Against All Odds

Saints and Sailors

"Okay class!" Ms. Darbus called out to the students. "Please be seated."

A few remaining students wandered into the class, and everyone found their seats.

"Today we get to work on our favorite humanities project." She said dryly. Louise Darbus had worked at East High for nearly twenty five years. She had been the drama teacher for twenty. She had been here longer than all but one teacher, including Principal Matsui himself. Yet, no one gave her the slightest amount of respect. Her musicals were always on the back burner to the sports teams, and it was her class that was interrupted for this stupid community service project.

A few groans let out as the students realized what she meant. Troy looked over at Gabriella, and gave a fearful look that made her giggle.

"Today's activity will be slightly different, however. I will pair up your groups, making larger groups of four. These groups will have to build some sort of presentation that expresses every member of the group. You will get three days this week to work on these projects and Friday we will have class in the auditorium to display them all."

More groans let out when the students realized that each and every one of them would have to put in some amount of effort to complete this project.

"And here are the groups. Taylor Mckessie, Mark Robbins, Zeke Baylor, and Sharpay Evans: you will be group number one. Chad Danforth, Melanie Smith, Jason Cross, and Kelsi Neilson: you are group number two. Gabriella Montez, Tim Nichols, Troy Bolton, and Zane Brown: you are group three."

Ms. Darbus continued to list of groups, but Troy had stopped listening. Even though he hated working with Zane – the chance to work with Gabriella made all that very unimportant.

The groups began to move towards each other as Ms. Darbus finished calling off the groups.

"Now please send up one of your group members to draw and determine what order you will be displaying your projects on Friday."

Troy, Gabriella, Zane, and Tim all looked at each other.

"I'll go." Gabriella said, smiling at the three boys looking at her.

As she made her way to the front of the room, Troy, Zane, and Tim all sat awkwardly in their group. For Troy, it seemed like eternity waiting for Gabriella to return. He was more than relieved when he saw her walking back.

"Well, I'm not sure if this is good news or not, but we're last." She said trying to keep the enthusiasm. It was more than evident that this was going to be a difficult situation. She held out her hand to Zane.

"I'm Gabriella, it's a pleasure to meet you."

Zane looked up at her but didn't take her hand. Gabriella simply put her hand back down and sat down again between Troy and Tim.

"Hi Tim, I'm.."

"I know who you are Bolton."

Gabriella winced. Silently, she prayed for just some form of help.

"Can we just get this over with?" Zane finally spoke up.

"I thought you didn't care Brown?" Troy said dryly, but immediately regretted after seeing Gabriella's reaction. He knew she was trying to make this go as smoothly as possible and right now he wasn't helping. He glanced at her apologetically, and was relieved when she smiled at him.

"Well, if I don't pass this class I have to repeat this entire year. I just want to get the hell out of here."

"Well that's enough motivation for me!" Gabriella said standing up. "Why don't we all head to the foyer." The three boys stood and followed her out the door.

Zeke, Sharpay, Taylor, and Mark all sat in the chemistry lab staring blankly at each other.

"So, uh, what is something we all have in common?" Zeke said, stumbling over his words. Even he knew that none of them had anything in common, well except Taylor and Mark's academic interest.

"Well, I like video games..." Mark said.

"Yeah, I guess I do too." Zeke said, his hopes rising a bit. They were immediately shot down when he saw Taylor and Sharpay's blank faces.

"Okay, well I bake." He said. There was no response to this.

'Dear God.' Taylor thought to herself. She looked around the lab at all the test tubes and beakers as if she were trying to find an answer. Then suddenly it hit her.

"Oh, I got it." She said, a wide grin across her face.

Melanie sat in a corner of the music room scribbling at her sketch book. Chad, Jason, and Kelsi all sat staring at her. How were they ever going to find something to express all of them?

Kelsi stood up and made her way to the piano. She silently played the keys as they all sat racking their brains for some sort of idea. Jason and Chad related to each other in several ways, but they couldn't think of anything that incorporated the girls. Kelsi listened to the boys brainstorm ideas as she broke into "Heart and Soul."

Suddenly, Melanie spoke up. "Can you play that in a duet?"

Kelsi looked up. "You play piano?"

"Since I was six. My mom was trying to take my mind off of things, so she got me a hobby." Melanie answered blankly, glancing at Chad. She knew that he knew what happened at age six for her to need a hobby.

"Maybe we can make this work." Jason said.

"Guys, I have an idea!" Chad jumped up and walked over to the piano.

"So what do you like to do Zane?" Gabriella asked.

He looked at her. "Listen honey, I have nothing in common with you. This is a lost cause."

"Okay. Tim, what about you? Tell me what you like?" She said with a sweet smile.

Suddenly, Tim was nervous. Her smile had shot right through his walls he put up everyday.

"I, uh, well. Um. I like anime?" He said with a question.

"Like art?" She asked.

"Yeah, kinda like that."

Gabriella looked at Troy who shrugged his shoulders. She then looked at Zane who was staring down the hallway. He shifted his weight, and she noticed something shimmer on his belt. She squinted her eyes to see what it was, and she realized what it was his key chain. But something on it was sticking out like a sore thumb. A silver guitar pick.

"Zane?" She said grabbing his attention, her eyes never leaving the pick. "Do you play guitar?"

"Yeah, how'd you know that?" He shot at her.

Troy followed her glance and saw what she was looking at. "Your guitar pick." He said, his focus now on the silver key chain.

"Wait. I play bass." Tim said excitedly. This grabbed Gabriella's attention.

"You play bass? This is absolutely perfect!"

Troy realized where Gabriella was going with this, and it was brilliant.

"Could you guys bring your equipment tomorrow?" He said.

"Okay, look Bolton. I realize you're all excited that me and shrimp here actually have something in common, but what will you and pigtails do to contribute?"

Gabriella grabbed one of her braids, and glared at him.

"Zane - Troy and Gabby can sing." Tim said looking at the tall grungy boy.

Gabriella's hurt subsided when she heard Tim call her "Gabby." Only her mother and her closest friends called her that. She wasn't sure why it bothered her so much. She shrugged it off, and look over at Zane who had begun to speak.

"Excuse me?"

"Yeah, they're the leads in the winter musical. They could sing."

"Sorry, I don't play show music."

"You should hold your breath. I'm sure Gabriella could sing any music you threw at her." Troy said defensively.

"I think I'm a little too hard rock for pigtails." He said winking at Gabriella.

"Please call me by my name." She said, her voice firm. Troy looked at her, surprised. He had never seen Gabriella even slightly angry.

Suddenly a light bulb went off in Tim's head. "I got it. Follow me." He started walking down the hall, causing the others to follow him.

A few minutes later, they were in the computer lab and Tim was searching up something on the Internet. After he found what he was looking for, he printed it off and brought it to Zane.

"You know this song?"

"Of course I do. This band is killer."

"Then we'll play this song. It's even a duet."

"Okay, I realize they can sing for a musical. But there is no way they can sing this."

Gabriella grabbed the paper and looked at the tablature in front of her. She recognized the song immediately and began to belt out her part. She caught everyone off guard, but mostly Zane.

"Okay, I take that back." He said honestly.

"We'll start practice tomorrow." Gabriella said, her voice was still firm. She walked out of the room, followed by Troy and Tim. Zane was still standing there dumbfounded.

The next few days were quite busy for Gabriella and Troy. The first few meetings for the musical had taken place, and Ms. Darbus decided that official practice would start in two weeks. They also had this project to deal with, and that was an entirely different story.

After realizing how huge this project was, Ms. Darbus gave the groups every day to work on it, but she raised how many points the project was worth as well. And this stressed everyone out into trying to make it as good as they possibly could.

Gabriella, Troy, Tim and Zane had just finished their practice for the day.

"Bye Tim." Gabriella said as she packed up her things. "I'll see you tomorrow."

She left the room, already in deep conversation with Troy. Tim sat there, kneeling at his guitar speechless, unable to fasten his guitar case.

"Dude, don't get your hopes up." Zane said smirking at him.

"Excuse me?" Tim said, breaking out of his trance.

"I see the way you're looking at her man. And I can see she's actually got a genuine heart, but she's got eyes for the basketball star."

"They're just friends. Even she told me so last week during the questionnaire."

"Whatever man." Zane said walking out of the room, guitar case in hand.

"They're just friends." Tim said again, although he was the only one to hear.