eyes revisit her plate again, knowing she could piece it together by her loss of appetite that something was definitely wrong. Gabriella excused herself to no one in particular, stopped by the bathroom for a quick splash of cold water, and went upstairs to her bedroom.

She was halfway down the length of the hallway when the door next to hers opened. She froze in place with her breath caught in her throat, fearing it could be the only other person who wouldn't have the appetite for the feast downstairs. Her heart stopped when he stepped into the hallway and looked at her, but the shocked expression from earlier didn't reappear. She dropped her eyes to the floor and walked by, his footsteps quietly fading away further down the hallway before pausing. She was almost to her room when he called out, "Ella." She looked over his shoulder, staring at his frown as he said, "It's nice to see you again."

"You too," she returned the curtesy, even though it was a blatant lie.

He seemed pleased enough with her response to continue down the stairs, and Gabriella retreated to her room. She locked the door behind her and changed out of her stale travel clothes. "It's nice to see you again?" she scoffed. How could he pretend everything okay when it obviously wasn't? Pretend the teenage dream they both believed would last forever was never meant to be anything more than that – a silly dream. Positano was the place to forget all her problems and complications, not find new ones. Now with Troy and her sharing the house, nothing could be certain anymore.

AN: Pretty please with a cherry on top let me know what you thought of this chapter! I cannot understate how much your support means to me. It makes me feel appreciated for the work I did and motivates me moving forward. If you read the old version, please let me know how this compares to the original. And if you're new, give me your first impression. I'm super excited to see all the reactions!

Much love,

S.