(Flashback)
It was Troy and Sharpay's first meeting, we hear Troy say in voiceover.
'To be exact, my dream came true on that day. The one who made my heard flutter at the sound of her name, Sharpay, was in front of me, smiling at me.'
It's flash-forwards to their college years, and then to Troy writing all of this in a letter. In it, he'd written to Sharpay how much he would cherish and love her.
Troy and Gabriella are still kissing passionately on the bridge thee Troy opens his eyes to give that soulless look of his.
(Troy's letter voiceover)
'I will never let you feel lonely, I won't ever leave you alone. No matter what, just like now. I will never let go of your hand.' As Troy says that Troy and Gabriella are watching the parade as he interlaces his fingers with hers.
'I will always be standing close enough for you to reach out to me'.
Gabriella loses Troy in the crowd and she runs through the street, terrified of all the foreign sights and sound assaulting her. Troy stands nearby, watching.
'I promise, my start is Sharpay Evans. And my end will also be Sharpay Evans. I promise that'.
Gabriella finally spots him across the way, and couldn't look more relieved. He holds up two drinks innocently, like he'd just meant to be gone for a moment, but Gabriella throws her arms around Troy like he's the only piece of driftwood keeping her from drowning.
'I wish for Sharpay to have the same feelings'.
Troy hugs her back with dead eyes staring forward.
Gabriella arrives back in Albuquerque and is literally glowing on her ride home from the airport, and couldn't help telling Secretary Nielsen why there's such a skip in her step.
'It's because I'm in love. This thing called love, can it make humans helpless and absurd? What was I doing all this time?' said Gabriella
Secretary Nielsen keeps her lips sealed, especially since she remembers how much Chairman Montez hated Troy. Gabriella doesn't care, and fills the silence with talk of getting a new wardrobe and learning how to put on makeup.
She makes Secretary Nielsen promise to keep this a secret from her dad and Secretary Nielsen offers some calming pills for the trials ahead, which Gabriella rejects on the basis of her being her fly self.
Gabriella arrives home and she isn't surprised when she sees Jason standing by a pile of all her packed things. Sharpay wheels Chairman Montez out so he can give Gabriella a good talking to, and meekly excuses herself to bathe her son Keegan.
Chairman Montez is kicking Gabriella to the curb, and tells Jason to confiscate all her credit cards and keys, and to make sure that no employee gives her even a cent in aid.
'Perhaps, just maybe, 'You did well. At least our Gabriella protected the resort. The resort we were about to sell to con men. The last thing my wife left behind, that resort. My daughter protected it.' Can you not, just once, know how to praise me like that?' asked Gabriella
Chairman Montez says 'no' because of the money lost with the contract. He even claims that Sharpay stopped him from filing a police report against her.
Jason tries to mediate the situation as best he can, but Chairman Montez wants her to apologize but Gabriella isn't apologizing for a thing.
'Saving Bahamas Resort was the smartest and greatest thing I have done in my life. If it were to happen again I would make the same choices'.
Chairman Montez orders her to get out of the house, and Gabriella chooses to leave with the only the clothes on her back. Once she's gone, Chairman Montez grips his chest in pain.
After a fail attempts to get Gabriella's attention as calling her 'Director' Jason switches to the informal 'Gabriella'. He tries to give her a credit card, not as an employee of the company but as 'Jason Cross the guy who has known you for a long time'.
Regardless, Gabriella doesn't want to cheat, and hands over her wallet after removing the cash.
'Are you really going to leave like this?' asked Jason
'I don't have a choice do I?' Gabriella replied
'Please take care of Dad'. Gabriella said and left.
Meanwhile with Sharpay she is done giving her son a bath she smiles and praises her son for being the best.
Gabriella hikes up to Troy's house, but hesitates at his door. In the yard, Chad is dancing while Taylor was watching, but Chad goes and answers the door.
Chad recognizes Gabriella and tells her Troy's work address when she asks.
As for Troy, he's tending his bar while standing face to face with Sharpay. She's reserved the whole club so that her and Troy can be alone, and Troy doesn't look too happy about it.
Sharpay tells Troy to stop playing around with Gabriella, because she already makes Gabriella's life miserable and there's no need for him to add more to her suffering.
Troy serves her drink with reluctance and tells her to go home.
'When I said I will go back to you, I was being sincere. I also couldn't forget some like Troy Bolton'. Said Sharpay.
This seems to get Troy's attention, but they're interrupted when Chad sends Troy a warning text that Gabriella is on her way, giving him time to get rid of any girls his with. It's why Chad chose to take Gabriella via cab instead of just giving her Troy's address.
Troy gives Gabriella a call, but leaves her on speaker phone so he can look Sharpay dead in the eyes while he tells Gabriella
'I thought I was going to die missing you.' Troy told Gabriella
Troy even tells Gabriella that he prepared a room at his house, knowing she'd get kicked out.
'In my room, come live with me' Troy tells her
Troy enjoys watching Sharpay squirm.
Before she hangs up, Gabriella nervously ekes out
'I love you'.
When he doesn't answer right away, she says it louder
'I love you'.
Sharpay looks like someone just killed her family, while Troy just smiles darkly at her as he replied
'Me too, I love you, Gabriella Montez.'
Then she hangs up.
'Gabriella sounds 100% sincere'. Sharpay says
'Using a pathetic girl who knows nothing, how are you going to be able to live with this late?' asked Sharpay
'Are you sure I'm 100% false'
'To an innocent, intelligent, handsome, bright and lovable girl on top of that… Does it seem like I'm 100% false?' asked Troy.
Chad acts like a Nervous Nancy the whole drive over, I guess not trusting Troy even though he just called Gabriella.
To Troy's credit, he is trying to kick Sharpay out but she turns to him and asks
'Let's just destroy ourselves together.' Do you want to do that Troy?'
And instead of giving him time to react, she grabs him in a kiss instead.
Sharpay votes that they kiss when Gabriella comes, that way she'll learn everything about who's using her and why one swoop fell
'Let's destroy ourselves together, Troy Bolton'
Just when Troy is about to wipe lips but, he does a one-eighty a traps her against the column with a rough kiss, one that's got her wanted out. He manages to snap a photo of their locked lips with his phone before pulling away, wiping his lips after.
He doesn't think Sharpay knows what 'destruction' really is, and shows her the picture on his phone with a smirk'
'Destruction is done like this, Sharpay Evans'
Outside the bar, Gabriella gets a text of a different set of locked lips Sharpay and Zeke's. She dials Jason.
Sharpay thinks that Troy lost it, but he asks her how a person with nothing to lose could win against someone with a lot to lose.
'Didn't you say you would come for me? Didn't you say you would drag me down? No matter how high you go, you can't have me.' And just like that, Sharpay changes up the power dynamics in her favour, with Troy hanging on her every word.
Even though the depths to which she'll sink may be bottomless, Troy still plans to bring her down. Now knowing that he has no plans to stop, Sharpay announces that she doesn't plan on stepping down either.
'What can we do but go all the way? Let's go as far as we can.' Said Sharpay
But Troy can't hide his concern when he sees Sharpay stumble in pain.
Zeke comes to pick Sharpay up, and when asked about her health, Sharpay simply replies that her hip gives her a trouble once in a while. She speaks frankly with him about his greed, and tells him to just take advantage of her instead of liking her. It'll be easier for him that way.
Chad is surprised to find Troy alone in the bar, and guesses something fishy went on with Sharpay. Either way, he tells Troy that Gabriella had to leave urgently and he wants Troy to be his friend and help him get over his breakup.
Gabriella storms in a café to demand answers from Jason.
Turns out he sent the picture to her just as an incentive to take a deal made with her father on how to return to the company. With her dad's health warning, if she wants to stop Sharpay, she has to be reinstated. Gabriella registers all this while trembling in rage.
Chairman Montez calls Zeke to set up Sharpay's phone as a tracking device, so he can know where she is at all times. He's grappling with chest pain in a half-empty beg, yet Zeke still lies to him about Sharpay's current whereabouts.
And when he tries to get Sharpay off the hook, Chairman Montez reminds him that he still doesn't trust women.
When Chad gets thoroughly wasted, Troy remembers how Sharpay originally hurt her hip – her brother had mercilessly beaten her to take her money, but since Troy had given it to her, she protected it with her life.
He swigs half a bottle of beer at the memory, and ignores Gabriella's calls.
She's already moving fast on her reinstatement deal, which depends on her ability to negotiate with the protesters who'd previously egged her. She has Jason there as a notary, and gives the Protest Head a challenge.
If he can beat her in a drinking context, she'll listen to his requests. Likewise, If she wins, he has to listen to her.
Taylor comes to the bar to find Chad passed out on the floor and Troy sleeping in his chair, Taylor drags Chad out of the bar and leaving Troy to take care of himself.
The drinking contest begins. Even if Gabriella is a drinking champion, there's just no way she can escape alcohol poisoning on this one.
Jason sat next to Gabriella and saying over and over again in his head
'This is a terrible idea'.
Gabriella excuses herself for a moment and the concerned Jason follows, but she reveals it as a tactic to get the protestors to take pity on her because she's cute.
So she lets Jason in on her new plan… to run away before the protestors notice. But she's gone by the time Jason brings the car around.
Meanwhile Troy wakes up to find Chad gone. Gabriella calls him as he makes his way home, looking like she's found her way to his house. When he asks if she drank she lies that she only had one bottle of beer.
She asks Troy what he's done to her that has her thinking of him all day, every day. While she's slurring, Troy follows the sound of her voice and finds her sitting near his house.
He then kneels in front of her, Gabriella reels like she's having this totally rad imagination party, she pokes him and says
'It's 3D!' drunk Gabriella says.
Troy's expression grows serious as he tells her
'It may be something you regret when you look back in time, but just think you're having a nightmare. You can wake up from nightmares. As time goes by, you wonder what you dreamt of, not being able to remember anything'. Says Troy
Troy takes her to his house to get some rest, and spends a long time just staring at her. He ends up talking to Jason when he calls Gabriella's phone, and reassures him that he's caring for Gabriella as her boyfriend.
Gabriella wakes up the next morning to find Troy sleeping next to her, and smile giddily.
Meanwhile Sharpay wakes up wearing a sour expression as she lies next to the sleeping Chairman Montez.
While Jason checks up on the kiss cam footage of Sharpay and Zeke, he ends up seeing something he missed last time…footage of Troy bringing Gabriella home.
He recognizes him from the picture he's been using to investigate Sharpay's past, which is bad news.
Gabriella's there to tell Troy 'good morning' and she asks about what she said or did the night before.
'Did I say I'm crazily in love with you?' asked Gabriella.
Then she asks him if he had a reaction, and he admits to it before trying to change the subject. Gabriella won't take her eyes off Troy, and keeps pestering him to tell her what he said.
Meanwhile, Jason is on Troy's scent as he calls Secretary Nielsen to confirm whether Gabriella's boyfriend is the Troy Bolton.
Gabriella asks Troy again, and he looks her square in the eyes and tells her that she's unlucky because she got caught by the wrong man named a Troy Bolton.
'Do you want to run away while you can? Get up now, put on your shoes, and run away with all your might. You only have one chance'. Said Troy
This definitely wasn't what Gabriella expected, but she thinks his joking. When he tells her that she hasn't given him an answer yet, she asks if it isn't too late…. And she kisses him.
Sharpay gets treated to a photo shoot in her wedding gown, while Zeke is watching with a angry look. But suddenly she gets a call from her twin brother. Her eyes got wide in terror.
Troy comes home from dropping Gabriella off to find Taylor tending to Chad's beat up face. Sharpay's brother, fresh out of prison beat him up to find out where Sharpay was and stole Troy's phone to get her number.
It's worth nothing that Chad wanted to keep this a secret from Troy to save his friend from getting involved.
Meanwhile Gabriella meets up with the protestors from last night, signing the contract. There is one where it requires to pay for their children's educations, and she agrees to sell everything she owns and take out loans to meet the demand. Jason is not happy about his
She even agrees to sacrifice her personal salary to reinstated fired workers. Which has the head man asking if she'll be okay?
'Even if I won't be okay, at most, it'll just be eliminating me from the family register and disinheriting me' Gabriella shrugs.
Afterward, Jason tries to get her attention while she waits for the bus, but Gabriella is too exhausted to think. He hands her an envelope and sends her on her way.
A neighbourhood woman stops her on the way to Troy's house with an oddly-timed gift, a photo frame for Troy. Gabriella turns the frame over to see a picture of Troy and Sharpay together at a graduation ceremony.
She looks shocked at the photo, and hides it when Troy pops out of his gate, all smiles for her. She doesn't smile back.