Disclaimer: I do not own High School Musical or any of its characters.

A/N: This was supposed to be up yesterday, but I went to post it and my internet was down. I was like are you kidding? So, here it is, bright and early (sort of). Enjoy…

Last Time…

The woman's soft eyes met Lily's and immediately she recognized her from pictures Gabriella had shown her.

It was her grandmother.

Jumping off the table, Lily ran into the woman's arms. She didn't care that the pressure of the tight hug was irritating the bruises, she was just happy to be in the arms of her grandmother.

Gabriella watched from behind the nurses as Lily stayed wrapped in their grandmother's arms. She had tears falling from her eyes. Her grandmother had just given her reason to be hopeful. Her grandmother was the solution.

Her grandmother was a miracle.

Chapter Twenty Eight – Success

The rest of that day had been a blur. Police officers, lawyers, doctors, child services had been surrounding Gabriella, Lucas and Lily since their grandmother had appeared. Gabriella had finally given in to her fears and told the police everything. She felt like she had no other choice. They all knew, especially after Dr. Fisher had examined Lucas and Gabriella as well, finding injuries similar to Lily's.

Dr. Fisher opened the door to his office for Gabriella. She stepped timidly inside, already seeing Detective Sarah Campbell sitting in one of the two chairs in front of Dr. Fisher's desk. Dr. Fisher motioned for Gabriella to sit in the empty seat in front of his desk.

Gabriella felt Sarah's eyes locked on her. She looked around the large, packed office to try and avoid Sarah's gaze. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Dr. Fisher sit at his desk; she could feel his eyes on her now as well.

"Gabriella?" Dr. Fisher tried to get her attention. Gabriella, not wanting to be rude, turned her head to make eye contact with the doctor.

"Where are my brother and sister?" Gabriella asked quietly. A short while ago, they had all been together. Then Dr. Fisher had requested that he be able to examine Gabriella and Lucas. He'd examined Lucas first while Gabriella had waited in another room. After he had finished examining Gabriella Dr. Fisher had led her to his office. She'd assumed Lucas and Lily were going to be in the office, but now that she saw they weren't, she wondered where they were and what she was doing here.

"They're with your grandmother," Sarah answered.

"So why am I here?" Gabriella wondered aloud.

"We wanted to talk to you Gabriella, away from everyone else," Dr. Fisher explained.

"There is obviously something going on at home, Gabriella," Sarah said bluntly.

"Everything is fine at home," Gabriella lied quietly as she looked down at Dr. Fisher's desk. She could hear both Sarah and Dr. Fisher sigh.

"Gabriella, I have been a doctor for a long while. I know what domestic abuse looks like. I know what's going on at home," Dr. Fisher spoke seriously.

"With Dr. Fisher's reputation, he'll be able to give a strong testimony in court. If you give us your account we can make the case even stronger and it'll be easy for a lawyer to convince the jury to throw your father in jail," Sarah explained.

Gabriella did her best to hold back the tears she knew were ready to fall. She believed Dr. Fisher, but there were still other worries plaguing in her mind.

"With your grandmother here now, she'll probably be able to gain custody," Sarah continued. Gabriella looked to Sarah, hopefully. Gabriella had hoped that her grandmother would be able to gain custody, but there was still something in Gabriella's brain that just wouldn't give in.

"Gabriella, aren't you concerned about the safety of your brother and sister? By not saying anything you're putting them in more danger. I know you're scared, but we are on your side. There are going to be a lot of people on your side, fighting for you," Dr. Fisher assured her.

Looking up at Dr. Fisher, Gabriella finally realized he was right. They were in too deep now. It was time to fight her father; for herself and for her brother and sister. Taking a deep breath she began,

"It's gotten worse over the years..."

After telling Detective Campbell and Dr. Fisher everything, she had been taken to meet with Diana Miller, her grandmother's lawyer and Blake Allen, the child services officer. Gabriella had retold her story to both adults once again.

Finally, a judge had arrived at the hospital. Judge Santos had granted Mariana temporary custody deeming the current Montez household situation too dangerous. There would, of course, be a trial to finally decide where the Montez children would go, but for now it was in their best interest to be with their grandmother.

Eventually, Mariana had taken Gabriella, Lucas and Lily back to the hotel she was staying at. For the first time that afternoon, Gabriella was finally alone with her grandmother.

Lucas and Lily were exhausted so Gabriella whisked them off to bed. Despite their protests, she assured them that they'd get to see their grandma in the morning.

Gabriella walked out of bedroom Lucas and Lily were sleeping and found her grandmother making two cups of tea in the small hotel kitchen.

"Abuelita, aye no. Let me get the tea. You must be exhausted with jet-lag and traveling and everything," Gabriella protested

"Don't worry about the tea. Come here and give me a hug," Mariana held out her arms and Gabriella gladly found a place in her arms. Slowly pulling away from the embrace, Mariana let her hands linger on Gabriella's face, "I have missed you so much. Look how grown up you are, mi cielo. So beautiful and intelligent and caring."

Gabriella felt a few tears leak from her eyes at her grandmother's kind words.

"I've missed you too," Gabriella whispered, "How did you…how did you know? To come here I mean? And why now after all these years?"

"Why don't we sit down," Mariana suggested reaching to pick up one of the cups of tea. Gabriella nodded and picked up the other cup of tea. The two women sat at the small table near the kitchen.

"All those years ago, when you stopped visiting and your mother stopped calling, I was confused. I wondered why I hadn't heard from her in weeks. So, one day I called house and your father picked up. I asked to speak with Maria and your father growled, 'she left. She walked out on us,' and hung up the phone. I didn't know what to think. I called back frequently hoping that you and Lucas and Lily would still be able to visit, but he would have no such thing. After a while he just stopped answering my calls. When your friends called me and told me about what was going on with you guys, I jumped on the first plane I could," Mariana explained.

"My friends? They called you?" Gabriella asked in disbelief. Mariana nodded,

"You have wonderful friends Gabriella. I've spoken to them a few times and they all seem to care about you a great deal."

"I hurt them though," Gabriella murmured, looking dejectedly at the table in front of her.

Mariana shook her head and placed a finger under her granddaughter's chin, so she could make eye contact with Gabriella, "Your friends are concerned about you Gabriella, they want to see you safe again. Especially that Troy."

"You spoke to Troy?" Gabriella whispered, feeling her heart flutter at simply the sound of his name.

"I did. He was the one who told me about everything. My friends thought I was crazy for jumping on a plane because a sixteen year old boy, who I had never met before, told me to. But there was just something about the way he spoke about you, it was just so genuine. I couldn't help but believe him," she recalled.

Gabriella could feel a smile tugging at her lips. The way her grandmother was speaking about Troy, she just couldn't help but be proud to call Troy her boyfriend.

"Aye, and that Sharpay. She is quite stubborn, but so generous," Mariana commented, "I tried to tell her I would be able to get the money together for a lawyer, but she insisted on paying for the lawyer and this hotel."

Gabriella shook her head and sighed. "I can work overtime and then I'll be able to repay her," she mumbled.

"Mi cielo, no more worrying about things. You've had to worry too much. Everything is going to be alright now," Mariana assured her.

For the first time in a very long time, Gabriella actually believed her.

--

Saturdays had always been Troy's favorite day of the week. Like any other teenager, on Saturdays Troy slept late, sometimes very late. Though he wasn't like Chad, who always slept until at least 1 in the afternoon, he certainly enjoyed sleeping until 11 or so.

Troy wasn't the heaviest sleeper, especially in the morning, so when his phone started buzzing from his bedside table, he groaned. Rolling away from the noise Troy ignored the buzzing. He let out a sigh of relief once the buzzing stopped. However, seconds after the buzzing stopped, it started again. Groaning again, Troy rolled back towards the phone so he could see who in the world would be calling. He grabbed the phone and squinted his eyes open so he could read the caller ID.

No name popped up and he didn't recognize the number. It didn't even look like an Albuquerque number.

He pressed reject, so the annoying buzzing would stop and put the phone back on the table. Just as he set the phone down, the buzzing started again. Grumbling, Troy grabbed the phone and flipped it open,

"Hello?" Troy yawned.

"Troy! Hi!" a familiar young voice spoke excitedly.

Troy furrowed his eyebrows, he recognized this voice, but from where? Shaking his head, to try and wake himself up, Troy sat up in his bed. As his brain woke up, it started going through all the people he knew, trying to match a voice to the one he was hearing. Finally, he connected the voice as well as the out of Albuquerque number,

"Lily!" he exclaimed, sitting up a little bit straighter. "How are you? How is your brother? Your sister? What about your grandmother? Did she find you guys alright? Where's your father?" Troy rambled, only stopping when he heard Lily giggling,

"I told you he'd want to talk to us."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Lucas responded nonchalantly. "I was just trying to make sure he didn't kill us for waking him up at 9 am on a Saturday morning."

Troy glanced at the clock, only to discover his clock read 7:02.

"Uh, actually it's more like 7 over here," he corrected.

"Oh! Shoot! We totally forgot about the time difference! I'm really sorry Troy," Lily apologized, " Waking you up at 7 is much much worse than waking you up at 9. If you want we can call you back in a few hours," she offered.

Troy chuckled, "Nah, it's alright, I'm up now. Besides I'm glad to hear from you guys."

"That's what we hoped," Lily admitted, "We decided you deserve to know what's going on over here."

"Is everything alright?" Troy asked. The way Lily had phrased her last statement made Troy slightly nervous. What if everything hadn't worked out according to plan?

"Everything is great Troy. We're living in a hotel until the hearing. Things were kinda crazy yesterday at the hospital, but the Judge sent us to live with Abuelita so we're safe," Lucas explained.

Troy nodded, even though he knew Lily and Lucas couldn't see him, and took a deep breath. They were safe; safe with Mariana. He felt relief wash through him, that was until he realized Lucas had said hospital. His breathing hitched and immediately thoughts of the worst shot through his mind.

"Woah, wait, hospital? Why were you at the hospital?" he asked, this voice calmer than he had expected it to be, but still concerned.

"Troy relax. Everyone was alright," Lily assured him.

"Lily blacked out because she was pushed off the playground," Lucas answered curtly.

"Are you alright?" Troy asked fretfully.

"I'm fine. In a way it's actually a good thing Jeremy Higgins pushed me. Dr. Fisher, the doctor who examined me and found my other injuries, was the one who convinced Gabriella to confess," Lily explained.

Dr. Fisher was officially Troy's favorite doctor. Convincing Gabriella was probably not an easy task, so Troy was thankful that Dr. Fisher was persuasive enough to do so. The only thing that worried Troy was the fact that Lily's injuries were severe enough that a doctor could see them and identify them as abuse easily enough. Troy had never seen any of the injuries inflicted by Tomas Montez (whether or not that was because the injuries had faded or that Gabriella had just gotten good at hiding them, Troy didn't know) so the only images Troy could form were the worst case scenario.

"I'm just glad you're all alright," Troy confessed.

"We are as well. We have to thank you Troy, for not giving up on us," Lucas confessed sincerely.

"And I don't think we ever got to say this to you, but thank you for making Gabriella so happy. It'll be nice to see her happy again," Lily explained.

Troy felt a proud smile form on this face. He was glad he had been able to affect the entire family so positively.

"You are more than welcome. Speaking of Gabriella though, is she there?" Troy asked curious. He couldn't help it, really. He hadn't spoken to her in ages and his heart ached to hear her voice.

"She's still sleeping. It's actually a miracle she isn't awake yet, usually she's up at 5 or 6," Lily answered, "We could go wake her up though, if you really want to talk to her," she offered.

" No, no, no. Don't do that. Let her sleep," Troy insisted. Though he was desperate to speak to her, he certainly didn't want to wake her up if she'd been sleep deprived. "Just get her to call me when she gets up alright?" Troy requested.

"We will Troy," Lucas promised."We have to go though, Abuelita is calling us for breakfast."

"Ok, say hello for her from me, will you?" Troy asked.

"We will." Lily assured him, "Thanks again for everything Troy."

"And we're sorry for waking you up," Lucas added.

Troy chuckled, "It's ok. It was good to talk to you guys. I'll talk to you soon."

"Definitely. Bye Troy."

"Bye"

The dial tone rung through Troy's ear as he held the phone to his face for a few moments after the call had ended.

There was no way he was going to be able to go back to sleep. He'd never been so relieved in his life. Gabriella was safe. Though, for the first time in a long while he didn't feel worried, he was so excited that sleep just wasn't an option. He couldn't wait for Gabriella to call him.

Re-opening his phone, Troy quickly sent a text message to the entire gang:

Success.

--

Gabriella's tired eyes opened slowly as the bright sunlight filled the room. Once her eyes were fully open, she let out a quiet yawn. Gabriella slowly pushed herself up so she was sitting against the headboard. She glanced around the empty room looking for a clock. When her eyes landed on the red digital numbers, her eyes bulged out of their sockets. It was 10:37!

Gabriella couldn't believe it, she never slept this late. Oh God, and she'd left her grandmother to look after Lucas and Lily. She'd only been in the US for a day and already Gabriella was pawning off her siblings to her grandmother. She scrambled to get out of bed and quickly ran a brush through her brown curly locks to tame them a little bit. She made her way into the kitchen and living room area of the hotel suite.

Mariana, Lucas and Lily were sitting at the table playing some sort of card game. Mariana glanced over and noticed Gabriella walking into the room.

"Gabriella!" she exclaimed warmly, "Good morning. Did you sleep well?"

"I slept wonderfully actually," she admitted, "I'm so sorry though I-" Gabriella was cut off my her grandmother who held up her hand,

"No. It's alright mi cielo."

"But-" Gabriella tried to interject.

"I'm here now Gabriella. You don't have to worry anymore, relax. You deserved a nice lie in," Mariana assured her.

Gabriella nodded. There was a weird feeling that passed through her. She knew that her grandmother was here to help take care of them but, she couldn't help but feel like she was still responsible for Lucas and Lily. After all, she had been for 10 years. She would have to get used to the feeling.

"Oh! Gabi! Guess who we called?" Lily questioned excitedly.

Gabriella shook her head, "I don't know. Who?"

"Troy!" she grinned.

There it was again, his name. She felt those familiar butterflies fluttering in her stomach just at the mention of his name. She missed him so much.

She felt kind of flustered trying to come up with something to say. It wasn't that she didn't know what to say, it was just that there were too many questions she wanted to ask. So she asked the most broad of questions she could,

"What did he say?"

"Well, he said he was excited to hear from us," Lucas answered.

"And he wanted you to call him back, " Lily divulged.

"When?" Gabriella questioned. Immediately afterwards she mentally slapped herself. That was a stupid question, but what else was she supposed to say?

"Now!" Lily encouraged.

"Now?" Gabriella repeated. Now there was a stupid answer. What was wrong with her this morning? Was she nervous? Yes. That was it. She was nervous about calling Troy. What if he didn't want to talk to her? Or what if everything was different?

Mariana sensed her granddaughter's anxiety. She stood up from the table and walked to Gabriella,

"Like I said last night, that boy cares a lot about you. Don't worry," Mariana encouraged, squeezing Gabriella's hand.

Gabriella nodded and turned back to go into her room. Sitting on the bed, she pulled the phone closer to her. Lifting the phone off the hook, she carefully dialed Troy's number. Swallowing, Gabriella put the phone to ear as she let it ring.

Ring…

Her breathing hitched as the phone continued to ring.

Ring…

"Hello," Troy's warm voice answered.

As soon as Troy answered the phone all the nerves melted away. His voice had instantly calmed her, as it always had been able to. Gabriella felt this calm wash over her that only Troy had been able to bring.

"Hello?" Troy repeated, this time sounding confused.

"Hi," Gabriella replied meekly.

"Brie?"

"HI Troy," she confirmed.

"You have no idea how good it feels to hear your voice," Troy confessed.

"I wouldn't bet on that," Gabriella countered.

Troy laughed softly, before he let out a content sigh, "I miss you so much."

"I miss you too Troy." Gabriella felt guilty hearing Troy's pain stricken voice. She knew it was her fault she'd hurt deeply, by not writing to him, "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"It's ok. You're safe now and that's all that matters."

"Thank you. Thank you for not giving up on me Troy, not giving up on us. You really are amazing," Gabriella praised.

"I'm not willing to lose you Brie. I love you too much to let you go," he confessed.

Gabriella smiled; it felt so good to hear him utter those 3 fantastic words: I love you. "I love you too Troy."

"So how do you feel?" Troy asked curiously.

Gabriella stretched her legs up and put them on the bed, so she could lie back. "I feel relieved, I feel hopeful, I feel kinda nervous too. I just – I don't know what to expect for the future. It's so uncertain and I just hope everything works out ok," Gabriella confessed truthfully.

"Everything will work itself out. No judge in their right mind will send you back to your father. Soon you'll be back in my arms," Troy assured her.

"Mmmm, I hope so," Gabriella murmured. "So, what about you Troy? What have you been up to?"

As Troy explained how life in Albuquerque had been over the last month, Gabriella felt herself slip back into her old ways. She felt like Troy was only a few minutes away and they were having one of their late night chats. Both teenagers cracked jokes as their conversation continued. Gabriella had that wonderful feeling in the pit of her stomach from laughing so hard. Her stomach hurt from laughing, but it was a pain she didn't mind and instead relished.

The pair spent hours on the phone simply chatting easily about school, friends and the future. Unlike some of their more serious conversations, this one was easy and lighthearted.

A/N: So, I didn't really like the way I ended it. What did you think? I know I'm already a terrible updater, but I don't know how long the next update will be. I'm leaving for the UK on Friday and I'll try to write while I'm away, but it's hard to write with my entire family running around.

Spanish translations:

Abuelita: Grandma.

Mi cielo: it literally translates to "my sky or my heaven" but it's like a pet name, like saying darling or sweetie.

Please review!