Author Note:

So, here we are at chapter three, friends and neighbors. There shouldn't be any terms in here that you or Wikipedia aren't familiar with. I know I may be drawing out the meeting for some of you, but I promise that backstory and internal processing are going to be big part of this story, so please trust me.

Thanks again for all of the amazing feedback that you've been providing. Appreciated as always.

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

"Shar, what is the big deal?"

"The big deal, Ryan, is that I am completely and totally mortified by how I acted in high school! I swore that I would never face anyone from East High ever again and now one of them is coming here and I'm just not quite sure I can handle this!"

In the delayed reaction that came with iChat, I saw my brother roll his eyes.

"Shar, seriously. Do you have any idea how different we all are? The whole point of getting older is to be different than you were in high school."

I cracked my knuckles and took a deep breath.

"But this isn't just…"

I could see his face crack into a smile. "I know, sis. It's Troy. Troy is a horse of a different color."

I nodded. "I just… I mean… I was awful to him."

"No, you were in love with him so you acted like an idiot. Totally different."

"Thanks."

"Anytime," he winked. "Hey, my skype credit is about to run out. I don't want to waste the whole time on Bolton and your high school sex fantasies. Fill me in on the clinic. Oh, and you know that Sarah will kill me if I don't actually get any info on Badi."

My niece was a woman after my own heart. Even at ten, she understood that African men were the way to go.

"Well, everything's going just as it always is. I'm going out to Kijabe at the end of the week, right before Troy gets here, to visit that CARE clinic for the disabled children. I have a meeting with the orthopedic surgeon there, he's American, about how to best do on the spot ortho care."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, like when kids come in with minor fractures. I'm sure there's a way for me to set them in the clinic without having to send them to a hospital or have them walk around with broken bones. Dr. Gokcen is pretty skilled in emergency care, so he offered to show me the basics."

"That's really exciting, Shar," Ryan smiled. I could see him look over his shoulder. His wife must be calling to him. Sure enough, my sister-in-law's head shortly popped over Ryan's shoulder.

"Hey Shar!"

"Hey Emily, I miss you."

Her face twisted into a grimace. "We miss you, too! We can't wait until Christmas. You're here for a whole month, right?"

"Right."

"Excellent."

Ryan cut in, "Shar, we've got to run. Can I tell Sarah that Badi misses her?"

I nodded in the affirmative and we said our goodbyes. As I signed off my computer, I noticed that my coffee cup was empty.

Nairobi was never quiet. Even now, at 2am, there was so much hustle and bustle out on the streets. As I waited for the next pot of coffee to perk, I stood at my window and watched the traffic sail by.

I really only missed America at night. In the wee small hours of the morning, as the song goes, when the whole wide world is fast asleep. Of course, my American world is not fast asleep. I'm seven hours ahead of Ryan, Emily and Sarah and nine hours ahead of our parents. Ryan and Emily are both on staff at NYU – Ryan in the theater department and Emily in the English – so they make their home just outside of Manhattan. My parents are retired and living in Albuquerque still. Although Ryan's family has made sure to visit me in every country I've lived in, my parents have never done so. I only see them on their terms, which means that I must be clean and presentable. None of this "African nonsense", as my mother puts it.

I love my job, I really do. I work for Oxfam International, primarily as an HIV/AIDS counselor and clinician. I've done a few other jobs for them as well, but that's the one I've spent the most time on. I've lived in Nairobi for about four years now. Before that it was New Dehli and Kilgali and London and Belfast. There was also that brief stint in Papua New Guinea, but that… well, let's not remember that tonight. I'm lonely enough as it is.

As I survey my humble flat, I realize that it is crammed full of the life that I have lead, all entirely after high school. I have a few pictures of college, but it's all mostly from my job and professional life. Even the pictures of my family are all from the past few years. I made a very conscious decision a long time ago to not be the Sharpay Evans that everyone knew from East High. I couldn't be that person anymore, not after all that I had seen and everything that had happened.

And now Troy Bolton is coming here. I wonder if he's the same or if he's different. Well, obviously, he didn't turn out to be a professional basketball player like all the New Mexico newspapers wanted him to be. I wonder if his journey to photojournalism was a strange as mine to Oxfam employee.

Does he know that he's meeting me? I wonder what his thoughts are…

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

"I can't believe that he has you going for a whole month!"

"Mom, calm down, Kenya is actually safer than LA. And I'm actually on my way to the airport, so it's not like you're going to talk me out of this."

"But don't' worry," Gabi muttered next to me. "She'll try."

I suppressed a giggle as my mother proceeded to do just that. It, of course, was all the same stuff that I've been hearing since Andrew first told me that I would be going on this little adventure.

"Mom, seriously, Mom, Mom…" I interrupted a few times before she finally shut up. "Mom, you have my itinerary, the embassy knows that I'm there, there is now nothing else for you to worry about. I have the international phone, you can call me and check in on me."

"But what if you don't answer?"

"Then I'm probably dead, Mom."

"Troy Bolton, do not mess with me!"

I took a deep breath, "Mother, we have been over this several times. Listen, someone's beeping in, it might be someone from Kenya, I don't recognize the number, I'll call you when I land, I love you, buh bye."

I snapped the phone shut and leaned back against the seat of Gabi's car.

"Lair," she snapped.

"Yeah, I know, I'm going to hell," I sighed.

"As long as you're aware."

The rest of the ride passed in relative silence. Gabi sang along to the radio and I flipped through my informational binder.

We were just about to pull off at the exit for LAX, when she turned down the radio and stole a glance at me.

"Troy, are you at all prepared for what you're going to see?"

I paused and flipped to a page in the binder. Reading out loud, I answered her, "According to UNICEF, only 43 percent of Kenyans have access to proper sanitation facilities. The average life expectancy is 48 years and it is the nation with the sixth highest HIV/AIDS rate in the world. The gross national income is $530 a year and most people will never experience electricity in their homes."

"So your answer is…"

"I have no idea what I'm getting into," I replied.

"Well, as long as you're aware," she repeated. I smiled at her, once again marveling at my high school sweetheart and the woman she had become. I remember being shocked by how much she had changed during freshman year. That summer that we worked camp she had completely come out of her shell. I wasn't quite sure what to do with it at first. Andrew, of course, didn't either… but in a totally different way.

"Troy," she started, breaking into my thoughts.

"Yeah?"

"I want you to really live this experience."

I laughed, "As opposed to?"

"Listen, idiot, I'm pouring out wisdom here."

"Sorry."

We had pulled up to the departures gate, so she parallel parked and then turned to me. Grabbing my hand for emphasis, she continued. "The greatest piece of advice that anyone ever gave Andrew and I before we went to Bolivia was lean in. Fully experience every moment, no matter how painful or confusing they are. You're going to see things that are going to mess you up in deep ways, Troy. Deep, deep ways."

"I know."

"No, you don't. And that's okay. You're not supposed to," she smiled. Gabi leaned forward and gave me a hug. "Now, I packed some presents into your carry-on, so have fun discovering them on the plane."

"Aw, Gabi, you shouldn't have."

"I know, but I did."

We loaded my luggage out of the car and onto the sidewalk and I walked through the process of curb-side check-in. As a frequent traveler, it's one of my favorite inventions. When I had my boarding pass for the first two flights of my three flight and forty-six hour extravaganza, I faced Gabi one last time.

"So, here I go."

"Here you go, Bolton," she pulled me into a hug. "Carpe diem the crap out of it all, friend."

I nodded into her hair and squeezed extra hard one last time. I had done this a million times before – flown away to a far away land by myself… why was I wigging out so much this time?

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&