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"Good morning, ladies," greeted Chad as he met Taylor and Gabriella for brunch. It was 10 AM the following morning and Chad was still pumped from the State Championship. "Isn't this morning beautiful? Everything is so nice, and bright, and sunny. Makes you really appreciate life more."
Taylor put her hand to her boyfriend's forehead and felt for a fever. "Are you sick, Chad?"
Chad laughed at this and shook his head. "Nope, just deliriously happy! Can't I be after yesterday?"
Gabriella laughed with him. "Of course you can. Taylor is just worried because normally, the real Chad would be all grumpy and such for having to wake up to have brunch with us girls. Speaking of, where is your partner in crime?"
"Oh Troy? Dead asleep, and I mean totally gone. I jumped on his bed and everything but couldn't get him up so I left him. Don't let him spoil our fun though, Gab. Come have brunch with us. He'll pay for not waking up to each when he's starving on our way back," said Chad.
Gabriella thought for a moment before she agreed. The three entered the same restaurant and were seated at a table for four.
"Hey, mind if I join you three?" asked Ryan as he entered the restaurant and saw them. "Or is Troy coming?"
"Not as of right now so yes, please sit," replied Chad with a smile.
Ryan gave him a funny look then looked over at Gabriella. "Is he okay?"
Taylor and Gabriella both laughed as Gabriella responded, "Yes, he's just extra cheerful Chad today, which also means polite evidently. How are you feeling?"
Ryan consciously touched the bruised area on his stomach and winced but noticed it didn't hurt as bad this morning. "Evidently better but still a little sore. It's a good thing Audrina wasn't here. She would have had a heart attack after that foul."
"No kidding, I almost did!" returned Gabriella. "I'm glad you are doing better though. You did have me scared for a while there."
"Oh, that's so sweet," commented Chad from across the table.
"Okay, is Chad freaking anyone else out besides me?" questioned Taylor as she looked at her boyfriend again. "He has every right to be happy but this is like, supersonic happy or something."
"Hey Chad, since you are so happy, we're going to shave all your hair off," stated Ryan. "That work for you?"
Chad's happy look instantly dissolved into a startled look. "You want to do what? No way, Evans! You are not touching my hair with anything, especially if you are going to put sparkles in it or something!"
The other three at the table burst into laughter at his reaction and eventually calmed down when the waiter appeared to take their orders. The rest of their brunch was filled with jokes and laughter until Chad had the last waffle bite that he could and declared brunch over.
They paid for their meals and started to walk out of the restaurant when Ryan spied his parents eating at a side table against the wall. "I'm going to go say hi to them. I guess I'll see you two girls back at school tomorrow and you, Chad, on the bus."
The three waved and then walked into the lobby where they stopped. Chad got another look on his face, which made Taylor groan. "What is it this time, Chad?"
"I think that Gabriella should do the honors of waking up our sleepyhead of a co-captain," declared Chad as he took his key out and handed it to her. "It'll be a nice surprise especially as he will be expecting my ugly face."
Gabriella laughed while she toyed with the key. "All right, I'll go do it, but you better be there to protect me if he comes chasing me through the hotel for throwing cold water on him or something."
Chad laughed and agreed. "Taylor and I will stay down here until you tell me the coast is clear. Now no monkey business up there, okay? Just wake him up."
Gabriella rolled her eyes. "Honestly, Chad, what else do you think I would do?"
Before Chad could open his mouth, Taylor slapped her hand over her boyfriend's mouth. "Go, Gabriella, before he says something stupid again."
With a nod, Gabriella entered an elevator and anxiously watched as the numbers of the floors kept changing until she was on their floor again. She tried to push back the grin on her face but found that she couldn't. 'Oh, what the love of your life can do to you,' she thought as she slid Chad's key into the door of his and Troy's room.
Gabriella heard some rustling of beddings so she crept quietly past the bathroom and closet and towards the room where the beds were themselves. She hesitated as she saw a discarded hotel robe on the floor but pushed herself to go on, even if she found a not so decently clad Troy on the other side of the wall. 'A little bold but I don't want to startle him either.'
Instead of that vision she had just thought of, reality on the other side of the corner was quite different. Gabriella felt herself rooted to the spot as she saw her boyfriend, the love of her life, Troy Bolton, with his arms around a blond girl who was lying in his arms with her own arms thrown around him as he passionately kissed her on the lips, in bed. She watched as Troy rolled over onto his back and brought the blond with him so that she was now half sitting on top of him as they continued to kiss. Troy reached up and brushed some of the blond hair that was covering her face back behind the girl's ear. Gabriella felt her heart shatter as the profile revealed confirmed her deepest fears. 'Sharpay…'
It wasn't until Troy sat up, kissing Sharpay's exposed shoulders, and slowly started to slip the straps of the lingerie Sharpay had on off that Gabriella found her voice, just as Sharpay let out a deep throated moan. "I can't believe Sharpay was actually right, Troy. That's all you are after!" screamed Gabriella before she dashed out of the room and back down to the lobby.
Gabriella was so hysterical, she ran right into Coach Bolton in the hall without realizing it was him before she dashed down the stairs and into the lobby.
"Gabriella, what's wrong?" asked an alarmed Taylor, who had just sat back down next to Chad after visiting the gift shop.
"Troy, he's, he's with Sharpay, in bed," got out Gabriella before she burst into tears even more so. "Please Taylor, I want to go home, now."
Taylor gathered her best friend into her arms and rocked her back and forth a little to try to soothe her. "Gabriella, are you sure it was Troy with Sharpay?"
"YES! He couldn't get any with me so he's obviously going back to her. Sharpay was right Taylor," sobbed Gabriella, not even realizing that Chad was running his hand down her back as she clung to Taylor. "Please, please Taylor, take me away from here."
Taylor looked over at Chad, who didn't know what to think at the moment. "All right, let's go get our things in the room then we'll go. Kelsi and Martha are up there already packing so we should be able to leave as soon as we get our bags and they are ready, okay?"
Gabriella nodded and walked with Taylor's arm around her into an elevator just as Troy burst out of the stairwell, out of breath and only wearing boxers and a plain white t-shirt. Chad just shook his head as he took in his best friend's panicked look on his face, knowing that Gabriella hadn't just seen an illusion, which is what he had hoped it was.
"Chad, where's Gabriella?" asked Troy as he scanned the lobby in a quick manner but didn't see her.
Chad made sure the elevator doors closed before he answered. "She's on her way out of here and I suggest you not try to beg her to forgive you this time, Troy. In fact, I should actually punch you for what you just did with Sharpay up in that room but I'm not going to because, sadly enough, I find you not even worth that."
Not really hearing anything else Chad said besides Gabriella was leaving, Troy sprinted back up the stairs in hopes of catching Gabriella before she left the hotel. When he got to their floor Troy banged on the door that he knew belonged to the four girls and started screaming Gabriella's name when he didn't get an answer.
"GO AWAY, TROY!" yelled Taylor from the other side.
"NO!" returned Troy. "I NEED TO TALK TO GABRIELLA!"
"SHE DOESN'T WANT TO TALK TO YOU!" answered Martha this time. "GO AWAY!"
Chad finally arrived on the floor and just shook his head at Troy's image off of the center elevator door as Troy slammed his body into the hotel room door and slowly slid to the floor, his head instantly being held by his two hands. Strangely, Chad felt his own heart ache at the sight of such turmoil, especially as he heard the cries Troy was letting out, even from around the corner where he was standing and observing Troy in the elevator part of the hall.
"Please, I need to talk to you, Gabriella," begged a much weaker voiced Troy. "I can't live without you."
"GO AWAY TROY! I NEVER WANT TO TALK TO YOU AGAIN!" screamed Gabriella. "SHARPAY OBVIOUSLY BETTER SUITS YOUR NEEDS NOW!"
Kelsi and Taylor rushed to their friend's side as she collapsed into tears against the door herself, trying their best to comfort her but knew that nothing they did would ever cancel out that image that was replaying on loop of what she saw in Chad and Troy's room not even thirty minutes before.
"It's not like that, I swear," got out Troy as he angrily wiped away the tears from his eyes and off his face.
Chad walked around the corner resolved to help the situation somehow but instead caught Sharpay standing at the end of the hallway with only a bathrobe on and a satisfied smirk on her face. She saw that Chad saw her, and instead of scurrying away like he thought, Sharpay smiled widely at him, one that closely resembled that of a wolf about to eat her prey. Chad felt chills down his spine from that look and watched as Sharpay entered her room again and disappeared from view.
Troy looked up and saw Chad nearby. "It's not what she thinks, Chad, I swear it."
Not really knowing why, Chad showed Troy he understood by offering him a hand up, which Troy took. "Come on, Troy. Let's get you back into our room and packed. Also, a pair of pants would probably be good about now."
Chad helped Troy into their room and closed the door, locking it behind him for good measure. Troy sat down on Chad's bed and stared at what served as his bed all weekend. "Chad, I don't understand how this all happened, but I wasn't cheating on Gabriella, I swear it."
"I believe that you didn't have sex with Sharpay, Troy," admitted Chad. "But I know you must have been touching her or kissing her or something for Gabriella to have come down to the lobby in the state she was."
Troy sadly nodded his head in admission to this as he replayed what happened over and over in his head, trying to figure out what had gone on and what led to this. "I single-handedly lost her for good this time, Chad. Gabriella is gone."
"Not necessarily, but I don't think you're going to patch this up as easily as last time, and that last time wasn't easy to start," comforted Chad. "Look, she and the girls are probably in Taylor's car now as we speak. Let's get you packed and fully dressed for the bus, all right? We'll chill in here, or in the lobby if you can't stay here, until then. When you are ready to talk to me about what happened, I'll be here."
"Thanks man," said Troy as he looked at his best friend. "I don't know why you are being so nice to me right now but I really appreciate it, and I do want to talk to you, but first I need to figure out what happened myself."
"That's what I figured. And as to why I am being nice, as soon as you figure out what exactly happened this morning, you'll understand," returned Chad as he got back up onto his feet. "Now, let's get you packed, shall we?"