A/N: I know, I know, I'm a terrible writer and it's been six months since this story was updated, but I just lost my interest and I didn't want to write something I wasn't happy with. But I found motivation to write this chapter because one of my friends is leaving for Camp America tomorrow, and so this chapter is written for her, with our very own cameo that we've been planning since she started helping me write this story many, many chapters ago ;). Have an awesome trip, Stace! I'm gunna miss you, but I'll forgive you if you can smuggle me back a certain blue eyed boy!
"So I was thinking," Joseph said to Maria as they washed the dishes at the small sink.
"How you're going to make your daughter hate you some more?" Maria asked with a sigh. "Because honestly, you're doing a mighty fine job as it is."
"I was thinking," Joseph repeated in a louder voice, forgetting that Gabriella was still up in her room and could hear everything that he said. "I have been too harsh on Gabi and Troy. I forget that Gabi is growing up."
"You were thinking that you've been too harsh? I know you've been too harsh, Joseph." Maria snapped. "You can't just stop and change your mind like this, it's not fair to anyone, least of all our daughter who is having her heart crushed every time you decide to get all overprotective."
"I know that, Maria," Joseph hissed back. "She's just been my little girl for so long, and now she's making out with some boy and doing god knows what."
"Troy is not some boy, Daddy," Came Gabriella's voice, having decided to interrupt her parents as she couldn't stand to hear them arguing about her. "I know you just want to protect me, but you taught me to make my own decisions, and you know I've always made good ones."
"So far," Joseph muttered, but Maria and Gabriella both heard him and he quickly kept on talking. "It's easy to make a decision in the heat of the moment and then regret it later when you've had time to think about it."
"I'm not going to have any regrets," Gabriella seethed, and neither of her parents could remember the last time they had seen their daughter this worked up. "My only regret will be not getting to spend time with Troy, because I've listened to you."
"Gabriella," Joseph started, but the teenager turned back to face her Father, her dark eyes burning with anger.
"No, Daddy, you're not listening to me at all," Gabriella cried, tears welling in her eyes. "I'm not a little kid anymore, and whether you like it or not, I'm growing up and I'm going to fall in love, I'm going to get married and I'm going to have sex!"
Gabriella stormed off, out of the motorhome, slamming the door behind her, making both her parents wince at the sound. Maria stopped Joseph from going after their daughter, following after her instead, knowing the teenager needed some time away from her protective father.
When she got outside of the motorhome, Maria saw Gabriella running off across the darkening campgrounds, with the entire Bolton family, and Will watching her, unsure if they should follow.
"Can I?" Troy asked Maria, gesturing towards Gabriella's disappearing figure. "I'll bring her back right away."
"Go and talk to her Troy," Maria said with a gentle smile. "Take your time."
Troy smiled back at his girlfriend's Mom, taking off after Gabriella and catching up to her easily. As she heard Troy approaching her, Gabriella turned to see who was following her, expecting to see one of her parents, so she was more than surprised to see Troy gaining on her.
"My Dad will kill you," Gabriella mumbled, feeling for the first time the hot, angry tears that were spilling onto her cheeks.
"It'd be worth it to make sure you're okay," Troy replied softly, reaching out for Gabriella's hand to stop her from continuing her movements away from the families' motorhomes. "Your Mom sent me after you anyways."
"My Dad thinks I'm going to regret this," Gabriella whispered.
"Regret what? This trip?" Troy asked confusion laced through his voice.
"Regret us," Gabriella confessed. "He thinks we're going to end up pregnant and I'm going to regret wanting to spend time with you."
"Do you think that?"
Gabriella shook her head quickly. "Not at all, I regret that my Dad is ruining this all for us though."
Troy had nothing more to add to the conversation, for he knew that he and Gabriella were both feeling the same way about the beginning of their relationship causing such issues amongst their parents, so he simply wrapped his arms around Gabriella and drew her to his chest.
After a long time of simply enjoying the presence of the other one, Troy nudged Gabriella's head with his lips, drawing her out of her content lull in his arms.
"We should get back, it's getting absolutely freezing cold out here," Troy said, his words and actions not matching as he tightened his grip on his girlfriend.
"I'd rather be cold than have to talk to my Father," Gabriella groaned seriously.
"Maybe someone has talked to him since we've been gone?" Troy asked hopefully, changing positions so he and Gabriella were standing side by side, his arm looped around her waist still, but allowing them to slowly start walking back to the campsite.
"Maybe someone gave him a personality transplant and my old, trusting Dad will be there."
"He's probably hoping his old, non-hormone driven daughter will be arriving back," Troy teased, determined to have her in a good mood before they got back to their parents. "But I'm sure as hell not hoping that."
"You are impossible, Troy Bolton," Gabriella rolled her eyes, snuggling into Troy's side as their motorhomes came into view and they saw four figures sitting outside, obviously waiting for their return.
"But you're still falling for me like crazy," Troy grinned as he loosened his grip on Gabriella waist, giving her hip one last squeeze before he dropped his arm back to his own side.
Gabriella didn't see the need to tell Troy he was right, she knew that by her fighting to see him, she was showing him in the most obvious way just how much she was falling for him, and from his returning fight, she knew he was falling the same.
"Hey kids," Jack greeted the pair with a smile. "We were just about to send some Siberian Huskies out to find you, since it's getting so cold out."
"You could've waited inside, Dad," Troy replied with a shake of his head at his Dad's attempt at lightening the situation.
"Well we could've, but we wanted to talk to you two first," Maria interrupted. "We're all aware that the two of you are almost adults, and we haven't really been treating you like that since you two became an item."
Gabriella was grateful that her Mom was making it seem like all four adults had been acting the same way, rather than placing the blame on Joseph, because Gabriella knew that if there was one way to get her Dad's back up, it was to place the blame on him.
"So we're going to do our best to treat you two like the adults you're growing to be," Lucille added in, smiling at her son and his girlfriend.
"We all are, right Joe?" Jack asked his long-time friend, with a raise of his eyebrows.
"Troy, do you want to come out with us tomorrow?" Joseph asked, looking like a little kid who was thanking his great-grandma for the horrible gift.
"He's going to kill me and bury me deep in the bushes," Troy mumbled to Gabriella as they followed Joseph and Maria through the bushwalk the foursome were going on during their "bonding time", they were almost halfway through the hour long walk, and the weather was steadily getting worse, despite Maria's protests that there wasn't meant to be rain until later that afternoon.
Gabriella giggled, squeezing Troy's hand in her own as Maria turned around to shoot the teens a grin, her own hand gripping her husband's to reassure him.
"Isn't this place beautiful?" Maria called back to the teens, looking up into the canopy of trees above them that blocked out the grey sky.
"It is, Mama," Gabriella agreed. "You can hardly tell that it looks like it's going to pour with rain any minute."
"Gabriella," Joseph warned, and Maria shot her husband a look that told him to be quiet, or else.
"Thanks for inviting me," Troy piped up, helping Gabriella to climb over a tree that had fallen in their path. "This beats sitting around at the motorhome with my brothers."
"You're welcome, sweetheart," Maria replied, looking back up towards the sky as she thought she felt raindrops falling on her head.
"Is it raining?" Gabriella asked a few minutes later, having felt for sure a few big raindrops hitting onto her face.
"It's just showers," Maria commented, fastening her pace as she realised that it was going to pour with rain at anytime.
"Should we turn around?" Gabriella asked out loud, looking at her watch to see how long had passed since they had left, knowing the walk was roughly an hour long. "Actually we're about halfway through so I guess we should just keep going? It loops around to where we started, right?"
Just as Maria went to answer, a loud clap of thunder sounded around them, rolling around the hills and making all four of them jump.
"Shit," Troy swore as Gabriella leapt at him, digging her nails into his hand, Maria and Joseph didn't hear the cuss word from the teenage boy's lips because Maria seemed to be as scared as Gabriella was and was clinging to Joseph, who was trying to calm her down.
Because of the dense bush area they were in, the lightning that was leading the thunder couldn't be seen, and Troy was inwardly freaking out about getting struck by lightning, though he was trying not to think of it so that he could calm Gabriella down.
"Baby, it's okay," he cooed in Gabriella's ear, trying to unclench her small fingers from around his hand with no success. He looked over at Gabriella's parents, seeing Joseph and Maria standing in a similar position to him, though Joseph was looking over at the teenagers as he calmed down his wife. Troy thought for a second of moving away from Gabriella, as he and Joseph locked eyes, but Troy decided that calming a growing hysterical Gabriella down was more important than trying to please Joseph.
As Joseph watched Troy hugging Gabriella, he felt anger build up inside of him for a few seconds as he saw how tightly his little girl was clinging onto her boyfriend, their embrace so tight it was impossible to see any space between their bodies. But as he watched longer and saw how much Gabriella trusted whatever Troy was saying to calm her down, Joseph wondered, not for the first time, if Troy was the perfect guy to take over caring for his little girl, who – as much as he hated to deny it – was no longer his little girl.
The foursome had arrived back at the motorhome just as the storm was ending, though they managed to catch the last few strikes of lightning, lighting up the sky as the thunder boomed around the hills, and though Gabriella and Maria still clung tightly to their men, they were all able to admire how beautiful the area looked in the storm.
When they got back to the campsite, Joseph had surprised everyone by asking Logan and Connor if they wanted to ride in the Montez motorhome for the 2 hour drive from Carterton to Wellington, saying that he was sure Gabriella and Troy would like to travel together.
Which was why Gabriella and Troy were currently joined in a passionate lip-lock in the back of the Bolton motorhome, both only vaguely aware of Troy's parents being a short distance away from them as they got caught up in the moment.
Troy let out a low groan as Gabriella's hand danced across his lap, applying pressure where he needed it the most before she quickly made work of his zip and worked her hand into the small space inside Troy's jeans.
"Troy, shhh," she whispered as she encased him in her tiny hand, slipping him out the fly of his pants and tightening her grip on his hardening erection. "You gotta be quiet, okay?"
All Troy could manage to do was nod his head as Gabriella's hand started working over him, his eyes rolling back into his head as he tried to focus on the movements and the pure look of joy and satisfaction on her face as she watched the pleasure wash over his face.
Troy was a typical teenage boy, and even though he had a very hot girlfriend – or maybe because he had a very hot girlfriend – he regularly took care of his needs, sometimes a few times a day, but nothing he did compared to the sight of Gabriella's hand moving up and down his member, her thumb brushing across the tip at random intervals, making him shiver in pleasure.
"I'm not going to last," he choked out after only a few minutes, his hips pressing up into Gabriella's hand subconsciously trying to reach his peak. "Oh fuck, baby."
Deciding quickly on how she was going to stop this act from turning messy, she pushed Troy across his seat slightly, moving back as far as she could before she ducked her head down and slipping her lips around Troy, her hand still working over what part of him didn't fit into her mouth.
"Fuck, oh god," Troy whimpered as he was engulfed by the warmth of his girlfriend's mouth, his hand going straight to the pulled back curls of her hair and tangling his fingers through the silky locks, his hips bucking up as she drew him in, in one last, long, slow movement that sent him spinning over the edge, out of control.
Despite his rapid breathing and his thumping heart, Troy caught Gabriella's lips in a zealous kiss as he quickly slipped himself back inside his pants and zipped them up before he plunged his hands back in Gabriella's curls, pulling her upper body flush against his own and happily replaying the favour.
Unsurprisingly, the drive passed fast for the two teenagers, and in no time at all they were pulling into their next temporary home, a holiday park located right near the city of Wellington. It was only 9am, the families having left early to ensure they would get a full day at the Wellington Zoo, an activity that for once appealed to everyone.
Once the motorhomes were parked up, the group went across the road to a bus stop, waiting for the bus that would take them into the city and right to the zoo, saving them the trouble of trying to find connecting buses. A helpful man at the holiday park had told them what number they needed to catch and after only a few minutes of waiting a dark purple bus had pulled up and the group were setting off on their next adventure.
When they arrived at the zoo, the group split up, Troy and Gabriella, enjoying their newfound freedom together, hung around the start of the zoo, watching the busy otters diving in and out of the water, swimming under the bridge and Gabriella excitedly ran from one side to the other to watch the particularly cheeky male otter.
When Troy began to grow bored he tugged Gabriella to the small rainforest walk where the different monkeys lived, and the pair were stunned to see tiny cotton top tamarind monkeys running above their heads in the branches.
"They're so cute!" Gabriella squealed and Troy had to agree with her, the mischievous looking little creatures stopped to look at the people below them before scurrying back off to hide amongst the branches.
Next the pair were faced with the nocturnal house, where the native animals the kiwi and tuatara were housed. They entered the small, dark room, and Gabriella immediately grabbed onto Troy's hand as they wandered over to the closest display, seeing that this was where the brown kiwi lived, and after almost five minutes of searching, the pair were blessed with seeing the flurry of feathers dart across the enclosure from one log to another. They had even better luck with the tuataras, spotting one straight off and seeing another two before they decided that the living dinosaurs weren't going to move anytime quickly and they headed back out into the daylight again.
Quickly they walked through the bird cages, neither very interested in the array of birds that greeted them, neither were they very interested in the reptiles, stopping only for a few minutes before they headed into the African part of the zoo, firstly stopping at the zebra enclosure where the striped animals were trotting around in the cool breeze. They visited the lions, tigers, giraffes – who were eating from a tree right next to the observation deck, so close that Troy and Gabriella were only inches from the huge animals -, the baboons, the wallabies and kangaroos that Troy were convinced were all kangaroos until Gabriella pointed out a sign that told of the differences in the animals.
After a long walk the pair ended up at the chimpanzee enclosure, just a few minutes before the talk about the animals was meant to start. There they met Joseph and Maria, and the pair offered to take Charlie for the rest of the zoo trip, since there wasn't much to see after the chimpanzees.
Once the three were sitting down by the chimp enclosure, Charlie grew restless and so Gabriella let her out of her pushchair so she could stretch her small legs.
Immediately, Charlie wandered to the four people sitting on the seats next to Troy and Gabriella, plopping herself down between the two couples and smiling widely at them.
"Charlie!" Gabriella laughed, jumping up and quickly scooping up the toddler from her seat. "Sorry about that."
"It's okay," one of the girls laughed. "She's so cute!"
"Thanks," Gabriella grinned, letting Charlie get back down and giving her a gentle push back towards Troy. "Sorry if she annoyed you."
"She's okay," the other girl commented as Charlie wandered back over to them, smiling at the four new faces. "Are you guys here on holiday?"
"Yeah, joint family vacation," Troy grinned, having slid over the seats to be closer to where Gabriella was now sitting, keeping an eye on Charlie who seemed intent on sitting with the four New Zealand teenagers. "I'm Troy, this is Gabriella and her little sister, Charlie."
"I'm Stace," grinned the curly haired girl, her blue eyes darting over to the boy with the shorter brown hair and the only brown eyes in the group. "And this is Aidan."
"I'm also Stace," the shorter of the two girls chimed in from her spot on her boyfriend's lap. "And this is Zac."
The long haired boy nodded a hello, smiling at the newcomers before he gestured to the seats behind where they sat.
"Take a seat," Zac commented. "Charlie seems to have gotten herself comfortable here."
Gabriella and Troy sat where the boy had indicated, and the six teenagers quickly fell into an easy conversation about where Troy and Gabriella had already been on their trip, and where they were heading to next.
"It'll be really cold down south," the curly haired Stace commented.
"Yeah you'll get snowed in somewhere I bet," Aidan added and the others all nodded at his comment. "And to think, you gave up your summer to have our crappy winter."
Troy laughed, dropping an arm around Gabriella's shoulder as he replied "I'd give up every summer if I ended up with a hot girlfriend on my arm."
The two Stace's awwed as their boyfriend's laughed and Gabriella elbowed Troy in the side jokingly, their conversation being cut as the zookeeper started the talk.
After the short talk about the thirteen chimpanzees that lived in the zoo, the new friends all stood up, Gabriella strapping a reluctant Charlie back into her pushchair.
"Where are you heading to next?" Zac asked Troy and Gabriella, and Gabriella looked down at her map.
"Cheetahs, we're almost finished," Gabriella answered, pointing forward to the cheetah enclosure.
"That's where we're heading too," the shortest girl grinned and the six teenagers talked amongst themselves as they visited the last few enclosures that the zoo had to offer, with Charlie falling asleep after only a few minutes of leaving the chimpanzee enclosure.
When they reached the food area of the zoo, at the end of the enclosures, Gabriella saw the rest of their families already there, eating corndogs and fries.
"We're going to grab hotdogs and chips," Aidan announced to the girls, gesturing between he and Zac. "Hungry?"
"Yeah you want a corndog, babe?" Troy asked and the four New Zealander's laughed at his American term.
"We call them hotdogs here," the shorter Stace explained and Gabriella and Troy nodded in understanding of why the other teens had laughed. "And chips for the fries."
"You'd never guess we all spoke English," Gabriella laughed as Troy and the other two boys headed towards the growing line where the food was being sold.
"It's crazy, huh?" The other girls laughed, and Gabriella gestured towards her parents.
"I'm just going to take Charlie back to my parents, do you want to eat lunch together?"
For the next half hour, Troy and Gabriella formed friendships with the other four, and they left with swapping facebook identities and emails, vowing to keep in contact.
"Maybe this trip isn't turning out so badly," Troy smiled at Gabriella as they walked out of the zoo at the end of the day.
"This are certainly looking up," Gabriella agreed. "I wonder what the South Island is going to be like."