"BRRIIIING!" The bell sounded. Everyone stood up and collected their things.

"Hey, Montez!" Troy called. Gabriella turned around.

"Oh, good morning," Gabriella said, softly.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Troy rolled his eyes. "Matsui told me that you're my tutoring partner."

"Oh, really?" Gabriella asked. Her large brown eyes widened. Her heart dropped. Ugh, she was stuck with Bolton.

"Yeah."

"Um, I guess you can come over after basketball practice or whatever." Gabriella shrugged.

"Uh, I was going to anyways, I just didn't want to scare you're mom or whatever," Troy said.

"Okay…" Gabriella trailed off. "I gotta go. I'll see you tonight."

"Duh," Troy muttered. He turned to go meet up with his basketball friends.

6:00 P.M. That Night:

"Ding dong!" The doorbell rang.

"I'll get it!" Gabriella called. She ran to the door and opened it. "Oh, Troy, hey, I wasn't expecting you until later."

"Basketball got out early," Troy smirked. She was only wearing a spaghetti strap belly button shirt and booty shorts.

"Um, I'm gonna go get changed. You stay down here and make yourself comfortable." Gabriella said, her face red. She turned and ran up the stairs at full speed. "MOM! Troy's here!"

Maria Montez came out of the kitchen. "Oh, hello, you must be Troy." Maria said, extending her hand.

"That'd be me. I'll bet Gabriella's told you all the good stuff about me," Troy laughed.

"Not really," Maria said, smiling, as Gabriella came back down the stairs in Victoria Secret sweat capris and a pink tank top.

"Oh, I see you've met my mother," Gabriella smiled.

"Gabby, you didn't tell me your guest was so…' Maria looked for the words. Stuck up.

"Yeah, sorry mom. Um, Troy let's go upstairs."

"Ah," Maria warned, holding up her hand. "Play nicely, but not too nicely."

"We will, mom," Gabriella murmured, her cheeks turning bright pink. Troy chuckled.

Gabriella lead Troy upstairs. She opened the first door down the hallway to the left. "This is my room." Troy looked around. It didn't seem nerdy at all. Nothing like he would've expected.

She had posters of Chris Brown, Rihanna, Metro Station, and Simple Plan. Her walls were painted neon green and pink and she had a laptop sitting on her glass desk with a bright orange chair. "Wow," Troy said.

Gabriella looked up and Troy did, too. There were glow in the dark star plastered all over her ceiling. "Are you scared of the dark?" Troy asked, in a teasing tone.

"No," Gabriella blushed and looked down.

"Then, why do you have those up there?" Troy asked.

"Because…" Gabriella trailed off.

"Because?" Troy encouraged her.

"Because I like to believe that my dad is up there watching over me. I know, it's kind of stupid." Gabriella said, in a small voice.

"No it's not," Troy replied, walking over to her balcony, taking note that there was a tree right in front of it, perfect for climbing up onto it. He saw that there was a telescope there also. "You look at the stars even though you have your own in your room?"

"Oh, well, I like to look for planets and I've always wanted to see a shooting star," Gabriella smiled, walking over to the telescope. She looked through the eyepiece. "You should check this out."

Troy moved toward the telescope. She moved out of the way and he looked through it. The stars looked so bright and shiny. "The stars are beautiful tonight." Gabriella said to herself. Like you, Troy thought. Wait, had he really just thought that? What was happening to him? A soft wind blew through the night.

Gabriella closed her eyes. "I like the wind."

"Why?" Troy asked, looking up from the telescope.

"It reminds me of the people I love in my life. It never stops blowing, somewhere it always is. Just like somewhere out there, someone loves me." Gabriella smiled, opening her eyes and glancing at Troy and then at the alarm clock on her dresser in her room. "Oh, we should probably get to studying."

"Oh, yeah," Troy agreed, tearing his eyes away from her and following her back into her room. She sat down on the floor and reached up and turned on the radio on her dresser. Then, she pulled a thick book off of the shelf.

"What's your homework for tonight?" Gabriella asked Troy. Troy pulled his history homework out of his pocket. Gabriella took it gently and looked it over, her eyes moving across the paper in a flash. "American History."

"You read fast," Troy pointed out.

"Thanks," Gabriella laughed, opening her book to the Table of Contents. She handed his paper back to him. "Read the first question."

"Who was the twenty first President of the Untied States?" Troy read directly off the page.

"Okay.." Gabriella said, flipping a few pages ahead in her book. "Read this first paragraph." She watched as he leaned over and his ocean blue eyes skimmed over the page. He looked up.

"Chester A. Arthur?" Troy asked.

"Exactly. You see? It isn't that hard. You probably just didn't give enough time to read the pages given." Gabriella told him. She looked over at the paper he had nailed to the floor with one hand. He scrawled the answer down. "And how long was he president?"

"Um," Troy looked back at the book again. "It says from 1881-1885, so about five years?" Gabriella nodded. He wrote that down. "This really isn't that hard."

"Yeah, because we had a sub today." Gabriella replied. "Other assignments are more challenging." Troy nodded. They finished the paper, just as Maria called them down for dinner.