Author's Note: Hey guys thanks to all of my Chapter 6 reviewers. My god sorry it took so long!

Summary: After the call backs, Troy and Gabriella's relationship begins to blossom. But Sharpay wants Troy, and the part of Minnie. Will Troy and Gabriella be able to pull through? Or will Sharpay succeed?

Discovering Derek

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Chapter 7

As "Twinkle Towne" was nearing, the entire cast was full of pre-play anxiety. Rehearsals didn't get off until at least seven o'clock at night. Everyone was exhausted. On top of that, Sharpay was always on Kelsi's case. About things to fix the show, she always made sure Kelsi put Troy in center stage, instead of Gabriella. Gabriella hadn't the slightest idea of what Troy saw in Sharpay. But, he chose her and it was time to move on and forget about Troy and Sharpay.

—

Gabriella sat at her desk fiddling with her pen as she gazed off at the clear blue New Mexico sky. Her math teacher was explaining something about algebraic expressions but Gabriella refused to pay any attention what so ever. Her mind was focused on other things.

She lifted her head when she suddenly realized the teacher had ceased talking. It took her a mere few seconds to notice that Derek had arrived, he was explaining something to the teacher as she looked over in Gabriella's direction.

"Class, I would like you all to meet our new student, Derek,"

The class made a polite but unenthusiastic hello.

"You should get caught up on the curriculum here Mr. Bale. I'm sure Gabriella Montez here would be happy to get you started." The teacher gestured towards Gabriella.

She gazed upon the handsome Derek. His luscious brown hair and deep cleansing blue eyes. Gabriella stopped herself suddenly realizing he would never be interested in a girl like her. Plus he was now on the basketball team and probably knew about her and Troy. She knew that a guy would never date another guy's ex. Some kind of male code of some sort.

He walked towards her, a friendly smile spread wide across his face. Gabriella made a polite smile back. She pulled up a chair, inviting him to side along side of her.

"Hi," Gabriella said softly.

"Hi, I'm Derek Bale," He put his hand in front of her face letting her shake it

"Gabriella Montez," Gabriella gave a meek smile as she pulled out some worksheets from last week. "Here, we'll start with these they aren't too hard,"

Derek whipped out a pen and calculator and began to work. Occasionally glancing at Gabriella.

"There done!" He said dropping his pen on his desk and smiling in triumph.

"Okay here, let me check your work. If that's okay,' Gabriella's eyes twinkled.

He handed her the sheet of paper as she took a pen and began to mark his mistakes. He scooted closer to her until her hair was brushing against his face.

"Okay you only got a few wrong but we can go over them if you need help," She looked up at him waiting for an answer.

He seemed to captivated by her chocolate brown eyes to comprehend what she had just said.

"Yeah sure...sound great,"

"Okay then lets get started," Gabriella looked up at him as she began to show him the equations. But the only problem he wanted to solve was how to get Gabriella to be his.

—

Mr. Bolton blew the whistle at basketball practice later that day after school.

"Alright men, pair up!' Mr. Bolton called as he blew the whistle again.

Since Derek was new at East High, he wasn't yet friendly with his other team-mates. Troy, decided to volunteer to partner up with him.

"Hey," Troy made his way to Derek handing him the ball as they moved to separate sides of the room tossing the ball back and forth to each other. "So you're new here right?' Troy asked tossing the ball again.

"Yeah I just recently moved here from Connecticut,"

"So you must have a tough time managing around here huh...must be way different from the East Coast," Troy passed the ball harder.

"Well actually things have been much easier for me with this girl that's helping me out," Derek made sure the coach noticed his impressive throwing abilities as he walked by.

"Who's the girl?" Troy asked.

"Gabriella Montez,"

The name stung Troy like hundreds of angry bees. He felt a cold sweat run through his entire body. But wait, why would he care. He didn't like her anymore...did he?

"Dude...hello?" Derek was trying to regain Troy's attention.

"What-oh yeah she's smart," Troy couldn't think of anything else to say. It wasn't necessary for him to say she was his ex.

"Oh Troy!" Sharpay came running towards him her blond curls bouncing up and down.

"Who is she?" Derek mumbled coldly. Thankfully Troy didn't hear him.

"Hey baby," Sharpay put her arms around Troy's neck as he picked her up. They nuzzled noses. The entire basketball team looked disgustingly at them.

"Ah-ahem," Chad raised an eyebrow at Troy as they returned to practice.

—

Gabriella hurried home as the crisp winter air of Albuquerque wind. She had volunteered at the children's center to help out for a musical that they were doing. Ms. Darbus thought it was a good idea to help the 'younger demographic understand the true arts of the theater.' Her exact words rung through Gabriella's head.

She suddenly felt someone coming towards her, but she refused to look back she was already going to be late. A few minutes later, Taylor's black toy poodle, Tille ran up beside her. Gabriella couldn't resist so she bent down to pet the black ball of fluff.

"Aw hey there Tille," Gabriella scratched the dog's ears.

Taylor joined the two.

"Hey Taylor," Gabriella focused on the puppy.

"So you like Derek, don't you," Taylor got right to the point, avoiding the pointless small talk.

"Where did you hear that?" Gabriella questioned.

"Well it's kind of obvious,"

"Oh my gosh a guy and a girl just can't be friends! I mean we just met!" Gabriella standing up now getting angry.

"Sorry Gabriella, I just thought-"

"Exactly! Thought! You don't know for sure, so you just go spreading things around that you don't know for a fact?" Gabriella forced the words out, she hated when she fought with friends.

"Gabriella don't get mad at me I didn't tell a soul," Taylor was getting a bit upset.

"Arg!" Gabriella stormed off. She knew what Taylor was thinking, she tried to be friends with Troy but she just ended up liking him even more! This was so difficult. Now she had lost the love of her life, and her best friend.

—

Gabriella walked into a gymnasium flooded with children of all ages. Each doing their own thing as some of the teachers discussed issues that needed to be addressed amongst themselves. Gabriella made her way to the group of adults standing near the stage.

"Excuse me," Gabriella said softly. The women either didn't hear or were ignoring her she tried once more. "Excuse me," Gabriella had raised her voice as the women stopped their contestation.

"May we help you?" A short brunette asked impatiently.

"I'm the high school volunteer. My name is Gabriella Montez," Gabriella put her hand out gesturing a shake but the woman refused.

"Just go wait over there, start getting the kids rounded up," The woman turned to her friends and restarted their conversation.

Gabriella turned away and blew her bangs out of her eyes and sighed. She looked at the kids. There was about one hundred of them. I'm supposed to get all of these kids together? Gabriella asked herself. She was here to help with the play not run a babysitting service. Gabriella walked over to get started.

"Excuse me," Gabriella asked politely as a kid ran past her. "Pardon me," Gabriella tried to grab a kid but she ran to fast our of her reach. Gabriella put her two fingers in her mouth and made a loud whistle.

The entire gymnasium halted. Even the women stopped their conversation to look over at what was going on.

"Okay guys now I need five rows of all you guys, now I'm timing you and if you do it in at least 10 minutes, we'll have a lot more fun today," Gabriella looked down at her watch. "Ready...go!"

The kids scrabbled around in circles trying to get themselves in order. In about 11 minutes the five rows were made. Even though it was a minute late. She still counted it as 10 minutes.

"Okay great guys! Now can anyone tell me what play we are doing?" Gabriella asked.

A tall blue eyed, blond raised her hand. She resembled a little bit of Sharpay. "We are doing our version of Annie," The blond sneered.

"Ah...Annie one of my favorite musicals, this is going to be a lot of fun!' Gabriella said cheerfully.

The blond sneered again and rolled her eyes.

A petite red headed girl standing in the back raised her hand shyly.

"I just wanted to say I like that play a lot too," The girl smiled up at Gabriella, as she smiled back.

The blond once again rolled her eyes and began to talk with a nearby friend.

—

It had been at least an hour into the rehearsal and so far they had gone over: acting techniques singing and dancing. It had been a productive day no thanks to the chattering supervisors.

It was time for lunch as the kids ran towards the crates which held their lunches. Gabriella decided to sit with them. She would hate to be bored to death talking to the adults about what kids spilt the other's milk last week.

"Well I have been in 17 musicals. I am a professional," The blond boasted. Somehow that line sounded very familiar.

"This is my first one but it should be fun," The young red head said kindly.

The blond rolled her eyes yet again and said "Amateur," She took a big helping of pasta from her fancy lunch and glared at the red head.

"Okay how about we take this time to get to know each other," Gabriella suggested. "I'll go first. My name is Gabriella Montez and this is going to be my first musical production at my high school," Gabriella smiled at the red head sitting next to her. "Do you want to go?' She asked kindly. The girl shook her head.

"My name is Allison Reid, I like to read, and this is my first show The girl said shyly. Everyone looked over at the girl with the blond curls. She was studding a boy attacking his cheese sandwich.

"Oh my name is Tiffany Evans," She raised her nose in the air, almost on purpose. The words coming out of the little girl's mouth made Gabriella's drop open. So she is Sharpay's sister.

Figures. "Me, my brother and my sister have been stars in all of the productions that we've been in," Tiffany boasted.

"My name is Lori LuHi!" A little girl shouted from the other side of the room. "And I am in love with a boy!" The girl cried as the room filled with ewws.

"That's very nice," Gabriella said companionably, obviously annoyed by the little girl's immaturity.

"Do you want to know who it is?" The girl asked. The room was quiet.

"I think we all know that after yesterday," Tiffany retorted.

"What happened yesterday?" Gabriella asked Allison.

"Well there were two other teen volunteers here yesterday, one was a boy. And well I think you know the rest," Allison whispered. Gabriella mouthed an oh and nodded her head.

"So anyone want to know his name?!" She was almost crying now.

"What's his name Lori?' Gabriella asked impatiently.

"Troy Bolton!" Lori raised her hands in the air and pranced around the room. Gabriella didn't notice, her jaw had dropped open.

So far this day was not going well, she had to deal with Sharpay's bratty little sister and a Troy Bolton crazy girl! She sighed, she thought to herself: What else could go wrong?

Tiffany leaned into Gabriella, "That's my older sister's boyfriend, he dumped this really geeky girl for her! Isn't that sweet," Tiffany coed.

"Really sweet," Gabriella clenched her teeth together.

After going through the children's names and getting to know each other better they started rehearsing. They showed her the moves that Sharpay had taught them, and of course Sharpay had Tiffany in the spotlight.

"Um... Tiffany why don't you move over a bit, so the others can get some stage time too," Gabriella moved Tiffany slightly to the other direction.

"But my sister told me to stand here, and I never go against my sister!" Tiffany scowled and put her hands on her hips.

"Well until your sister and I meet you are going here," Gabriella raised her voice. Tiffany opened her mouth to probably make a rude remark but the gabbing ladies announced that practice was over.

Gabriella grabbed her messenger bag and ran off before she had another run-in with Sharpay. She saw her walking towards the stage door, Gabriella dug her head into her bag as she walked off.

---

Gabriella had called Taylor's house and cell phone millions of times but she never answered. She could tell she was avoiding her calls. She flopped on her bed and sighed. She couldn't let Taylor go like she did with Troy, she brushed herself off and headed for Taylor's house.

She rang the doorbell until she heard footsteps coming up the house walkway. The door opened, to see Taylor. A look of shock immediately hit her friend's face as Gabriella turned around to face her. She took a deep breath and started the apology she had worked on the way there.

"Listen Taylor, I am really sorry for blowing up at you like that. It's just the fact of liking another boy besides Troy scares me. I hope you understand I didn't mean to hurt you." Gabriella sighed as she waited for a reply.

Taylor folded her arms across her chest and put an uneasy grin on. "Gabriella, I know it hurts to not have Troy in your life, but don't take it out on your friends!" Taylor was about to shut the door as Gabriella stopped her.

"Tay!" Gabriella held the door open with her foot. "I am sorry! I was just angry and annoyed okay, please forgive me," Gabriella put her lower lip down and whimpered like a puppy.

"Aw how could I say no to that!" Taylor ran up and hugged her friend. She then pulled her away. "But wait, do you like Derek? Just wanted to know," Gabriella laughed and put her arm around her friend as they walked into Taylor's house.

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Hey, sorry this chapter like took me forever. I have had a lot of tests and stuff. On top of that our 8th grade class went to Washington D.C. this Thursday-Friday. Chapters are going to become longer and most likely not updated as often. So...anyway leave a review!

Breaking Freexx