Again, thanks for the amazing response! I'm really glad that you guys like this story!
Disclaimer: I don't own High School Musical...
Remember when I said that I felt bad for putting down Troy the first day I was here? I take it back. I take back every mellow comment I ever thought about Troy. It's official: he's a jackass. Worse than a jackass. What's worse than a jackass? I don't know - all I know is that I'm appalled, disgusted. I can't believe I ever felt one ounce of guilt for shoving him off my porch a week ago. I remember the face he put on when he stared off blankly after I told him that I didn't want to see him in Morton and I wonder how I ever thought that it was genuine loneliness. I wonder what actually made me feel bad. I don't want to feel bad. I hate it. For the past week, I've hated myself every night when I go to bed thinking I might have been too harsh that day. Now, I hate myself for hating myself. And, here's why:
Over the past week, Troy Bolton has proved that he is a heartless bastard. He has made his way around every respectable girl in town and turned them into one of his blind followers. I can't believe it. My Morton. My own Morton has fallen into the hands of the devil. Even some of the moms are distracted by him.
I thought I made it clear to him that I didn't want to see him here. For just three months couldn't he have just left me alone to my heaven instead of corrupting it with his filthy presence?
Thank god at least Taylor hasn't turned over to the other side. That's because she knows what he's done to me the past few years. It was like Taylor and I were sitting back and watching every girl be hypnotized by him like in a magic show. The only thing missing was the popcorn.
It's raining this morning. There's a gutter right outside my window that must be broken or something from my grandpa's last painting job of the house because I can hear the rain rushing through it so loudly. I turn over in my bed try to ignore the rain outside and go back to sleep but I can't. It's slowly growing annoying. My mind flashes from Troy to the rain and I inwardly groan.
I uncover the thick blankets off of me and I'm immediately met with the cold of my room. Just a week ago, I was listening to birds chirping. That's Washington for you. By now, I'm desperate to get away from that guttural noise because it's driving me crazy. I swiftly open the door to my bedroom and step into the hallway. It's warmer out here. My grandmother has turned on the fire in the living room and I can smell the bacon on the frying pan. Grandpa is reading Seattle Times on the dining table. They're the perfect image of an elderly couple. Before entering the bathroom, I admire them lovingly.
Inside, I wash my face and brush my teeth. I'm in the kitchen again in no time. My grandparents wish me a good morning, which is pretty pointless because with a morning full of weighing how much I hate Troy, the stupid rain and the broken gutter outside my window, I'm off to a pretty bad start. I had a worse feeling about today.
My grandmother places a plate of bacon and eggs in front of me and her husband.
"Ay, your grandmother is going to make me fat" says Grandpa to me with a twinkle in his eye. He looks up at Grandma while her cheeks go rosy.
"Breakfast is the only thing that you let me cook, mi amor. You can make the most gourmet meals but I'll be the one serving you fresh kisses and waffles in the morning" she replies back to him. His tan hand reaches around her and they kiss. It's long and by the end, my Grandma is on his lap. If we were in a movie theater about now, the whole audience would be looking away awkwardly.
Me, on the other hand, wince and say, "Ew. Papi, get a room!" I look down at my plate and turn the eggs over with a fork.
"Mija, you'll know when your old; this is all you get!" says my grandmother. She gives him another kiss on the lips and leaves to the stove again. My grandfather chuckles and begins devouring his breakfast. I do too, erasing the image of my grandparents from my head.
After I finish and place my plate in the sink, my grandmother tells me, "Mija, I have to go grocery shopping later, do you want anything?".
I don't really want to think about it so I say, "I'm okay".
"Alright" she says. "Do you mind, then, dropping this dish off at the Caton's?"
I hesitate, remembering that the Caton residence is where Troy lives now. "Please, mija. I'll really appreciate it"
I lick my lips and accept, "Fine". It's hard when someone about fifty years older than you starts to plead sweetly. I take the clean casserole dish in my hands and make for the wall beside the doorway where the truck's keys are hanging by a nail.
"Wear a jacket! Tell her I thought the casserole was delicious!" Grandma calls after me. Before leaving, I change into a white top and a pair of jeans. I slip into my boots and jacket and zip it up fully then put the hood over my head. I was in no mood to have one drop of rain fall on me. After bundling up, I make my way out of the house. My hands are already cold and wet, holding the dish in front of me carefully so it doesn't slip. That would be a bad way to give a borrowed item back: broken.
I have to tug extra hard for the truck's door to open and slip inside. The leather seats instantly become damp. The truck roars to life once I key the ignition. I turn the heater on immediately and the truck fills up at first with fragrance that smells like old furniture. It clears out and by the time I'm out of my driveway, the truck begins to heat up.
It literally takes me three minutes to drive over to the Caton's house. It was a definite waste of gas but worth it because I was fully dry by the time I got there. Too bad I needed to step out in order to successfully give the dish. I duck my head under my hood again, grab the dish from the passenger seat and hop down from my truck.
I'm too concerned about not getting wet that I stare at the ground and don't bother looking up to see if I'm going the right way. I've been here thousands of times though. Then suddenly, bam! The dish was knocked out my hands and I staggered back five feet.
"Shit" I swear under my breath and anticipate a broken casserole dish when refocus my attention to it. Instead, it's caught just before it hits the ground. I look up, wondering who just saved me from apologizing endlessly to Lorrie Caton for breaking dish. It's probably her favorite dish took seeing as my damn luck won't make that situation any better.
Lo and behold, it's Troy. Of course. Those striking blue eyes find mine with that same playful look. I'm reminded of how much I hate him instantly. I don't stop to thank him. I just take the dish from his hands and shove past him towards the door after giving him a deathly look.
"I wouldn't go in there if I were you!" he yells to me as I march by him.
"Screw you!" I retort, immediately regretting it. Screw you? I repeat in my head. Honestly, I feel like I could've thought of something better than that. Something mildly more vulgar, perhaps.
I knock on their door twice. No answer. Impatiently, I try the knob and it's open. It doesn't take much strength for it to swing. I enter their house and in its silent. But not an 'empty home' silence. It is the silence that comes in horror movies right before the murderer strikes. I think back to what Troy told me before I embarrassed myself in front him. I wouldn't go in there if I were you. Why would he say that?
Then I hear them. It's muffled and probably behind a door somewhere but it's clear enough for me to know what's going on. Way. Too. Clear.
"Harder!" I hear. "Faster! Oh god!"
"Fuck!"
"Ah!"
My ears! My poor ears! At once, I panic. I find the nearest table for me to place the dish on and I bolt out of the house. This time, I don't care if my head gets wet. I just keep running until I'm back in the safety of my truck. I stare at the steering wheel, wide eyed, undoubtedly scarred for my life and breathless. God, twice in the same month I have gone through this. I just know that somewhere Troy Bolton is laughing his ass off. I'm tempted to look around and see if he's watching me right now but I stop myself, knowing that would just make me look dumber. I picture him laughing mindlessly until his face goes red and he has to try hard to catch his breath with strained wheezes. And then, I don't know if it's the image in my head of Troy guffawing or the fact that I actually think what just happened is hilarious, but I start laughing too. It starts as a giggle. Then I can't stop. I keel over the steering wheel and the euphoria fills my head. Tears rush to my eyes and soon my lungs begin to shrivel in need of oxygen.
The whole way home, I'm bursting out every time I remember the panic that went through me the moment I heard Mr. and Mrs. Caton. I couldn't even get out of the truck once I reach home. I decide to rush to Taylor's house and tell her the whole thing in person. Calling her won't do. I want to see her face when I tell her.
This trip doesn't take that long either but that's because I'm speeding slightly. I can't hold a straight face. When I arrive on the porch, I ring the doorbell. I stuff my hands in pockets of my jacket and grin ridiculously at the mesh door. The door behind it opens in time and Rob appears at the door way. Once he sees me, his face doesn't reflect mine. The joy that appears on his face every time Rob sees me doesn't shine in his eyes. I stand there looking like an idiot before I comprehend that something is wrong. The seriousness on his face is certainly not normal for always cheerful Rob.
"Hi, Rob" I greet cautiously. "Is Tay here?" I look passed him and I see her brown eyes peeking behind the wall that hides the stairwell behind it. He turns his head and catches Taylor's eyes. She shakes her head.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart. It's not the best time" says Robs. He shuts the door and leaves me standing there in a faceoff with the door. I'm the first to look away.
The nervous look in Taylor's eyes flashes in my head. Not the best time? I'm Taylor's best friend. There's no such thing as 'best time' for me. I'm always supposed to be there. The curiosity overwhelms me and I ditch the pathway to my truck and work my way around Taylor's house, over the soggy wooden fence and into her backyard. There are gigantic plants growing everywhere. It was clear that the past two years, Rob wasn't in the right health to tend to his yard. Weeds infested the area behind her eyes and god knows what else. I made my way through it because I was determined to know what was going on with Taylor whether or not she wanted to tell me.
Thankfully, there's a ladder up to Taylor's window. I climbed up, holding on tight to every single hinge because it's still raining the bars were very slippery.
"Tay!" I called out. I made it to her window and my arms were already tired. I hear a shuffling inside. The light was on but the curtain to her window was blocking me from seeing her. I knocked on the window.
"Gabi?" she was close, I could hear it. In a matter of moments, the window open I was able to scramble inside. I landed hands first on her ground, staining her carpet with the water dripping off my hair.
"Tay, what's going on? Why didn't you let me in?" I ask.
"Gabi.." she hesitated. I gotta say, this hurt. We were best friends since sixth grade and she can't tell me what's going on? I decide to tell her this, minus the fact that it was slightly offensive.
"Tay, come on. We've been friends since sixth grade. I think I can handle a secret"
"It's not you" said Tay.
This was beginning to feel a lot like a break up. "What? It's you?" I guess.
She sighs. "You're not making this any easier" she tells me quietly now. I stop and take a deep breath. Maybe I was being a bit harsh. A pang of guilt washes over me in our moment of silence. She sits on her bed and stares at her hands.
"Sorry" I apologize and sit next to her. "Seriously, Tay, you can tell me whatever you want. I'm here for you no matter what". She bites her lip and I see water appearing in her eyes.
There's a longer moment of silence. I wait, my patience was restored now that I stopped thinking too selfishly. The tears start to roll down her face and I move to wipe them away.
"Come on" I say encouragingly and wrap my arms around her in an embrace. She puts her head on my shoulder and sniffles. "It's okay"
"I'm pregnant" she says abruptly.
At first, it's like I never heard what she said. I stare at the fairly large sized poster of Josh Hutcherson on her wall and wonder why she likes him. I think to myself that he's grown up in the past couple years and got increasingly attractive so maybe that's why. He played the cute, innocent kid in an R-rated movie and is playing a character from one of my favorite books, so that's always a plus. Come to think of it, he's not that bad at all.
And then, finally, it hits me. I feel stupid after it takes so long for it register in my head.
"Pregnant?" I whisper. She pulls back and her sad eyes meet mine. She nods. I swallow.
"What-" I clear my throat. "What are you going to do now?"
She pauses at this. I have a feeling she hasn't thought about her options. Maybe she has, though. Maybe she's just wondering why I haven't figured out what she's most likely to do now.
"I guess, I-I'm having a baby" she tells me. I have to look away for a second, back at Josh Hutcherson on the wall. He's looking at me like I'm the worst friend ever. Aren't I supposed to make this less hard for her? Make her comfortable? Then, I remember something else.
"So, um. Who's the guy?" I hope this works. If it's just some guy she hooked up with at a bar and I just reminded her of that night she made a stupid mistake, I wonder how Josh would look at me then.
But, it looks like I hit the right point because Taylor's face literally lightens up.
"Oh! His name is Chad" she says. "Chad Danforth. And he's a freshman at the University of Washington in Seattle. He volunteers at the hospital that Dad goes to. He's going to be here in a week. You're going to love him Gabriella!"
I nod my head and look at her. She begins telling me about Chad. I tune in and out of what she says. She seems so happy and well-off with Chad, like they were a married couple. My thoughts started drifting. Is that what would happen now? Would I lose my best friend to a baby and the dude that knocked her up? The fear built up in my heart as Taylor showed me pictures of them. It seemed Chad had shown Taylor and Rob all around Seattle. Even Rob came to like the boy, or so Taylor thought. The whole time I was in panic mode. Every time she showed me a picture of just the two of them, my heart beat rapidly in my chest and I bit my lip to stop me from showing it.
I stayed there for the rest of the day. Rob came up an hour after I climbed up to Taylor's room and smiled at me like I expected him to do when he first saw me at the door.
"I knew you'd find your way up here" he told me and then invited both of us down for coffee and a treat. He had baked cookies. They told me about what they started to do for the baby that's coming. The diet that she would have to go on, the doctor's visit that she was going to go to regularly, how big she's going to get.
17, I remember. We're seventeen. But as I sat in Rob's kitchen drinking coffee and the rain still poured on outside, I felt about ten years ahead of us. They seemed happy. What was she going to do when school starts? What will Chad do when his baby was born? Will she move to Seattle? I didn't know why they weren't completely scared like I was. Was I the only one losing something in this situation?
I left Taylor's house with a fake smile on my face. I was terrified though. I drove home without the heater or the radio, just in my own eating silence. Instead of going inside once I got home, I climb to the top of the roof of my own home. The rain's still pouring and I stopped caring about getting wet. My hairs soaking wet, I can't feel my face and inside, I feel like hell.
Everything was changing. The one place I depended on to never change was slipping out from underneath me. It's not Morton itself that I love so much, it's the people in it and I just can't afford to lose them. They were my everything. Still, my grandparents are getting older and now, my best friend is pregnant.
Furthermore, this whole day everyone seemed completely satisfied: my grandparents this morning, Taylor, Chad and their coming baby and even my unfortunate confrontation with the Catons. Everyone was in bliss. Settled. Was I the only one struggling to stay glad just for a day? As I sat there on the roof with my head on my knees and the skies washed down on me, I couldn't help but feel; where was my happy ending?