Author's Note: I'm getting SO fooking messed up on this site! The chapter title and heading did not come out the way they were supposed to! Oh well. Chapter 2 will be better. It will be PERFECT G damn it!
Ahem. As an homage to Lindsay Lohan (and by "homage" I mean stealing somebody else's idea!) there's a little line from Mean Girls in here. See if you can pick it up.
Oh, and I'm supposed to put a disclaimer, too, aren't it? Okay, this goes without saying but I do not claim to own High School Musical or any of its characters. Kenny Ortega is a better dancer than me. And he's an old white dude! But that's beside the point.
Enjoy…
Chapter 2
Road Trip
Sharpay
Sharpay gave a sigh of satisfaction at her image in the mirror that evening. She wore a black halter-dress. It had red and black pleats at the bottom and was covered in glitter. Her red heels made her that little bit taller and a scarlet ribbon stood out against her blonde hair. Sharpay was going to a Chinese restaurant and she looked like a Salsa dancer. It was perfect.
Her mind wandered to the evening ahead. Ms. Darbus took the Drama Club to her favorite Chinese place once a month to commemorate Twinkle Towne's success. They all suspected she had nothing better to do with her time. And while Sharpay dreaded an evening of watching Troy and Gabriella kissing and cooing across the table, she liked her Chinese food.
But seriously! As if Gabbie was not annoying enough, she just had to land Troy, too. First it was the musical, then she scored Sharpay's four-year crush. What would she take next? Ryan? She knew her brother was in puppy love with Gabriella and it may have expanded to strong attraction in the months since they had discussed it properly. She could not blame Ryan. She was a pretty enough girl. But if they ended up together she would blow chunks. It was impossible anyway. As much as she loved her brother, there was no leaving Troy Bolton for him. And Gabbie clung to Troy like a leech these days.
Sharpay was thrilled to notice that the more she held on the more Troy seemed to pull away. Maybe her perfection was finally boring him. Well, Sharpay was not above taking advantage. She had started to put on a much more pleasant persona around Troy. She did not act like an entirely different person, but she made the effort to be…decent. And sometimes they talked. Actually talked, and she liked it. Contrary to her initial beliefs, he was not as dumb as his pretty face suggested.
She was jealous of him and Gabbie, she admitted with a sigh. There was no denying it. At least not to herself. No one had ever made her feel as insecure as Gabriella did, like she would never be good enough for someone like Troy, and she hated her for it. She would continue to hate her until she shriveled up like a prune and died.
A soft knock on the door interrupted her musings. She knew it had to be Ryan because he always came in immediately after he knocked, not waiting for her invitation. Ryan was the only person who she allowed to disrespect her so blatantly.
He was dressed in a black shirt with red suede trousers. A red fedora was perched atop his sandy-brown head. Sharpay surveyed him with satisfaction.
"See! I told you it would look good."
Ryan gave a wry smile and held out her black cardigan.
"The Darbus Bus has arrived," he said, holding it up while she slid into it.
"Thought I heard a car," she murmured. "Okay." Ryan offered an arm and she looped hers into it. "To the Great Wall!"
Gabriella
Gabriella always enjoyed her evenings out with Ms. Darbus, Kelsi, Troy and Ryan. It was a little weird at first. Seeing a teacher outside of school was like seeing a dog walking on its hind legs. But they all felt kind of bad for her as she obviously had nothing better to do with her time since breaking it off with Mr. Delaine, the art teacher. But that was just a rumor, fueled by Sharpay. A lot of bad things seemed to be fueled by Sharpay, even her troubles with Troy.
They weren't really troubles, per se. Troy and Gabbie were the kind of couple that never found anything to be really angry at each other about. But as of late Sharpay's lusting after her boyfriend was becoming less discreet. Gabbie was not threatened. She knew Troy was devoted to her. But once she walked into homeroom and found them talking, actually laughing, and for some reason it annoyed her. She politely warned Troy not to indulge Sharpay, even if she was "acting a lot nicer". Because then Sharpay might get the wrong idea and think Troy was actually interested in her, or something equally bizarre.
"Come in," Gabriella responded to the knock on her bedroom door. Troy walked in, smiling and looking typically gorgeous. He looked the same as he had the day they first met except the shirt was black. She felt a warm, fond feeling in the pit of her stomach. She had been having the warm, fond feeling for a while now and she imagined this must be what her grandparents felt when they looked at each other. But for some reason the thought terrified her so much she had to put it out of her mind.
"You look great," he kissed her cheek.
Gabriella glanced at the mirror perched atop her bureau. She wore a black empire-line dress and strappy sandals with a glittered shawl. Her hair fell in dark waves around her shoulders. Simple but pretty, that was how Gabbie liked it.
"Thanks. You do, too."
"Thanks."
They smiled at each other and for a few moments silence reigned. It seemed they had run out of interesting things to talk about as their relationship went on.
"So," he said slowly, swinging his arms.
"So," she repeated. They chuckled.
"Should we uh…go wait downstairs for Ms. Darbus?"
"Yeah," she chirped. "Sure."
She hooked her arm in with his and they walked down together, a cute perfect couple.
Ms. Darbus
Kelsi sat in the passenger's seat of Ms. Darbus' van and they pleasantly swapped ideas on this year's music-hal. They were on their way to pick up Ryan and Sharpay, and then Troy and Gabriella.
Ms. Darbus knew they all thought this dinner thing was her sad way of trying to maintain human contact after another failed relationship, rather than a treat for all their hard work. She wished she could say it was the latter, but if she were to be truly honest it was half and half. It was not that she did not have friends her own age, it was just that all her friends had actual lives.
But no matter. It would be a pleasant evening at one of the best Chinese restaurants in New Mexico. She had deliberately picked the Great Wall, which was owned by one Lu Ling Baxter, a clever, old woman who had emigrated from China and into a "marriage of convenience" thirty years ago.
It was but a precautionary measure that she was taking Gabriella and Sharpay to this particular eatery. Something catastrophic would have to happen for Ms. Darbus to resort to Lu Ling's "assistance." But one of the many lessons Ms. Darbus had learned from being a high school teacher was that it is always best to prepare for the worst.
Author's Note: And the worst is sure to come. People, where are my reviews? I need my ego boost! He he he…just kidding. Sort of. Chapter 3 is coming soon.