AN: Heh... so... I kinda forgot about this story. I got photoshop and I haven't done any writing the last couple days and I forgot that I was supposed to post this yesterday. But hey, a three day wait for a chapter isn't bad at all.
Title: Cruel to be Kind
Rating: T
Author: MadiWillow
Summary: Ryan likes Taylor, but he can't date until Sharpay does. Chad is the only one deemed brave enough to tame the wild beast. But he didn't expect to find a human being behind her facade.
Genre: Romance/Humor
Chapter: Chapter 6
"I can't believe you hit me with six of those on my head," Sharpay complained.
She and Chad had finished paintballing and returned to the school, way past dark. Sharpay's bright pink car was the only one remaining in the parking lot, so Chad pulled his right up next to hers.
"I guess instead of homework, you'll be showering all night?" he stated knowingly.
"Yes," she snapped, wincing as she touched the paint that had dried in her blonde mane. "If I come to school with green hair tomorrow, so help me, I will hurt you."
He just rolled his eyes and leaned across the seat, kissing her again. She kissed him back enthusiastically, but pulled away much too soon. "I have to go," she said quietly.
"Okay." He grinned, bending forward to open the passenger door for her. "Bye."
"Bye." She smiled back and slid out of the car. She walked around the front of her car to the driver's side and waved to him before getting in.
As she drove off, Chad found himself unable to move. He ran his tongue slowly across his lips, still tasting her lip gloss. It was peach.
His eyes widened and he blushed as the thought crossed his brain, even though he was alone; did he really take notice of what her lips tasted like? He swallowed as his pulse quickened.
He wasn't falling for her. He wasn't falling for her.
Fuck.
He was falling for her.
He punched the steering wheel so hard that the horn honked loudly. He couldn't believe that he'd ended up liking her, through this whole ordeal. Just a week ago, he was tossing and turning in his bed over the fact that he might have to take her to the movies. And now he was going out of his way to make her happy, and he was kissing her more than was necessary. He was initiating the kissing.
Chad ran a hand through his own paint-drenched hair, before whipping out his cell phone and sending a text message to Gabriella. "We have a problem."
--
Gabriella was already outside and waiting for him when he pulled up to her house. She looked thoroughly annoyed; her arms were crossed over her chest, her right foot was taping impatiently, and her face wore a scowl. "This better be important, Chad," she said irritably as he exited his vehicle, "because I have a huge Econ test tomorrow --"
"I think I like Sharpay," he said in a rush.
She froze, her arms falling limply to her sides. "... what?" she said at last.
He kicked the cement steps and swore loudly. "I can't fucking believe it, but I am."
"How?" she stammered. "I don't – you and her? Are you sure you're not mistaken?"
Snorting, Chad said, "Trust me, I've turned it over about a thousand times in my head, looking for every possible loophole." He sighed. "But it definitely is Sharpay."
"Wow." Gabriella slowly sat down, crossing her legs Indian-style. "I can't believe... you and Sharpay!?"
"You wanna say it again?" he grumbled sarcastically, sitting down too. "What am I gonna do?"
She frowned. "Well, I'm not exactly sure what the problem is. You're already dating her..."
"Yeah, but..." He scratched his chin thoughtfully. "It's just... I don't know, I'm being paid. Is it really right to start a relationship on something like that?"
Gabriella shrugged. "Well, if you like her now, it doesn't matter. Just stop accepting the money."
"What if she finds out?"
"She won't," Gabriella promised. "Don't worry. We won't mention it to her or anything."
"Really?" asked Chad in a small, hopeful voice.
She beamed down at him. "I still can't believe you like her. I never thought you would have a girlfriend. You liked Taylor for, like, six months and that went nowhere."
Chad scoffed. "Well, that's also largely because she made out with Ryan the night of the talent show."
"If you'd made a move," Gabriella overruled, "she wouldn't have made out with him."
"Fair enough," he said.
--
Chad yawned as he leaned against the locker next to Sharpay's the following day. "So, it took approximately ten hours to get all that paint out."
Sharpay chuckled. "Ten hours? Wow, I only spent three..." She ran a hand through her blonde hair, observing the ends with a crinkled nose. "I'm gonna have to trim these dead ends off."
"My luscious curls are still beautifully intact," Chad said, dramatically flipping his hair. She made a face.
"What would you do if I shaved your head?"
He leered at her, suddenly serious. "What would you do if I shaved your head?"
Her jaw dropped. "Murder you."
"And that's what I would do, too."
She rolled her eyes. "You and Ryan are both girls in disguise."
"Then that would make you a lesbian," he pointed out.
She just shook her head, a smile playing lightly on her lips. Chad couldn't help but notice how often she'd been smiling recently. "I gotta go to drama. See you later?"
"Mhm," he murmured, leaning forward and giving her a quick kiss in parting. She smiled lightly and turned to head toward the theatre.
Chad watched her walk for a minute before pivoting in the opposite direction, and nearly jumped out of his skin to see Ryan standing right there. "Jesus fucking Christ," he gasped, his heart pounding with adrenaline. "How long were you there for?"
Ryan just shrugged, and nodded in the direction of his sister. "Nice job with Shar," he said approvingly. "So, about Homecoming --"
"Look," interrupted Chad, holding up a hand. "I don't wanna play this little game anymore."
Eyes widening, Ryan said quickly, "No, no, no! You have to take her."
"Ryan, it's not --" Chad tried, but Ryan cut across him.
"Look, I'll give you threehundred dollars, okay? That should take care of everything you need, right?" he said desperately, digging through his wallet and extracting three hundred-dollar bills. "Please?"
Chad shook his head, and said again, "That's not --"
"Four hundred?"
Freezing, Chad eyed the four bills in front of him. He bit his lip. Four hundred dollars was a lot of money. He could really use it. With a quick glance over at the direction of the theatre, he told himself that this was it. No more. And Sharpay never had to find out.
"Okay," he sighed. "But after this, I'm done." He took the money, holding it as if it was going to bite him at any moment, and shoved it into his pocket.
"Late time," promised Ryan. "I swear."
Chad side-stepped the hat-bearing boy to go to his next class, and felt eyes burning into his skull. He glanced around and his gaze rested upon Gabriella, who was standing near Troy's locker and clutching her books to her chest. Her frown told him everything he needed to know. He shook his head slightly, his lips pursed, before lowering his head and continuing down the hall.
--
Chad and Sharpay went to the movies together later that night. He let Sharpay pick the film, and she'd dragged him to some chick flick that she knew he didn't want to see. It didn't bother him, however, since he didn't pay attention to any part of it. He kept one hand in his pocket the entire time, fingering his wallet and feeling the guilt bubble deep within his stomach. He kept squirming, so much so that Sharpay leaned over a couple times to hiss at him to stop moving. Though as much as he tried, he couldn't, and he continued to fidget.
Once the movie was completed, the two walked out of the theatre, hand-in-hand. An unspoken agreement was reached that neither of them wanted to go back home yet, so instead they sat on the front steps of the theatre.
They were quiet for a few moments, Sharpay drawing her cardigan closer around her body from the chill. Chad was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn't even notice.
"So, you kept, like, twitching during the movie," said Sharpay, finally breaking the silence. "Are you out of your stash of meth or something?" When Chad didn't respond, she sighed. "Okay, so you're not in the mood for lame jokes. What's your problem?"
His head snapped up. "I don't have a problem. I'm fine."
"Then what do you keep thinking about?" she challenged.
He opened his mouth to answer, but closed it when nothing came out. He opened it again and said, "I have a science project due tomorrow that I didn't start."
"Oh." Her face fell slightly. "Well... I mean, if you wanna go do that, it's totally fine with me."
"No, I don't," Chad said quickly. He scooted over to her and put his arm around her shoulders, rubbing her upper arm to warm her. She melted into his embrace, leaning her head on his shoulder and closing her eyes halfway. "Wanna go to Homecoming with me?" he asked softly, feigning casualty, but his insides were writhing.
He felt Sharpay tense beneath him. She slowly lifted her head up and said, "Um... not really."
"Why not?" he asked thickly.
"Because I don't want to," she said shortly.
Chad had to get her there. Ryan might blow the whole thing if he didn't.
"Please?" he asked in a strained voice.
She shot him a glare. "I don't want to," she snapped again. "Why do you wanna go? What's in it for you?"
"What's in it for me?" he reiterated. "Because... because I wanna spend time with you! Is that so hard to believe?"
Sharpay narrowed her eyes and shifted away from him. "You don't have to spend time with me at a dance. We can just hang out and do something else instead."
"But I wanna go to Homecoming with you," he persisted. "All our friends are going --"
"All your friends," she corrected.
He groaned, frustration starting to overtake him. "Since when are you so against school events? You've always gone to Homecoming."
She stood up. "Look, I don't wanna go, okay?!" she shouted. "Is that fine with you? Do I have your permission to not go?" she said sarcastically. "If you really wanna go, find someone else!"
Chad felt himself getting annoyed with her as she began stalking away. She can't just say no and offer no explanation. He stood up angrily and called after her, "Is this because everyone talks about you?" She paused in the middle of the street, and turned on the spot to stare at him. "If it is, I think you need to get the hell over it."
"I'm over it!" she snarled. "Everyone can fucking talk about me all they want! I don't give a shit! But I'm not gonna go to a school event where I know everyone will be talking about me! Would you go to a party if you knew everyone there hated you?" Headlights illuminated her, and a car stopped some ten feet away, honking for her to move. She flipped off the driver before turning and marching toward her car.
Chad cupped his hands over his mouth as he shouted, "Not everyone there will hate you!"
If she heard him, she gave no indication.
--
"Chad, I'm really getting sick of having to get you out of these messes," said Gabriella with much annoyance as she met up with Chad on the steps of East High early the following morning. "And frankly, everything you do is brought upon by yourself," she continued. "I can't believe you accepted more money from Ryan!"
"Are you through lecturing me?" he asked bitterly.
"No," she said firmly. "You can't just keep leeching money out of Ryan. If Sharpay does find out --"
"You said she wouldn't!" he exclaimed.
She waved his comment away, "Oh, psh! I was just saying that. For all we know, she could find out! Jason's not exactly the best secret keeper in the world."
"Great, thanks," drawled Chad. "Well, it won't matter, because she's already pissed at me."
"Did she ask why you're suddenly five hundred bucks richer?" sneered Gabriella.
"Are you done now?"
She sighed in defeat. "Yeah." Sitting down next to him, she said in a bored tone, "Okay, go on. What did you do?"
"I tried to get her to go to Homecoming with me."
Gabriella waited, but when Chad did not continue talking, she tried, unsure, "Um... how horrible?"
"The way she responded, you'd think I'd tried to rape her or something," he grumbled. "She flipped out. She said no, and when I tried to convince her to go, she started yelling about how no one likes her or something." He threw his hands up in their air, narrowly avoiding a whack to Gabriella's head. "I didn't know she cared so much!"
Gabriella smiled, somewhat condescendingly, down at Chad. "Well, most girls care if no one likes them."
"Does no one really like her?" he asked. "I mean, yeah, she's a bitch, but... no one likes her? She's really not that bad."
Laughing, Gabriella said, "Listen to yourself! A week ago, you wouldn't have gone near her even if she was bathing in a tub full of basketballs."
"Yeah, but --" he stammered, "That-that's different."
"How?"
He let his head fall back, causing him to face the sky. "Fuck. It's the same."
She nodded. "It is. And I really can't blame her for not wanting to go. At my old schools, everyone always talked about me because of how nerdy I was. It didn't bother me, per se, but the last thing I'd wanted to do was go to school events I wasn't required to attend."
He sighed. "So, what now? I have four hundred bucks to take a girl to a dance that she doesn't even want to go to."
Gabriella stood up quickly, and he stared. "That," she said, "is your problem. I told you not to take any more money."
"I could really use the money, Gabriella!" he said desperately. "And I swore that this was the last time."
"You sound like a drug addict," she said, not convinced. "You're gonna keep saying that until you and Sharpay celebrate your six month anniversary and she starts getting suspicious over how you made three thousand dollars without a job."
"I swear," he repeated, in a low voice, "that this is it."
Gabriella studied him for a long moment, seemingly X-raying him, before exhaling deeply. "Okay," she said helplessly. "If you say so."
--
"She's not at lunch," Chad mumbled to Gabriella later that day.
"I noticed," she hissed back.
The day before, Sharpay had sat with Chad and the rest of the group, much to the shock of the rest of the students. They'd all stared, deeply interested, and Chad noted, with much annoyance, that they seemed to want nothing more than to get involved in his own life. As if their own lives weren't fulfilling enough.
However, now that Sharpay was gone after only a day, people were whispering more than ever.
"I heard Chad dumped her because she wouldn't put out."
"Really? I heard Ryan got pissed after he caught them doing it in her room..."
"No, Ryan could care less about what Sharpay does! What really happened is Chad called her fat yesterday, and she stayed home today because she's so depressed..."
"I saw her in first period though!"
"Maybe she feels like she can't eat in front of him?"
There was a murmur of assent from that particular table, as they felt that they'd reached the correct conclusion. Chad looked ready to hurl his lunch tray at them as Gabriella stood up. "I'll be right back," she said, giving Chad a pointed nod, before leaving the lunch room.
"Did you mess it up with Sharpay again?" asked Ryan exasperatedly. Chad shoved a handful of fries into his mouth. "Can you just try and keep from pissing her off until after Homecoming?"
Chad narrowed his eyes as he swallowed, and said, "Do you care about her at all?"
Ryan shrugged. "Yeah. I mean, she's my sister. But she's a bitch to me."
Chad bit the inside of his cheek to keep from responding.
--
Gabriella checked every girls' bathroom and every science lab in the school for Sharpay, not finding her anywhere – although she wasn't exactly counting on Sharpay being in the latter. After ten minutes, Gabriella grew tired and decided to head back to the lunchroom. On her way, she passed the library, before doubling back.
She saw, through the open door, that Sharpay was sitting at a table in the corner of the library, her large purse hiding her lunch from the librarian. Gabriella slipped inside, nodded a greeting to the librarian, and sat next to Sharpay. The blonde looked up at the other girl, her eyebrows raised.
"Hey, Sharpay," smiled Gabriella in greeting. "Is that a turkey sandwich?" she said with faux-enthusiasm. "Looks good!"
Sharpay slowly finished chewing her food and swallowed, and said, "What do you want?"
Gabriella sighed, instantly dropping her perky act. "Before you yell at me about you being my 'good deed of the day,'" she started, using air-quotes, "I'm here because... well, I talked to Chad this morning." Sharpay glanced down, averting her eyes, as Gabriella kept going. "He really wants to take you the dance."
"Did he tell you guy I didn't wanna go?" asked Sharpay quickly, her shoulders tensing.
"I – no," lied Gabriella, noting Sharpay's frightened expression. The latter visibly relaxed. "But... I mean, he probably doesn't get it... he's a guy, you know."
"Well... I mean, I do kind of wanna go with him," said Sharpay slowly, after a small silence. "I think it would be fun if we went together."
Gabriella nodded. "But?" she prodded gently.
"But, I don't want Chad stuck with me the whole time," Sharpay said, frowning. "Like, at the party, when... well, when I wasn't exactly welcome, he was stuck parenting me the entire time. I think he'll regret it if we're hanging out alone throughout the whole dance."
Gabriella knitted her eyebrows together. "Why would you be alone?"
Sharpay blinked, and let out a laugh. "You're serious?"
"Yeah. I mean, we'll be there."
Giving her a strange look, Sharpay said slowly, "Well... yes. But in case your memory is faulty, you're the same people who didn't want me at Bogie's party."
Flushing slightly, Gabriella said, "I know. And, trust me, I felt really bad after that. But... I mean, you kinda have to know where we were coming from. Over the summer, you..." She searched for the right words, "weren't exactly the nicest person."
"I know," said Sharpay in a small voice, staring, again, at her lap. "I really just wanted you guys to like me," she confessed.
Taken aback, Gabriella raised her eyebrows and gaped. The statement seemed to atrocious, and yet to pitiful, all at the same time. "You tried to steal Troy from me... to get us to like you?" Gabriella couldn't stop the words from tumbling out of her mouth.
Smiling sheepishly, Sharpay said, "You weren't exactly included in that group."
"So you thought Taylor and everyone would like you more if you stole Troy from me," stated Gabriella, still not comprehending.
Biting the inside of her lip, Sharpay said, "I really don't know what went through my head. I just thought... everyone accepted you so well into their group when you got together with Troy, after, like, two weeks here, and I'd been trying to be accepted for years. I mean, it was fine when it was just Ryan and I, but... I don't know, I guess I was jealous of you. I wanted to be in your position." She paused, and added quickly, "And I know it sounds crazy, me wanting to be you."
Ignoring the last comment, Gabriella said, "Yeah, but you didn't have to be with Troy for that."
"I know," said Sharpay. "Well, now I know." She looked up, meeting Gabriella's eye. "Sorry about that, by the way. For, you know, making everything hell."
Gabriella laughed. "It's okay."
Sharpay's eyes flickered about the library as she asked, "So... you guys will really be cool if I go with you to Homecoming?"
"Totally," said Gabriella enthusiastically. "And I know it'll make Chad happy." After a short hesitation, she added, "But... just, be careful, okay?"
Her brow furrowed, Sharpay restated, "Be careful?"
"Yeah. Just... take it easy with Chad for a while," Gabriella said uncomfortably. "Don't dive in to anything."
Sharpay nodded. "Okay." She took Gabriella by surprise when she leaned over and hugged the other girl. Gabriella's eyes widened as she patted Sharpay on the back awkwardly. "Thank you," Sharpay whispered.
--
AN: Don't be too hard on Ryan. I'm not trying to make him The Jerk. Try looking at the situation from his point of view. Sharpay has never been that nice to him, as shown in chapter 1, and siblings are known to get each other back. I'm not purposely portraying him as the antagonist; he's just unaware of what he's doing could actually hurt his sister.