Hey readers, I'm back from the land of abandoned fanfiction accounts. But it's for charity so my motives are all pure. This fic is loosely, and I stress loosely, based on the book Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen which is a fantastic book. I recommend it to anyone who hasn't read it because I'm such a Sarah Dessen superfan and according to my friend Tyler, she is now "my" author which is a title I accept honorably. The title should make sense to anyone who's read the book.

This is for Diana as a part of the Wildcatsgivebac auction for Japan so massive kudos to her.

I hope you all enjoy.

Disclaimer: Do not own HSM or Along for the Ride.

"The night changed things, widening out the scope. What we said to each other, the things we did, they all took on a bigger meaning in the dark. Like time was sped up and slowed down, all at once."
-Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen

The Best of Times

Hands shoved deep in the pockets of her denim shorts, the toes of her sneakers scuffing along the sidewalk. Above her, sickly, florescent yellow streetlights flickered. Smiling, she grabbed onto one of the black metal poles and spun around, moistening her hands with the droplets of a previous rainfall.

It had been something like hours since she'd left the house. Still, she had absolutely no desire to go home. Her father and new step-mommy dearest were borderline sickening and had practically banished her from the house as soon as she got home from her first day of school.

Alone time, they called it. The opposite of Empty Nest Syndrome, Gabriella called it.

They didn't want her there, that much was obvious but had little choice when Gabriella's mother had taken some prestigious teaching job in Paris and insisted that Gabriella finish her education in the States.

And then suddenly, there it was. Gabriella nearly had to backtrack upon reaching it, having not anticipated it at all. It's like it had fallen out of the sky but there it was. There was no sign advertising a name but a humming neon blue and red sign proclaimed it to be OPEN, 24 HOURS. Just what she needed. Gabriella pushed open the swinging glass doors, barely registering the light tinkling of bells that sounded upon the disruption of the door.

The dark, underground appearance of the outside gave the impression of being a bar but the inside was bright and cheerful enough to be a retro fifties' style diner, albeit very small. Taking a seat on one of the red stools lined up against the cream colored linoleum bar, she quietly ordered a cup of coffee while laying her jacket across her lap while The Fray's "How to Save a Life" played quietly in the background.

The waitress set down a white cup and saucer and filled it with black coffee as Gabriella took in her surroundings. There were only four other people in the room including the waitress who looked like she was in her late twenties with a silver stud in her nose and about thirty black rubber bracelets stacked on her right arm. Besides her, there was an elderly couple sitting in one of the booths, sharing a piece of cherry pie and at the last table, there was a boy. His head was bent over what appeared to be homework but all she could really see was his messy, brown hair.

For lack of anything better to do, she pulled out her dog-eared copy of Pygmalion from her bag and leisurely flipped through the worn pages. It could've been hours or minutes later when Gabriella began to feel uncomfortable, like someone was watching her. She quickly looked up to find the messy haired stranger staring at her with a perplexed look on his face.

Wait.

Shit.

He was no stranger – she recognized him. She had only spent one single day at East High but you only needed a minute to know who Troy Bolton was. He was, as they say, the "Big Man on Campus". His face alone took up approximately a third of the high school's main hallway.

But what on Earth was he doing here? It was midnight on a Wednesday. Only the crazies and insomniacs were out at this point and Gabriella already knew herself to be the latter. At least most of the time.

Out of the corner of her eye, Gabriella noticed Troy moving from his booth. The good news was, seeing as how it was her first day at East High, there was a ninety-nine percent chance that he wouldn't recognize her at all.

"Hey, do I know you?"

God dammit. That last one percent always screwed her over.

Unable to control the rising color in her cheeks, Gabriella figured her best bet was to lie her ass off. She couldn't even bring herself to turn around to face him. "No," she answered, her voice strangely high-pitched. "I don't think so. You probably have me mistaken for someone else."

The next thing she knew, Troy slid into the seat next to her and peered thoughtfully at her face which was staring resolutely ahead. He frowned and took a closer look. "No, you're the new girl. You're in my homeroom, aren't you?"

Gabriella nervously gulped her coffee – damn, that was good – and wondered about how she should continue. Her options were limited. Proceed with this futile lie and get out of there as soon as possible? But where would she go? She wasn't planning to going back to the house (it certainly wasn't her home) for another five or six hours.

"Oh, you go to East High?" She asked, feigning ignorance. "Maybe that's why I didn't recognize you, I just started today." She carefully avoided his eyes which he narrowed as if sensing that she wasn't being entirely honest with him.

"Okay...well, how are you liking it so far?"

"It was decent enough," Her answer was cautiously diplomatic. The conversation would probably go a whole lot smoother if she didn't mention that Albuquerque, New Mexico was only a few places away from hell on her list of places she didn't want to be. "Ms. Darbus was quite a character." She added, giggling.

Troy smiled and nodded in agreement at the accurate characterization of their dramatic homeroom teacher. "She'll grow on you eventually, whether you like it or not. Just try not to get caught with your phone." He advised and Gabriella gave him a bemused look but still made a mental note to store that information for later.

"I'll keep that in mind." She deadpanned.

"By the way, congrats on finding your way to Clyde's. It took weeks of aimless wandering for me to find decent coffee this late."

"Excuse me?"

"Clyde's. The unofficial name for this place. They haven't come up with anything more permanent yet." Thus explained the lack of a sign identifying the establishment.

"Oh. Well apparently I have a knack for finding the best night-owl haunts. I'm not entirely sure whether or not it's something I should be proud of."

Frankly, she was surprised at how openly...friendly Troy was being. The half a dozen times that Gabriella had caught even a glimpse of him at school, he had been surrounded by a posse of similarly athletic-looking kids, one in particular with puffy hair who seemed to perpetually have a basketball in his possession. She had moved enough times, been to enough schools to know that generally, the high school hierarchy elitists tended to be pretty isolated, never deigning to interact with the inferior castes. The bottom of which being the new kids.

"Hey, do you want to get out of here?" Troy asked suddenly, pulling Gabriella out of her reverie. "Go somewhere, maybe?"

He couldn't be serious. Yet his tone implied that his suggestion was casual and spontaneous enough to be completely serious. "With you?" Her eyebrows raised of their own accord and he chuckled at her obvious question. "We don't even know each other. In fact, I'm not even sure if you know my name."

"Well Gabriella," A slightly mocking lilt was inflected in his voice. "I'm Troy Bolton. I'm not a serial killer and I'm damn proud of it. How about you? Do you have malicious intents toward me?"

"Of course not." She shot back. She blushed, feeling a little silly.

"That wasn't so hard now, was it?" His teasing grin was warm, open and well, plain gorgeous. Gabriella could begin to feel herself caving ever so slightly. It was really not fair when he had those damn eyes on his side. "I promise, I'm not a bad guy. I'll even prove it to you, if you want. Besides, Melanie looks like she'll kill us if we stay here any longer."

"Who?"

"The waitress." Gabriella turned to look at her, seeing nothing but the apathetic expression that she'd been wearing since Gabriella arrived but Troy seemed pretty sure. Before she could protest, he pulled out a ten dollar bill from his wallet and told Melanie that he'd cover Gabriella's cup of coffee too.

"Bye, Mel." Troy waved as he gathered his books into his arms.

"See you tomorrow Troy."

Huh, so Troy came here often, very often by the looks of it. He looked so comfortable, so at ease with everything around him but then again, Gabriella suspected that people like Troy could find their niche no matter where they were. On the other hand, Gabriella thought of herself as the opposite. Universally alienated by others. What an odd, apparently nocturnal pair they made.

Helplessly, Gabriella stayed glued to her seat as Troy prepared to leave, unsure of what to do. Her head was telling her that going with Troy would be a terrible idea. She'd known him for less than an hour and for all she knew, he could be propositioning her to smuggle heroin to Mexico or something equally dangerous/stupid/illegal/all of the above. Should she risk it?

Troy stood expectantly by the door, waiting for Gabriella to hurry up.

When else was she going to get an opportunity like this? Gabriella had spent so many years with a stiff upper lip, working her ass off to be perfect, to impress her mother who always seemed to be preoccupied with something, anything else. And for what? To be dumped at the first opportunity to go to Europe with no metaphorical baggage? Time well spent, clearly.

Old Gabriella would've never followed a, for all intents and purposes, stranger in the middle of the night to God knows where. But with a kind of determination that she usually reserved for far more practical and rational uses, she hopped off the stool with her bag slung over her shoulder and marched out the door Troy was holding open, oblivious to his wide and triumphant grin

It wasn't until Troy began leading her down an eerie, dimly lit alley – the kind that, according to comic books, was particularly susceptible to villains jumping out from behind Oscar the grouch style trash cans – did Gabriella feel her first wave of uncertainty.

"Um, I know that you said that you were decidedly not a axe-wielding murderer and whatnot but it just occurred to me how easily you could've lied to me about that and any other particular inclinations for psychotic activities that you may potentially have and..."

Troy chuckled but didn't say anything. Instead, he closed his fingers around her wrist and pull her to...a parking lot. Oh.

"Whoops. Ass. You. Me."

Troy laughed again and Gabriella felt something from within her...was that - was her stomach fluttering? Was that even possible? Dear God, just what she needed. Breathing deeply to clear her head, she followed Troy as he twirled a key ring around his finger to a clunky rusted white truck.

"We're going in there?" Her voice was full of justified (at least, in her opinion) trepidation.

"Hey! I take offense to that. There is only a forty percent chance that she will break down." Troy said cheerfully, missing the increasing apprehension that Gabriella was clearly displaying. He took his seat behind the steering wheel then slid across the bench seat to open the passenger's door for Gabriella to come in. "Hop in."

"Can't we just...walk somewhere?" She asked hopefully.

"C'mon, you don't trust me?" Cheeky, very cheeky but not especially convincing.

"Not in the slightest." Gabriella returned flatly.

"Ouch, that hurts."

"Oh, I'm sure."

"Late night cruising requires a set of wheels. You just don't cover enough land on foot. Believe me, I've lived in Albuquerque long enough to know by now. Just get in, please?" His hand patted the ripped pleather seat like that was supposed to entice her in some way. It didn't but somehow, she still found herself climbing into the death contraption in disguise.

"I'm still not convinced that this car is going to make it more than two miles out of this parking lot." Gabriella stated matter-of-factly as she bucked the questionably-safe safety belt over her lap.

"O ye of little faith." His clear blue eyes narrowed playfully. "We shall prove to you our worth. You will be thoroughly persuaded by the time you leave this car."

"Which, for all we know, could be in five minutes."

"Okay, that's it. The sass. Ends. Here."

She threw her head back and laughed. When was the last time she had fun? Troy's natural friendliness and charm automatically set an overall relaxed environment and Gabriella found herself increasingly pleased that fate had led her to Clyde's.

And to Troy.

"So where exactly are we going?" Gabriella asked after a few minutes of quietness in the car.

"No idea," Troy said flippantly, flicking the turn signal and changing lanes.

"Well as long as there's a plan."

"There isn't supposed to be a destination! These are one of those occurrences when getting there is equally important," Troy stressed vehemently before he got momentarily distracted. It seemed that one of the green highway signs had captured his attention. He gave a sudden jerk to the car to put them on the highway. "Perfect."

"Where are we going?" She repeated.

"You'll see. I'll guarantee you'll like it."

She shook her head in disbelief. "Whatever you say."

"So new girl, why are you up this late?" Troy inquired, one hand casually laying atop the steering wheel.

"I always am." Was her nonchalant response.

"Why's that?"

She shrugged, resting her head against the cold glass window. "Can't sleep." That was the simple answer. The complicated answer was just that – complicated. Gabriella wasn't sure if she trusted Troy enough to divulge her life secrets. Yet. "I could ask the same of you." She returned quickly, bringing the heat back to him.

He shrugged, his eyes trained on the road. "Same as you."

Ah, so he had to be hiding something too. She wasn't entirely sure why but she was dying to uncover the mystery that was Troy Bolton.

"We've been driving for almost an hour." Gabriella complained. "Can you just tell me where we're going already?"

"The beach!"

"I'm sorry, what?" There was no way she heard him correctly.

"The beach."

"You're crazy, aren't you. You're really good at hiding it, but you're crazy."

Troy cracked up like it was the funniest thing in the world which did little to convince Gabriella of his sanity. "Come on," He said jovially, "who doesn't like the beach?"

"This isn't exactly the ideal time though..."

"Ideal time? We're driving around in the middle of the night on a school night. We scoff at the concept of conventional time. I mean, if you can't do something at two in the morning, when can you?"

"Ah, the eternal question strikes once again." She commented sardonically and he gave her a mocking face in return. "Well, which beach are we going to anyway? I may not know Albuquerque but I do know geography and I'm pretty sure the nearest ocean isn't anywhere near us at all."

"Okay so it's kind of a psuedo-beach. But I used to go to this pond all the time when I was a kid and it was the best. Why, do you have any better suggestions?"

"...no." Most of her late nights were confined to her room or roaming the streets of wherever she happened to find herself.

"Then it's settled, we're going to the beach."

It really was a gorgeous place. The pond wasn't large but it looked like the sand stretched all around its edges, the fringes of the water licking the shores. Besides Troy and Gabriella, there wasn't a soul around except the birds and fish.

Troy produced a large blanket from the bed of his truck as Gabriella took in the sights.

"Do I even want to know why you keep that in your car?" She asked amusedly following Troy closer to the water.

"Funny girl." Troy said, shaking out the blanket and flattening it on the sand. "My mom makes me have it. There's a whole emergency kit back there, she's kind of paranoid that my truck'll get stranded on the middle of nowhere or something ."

"I could see that happening." She teased.

He made a face at her. And still he was devastatingly attractive. Life was just so not fair sometimes.

They leaned back on their elbows, not talking. It was a content, calming quiet that Gabriella savored. But she still wanted to know Troy better. He was easily the most popular guy at East High but rarely did anyone ever lose sleep over being Mr. Congeniality.

Taking a deep breath, Gabriella spoke. "So what's the real reason you're an insomniac?" Troy still looked moderately uncomfortable at the prospect of sharing. "I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours."

He sighed. "Alright. I guess it started when Cammie got sick a couple years ago." An unmistakable feeling of slight jealousy sprang through Gabriella although it quickly disappeared when Troy continued, "My sister, she had something wrong with her heart. I don't really remember what the doctors were calling it but for a little while," His adam's apple bobbed as he broke off and she knew that this was hard for him. He was talking slowly with pauses in between each of his words like he didn't know how to make it sound less significant to him than it actually was. "It didn't look too good for her."

He didn't have to say it but Gabriella knew he was referring to her life expectancy.

"Did she..." She trailed off tentatively, feeling considerably worse for bringing this up for him.

His head snapped to look at her. "What? No, no, she's fine. She got a heart transplant a year and a half ago and she's doing okay now but at the time...she was only eight. And she was just cooped up in that hospital every day which had to suck. So I ended up spending pretty much all my free time there. And I'd stay until she fell asleep. I don't even think I was technically allowed to but her nurses really liked her. I think they felt bad for her too. Cam hated being pumped full of those drugs so sometimes, when it got really bad, she wouldn't sleep and then I wouldn't either. Kind of became a thing for us."

It was a sweet story, Gabriella found herself smiling at Troy's sentimental reminiscing.

"So, what's your story?"

And so she told him.

When Gabriella was twelve, while her mom and dad were embarking on their messy divorce, her dad loaded up his battered green hatchback with all of his possessions as Gabriella sat on the porch, her face set in an expression of defiant indifference. She was angry, furious even, with her dad for being able to abandon her without a second thought.

But as he knelt before her, he had promised her, with all the sincerity in his soul, that he would call her every night. He never did. Her cynical heart never believed he would but every night, she would stay awake until her eyes would no longer stay open, waiting for something that would never come. And at first, her energy would dissipate by ten or eleven but within a month or two, she couldn't sleep at all.

"Now, I'm living with him until graduation. Ironic, isn't it."

And then she told him things she didn't mean to. It was only fair. It wasn't tit for tat exactly but they were on an even playing field. It was all out on the table.

They made small talk for what seemed like hours, revealing the smallest, most trivial things that appeared to have more significance pieced together as opposed to if they'd learned all these things over a long course of time.

Anyone listening would have thought they were insane, jumping from household pets (none for Gabriella although her dad had a golden retriever puppy - how cliché - and two cats and a goldfish for Troy) to first kisses (Caroline Winters in first grade, Will Bowman, eighth respectively) in a span of five minutes, each segue having no logical sequence at all.

The sand tickled the soles of her feet as Troy rambled about the most epic food fight of '06 when Gabriella interrupted. "Hey Troy...I have a question. Why exactly did you come and talk to me at Clyde's?" She voiced the thought she'd been repeating to herself for hours. She was a small person, not particularly eye catching in appearance or personality. Sure he recognized her but she recognized him too and if hadn't said anything then she wouldn't have either.

There was something about Troy that made her inordinately curious.

"Mostly because you were there."

Ouch. Why did that hurt?

"And," he sighed reluctantly and Gabriella felt her heart elevate ever so slightly. "You just seemed...nice. Someone I could talk to. And I was right. I like that."

"I think everyone likes to be right." she said dryly.

"Well, not that part although that's pretty great too but I like having someone to talk to. I don't have a lot of that in my life."

"Glad to be of service." It was supposed to sound sarcastic but it came out sounding much more sincerely than she intended. The scariest thing was, she realized a few seconds later, that she was pretty sure she meant it.

After her parents' divorce, her mom tried to send her to three different therapists, each of whom Gabriella despised with a passion. If anyone knew how difficult talking to be, it was her. Finding an audience you were willing to talk to? Even more so. It was a small comfort knowing that in the few hours she'd known Troy, he'd put more confidence in her than she had put in the bi-weekly session with Drs. Bates, Hunter and Carlson.

"Rebuttal question: why did you decided to come with me tonight?" He asked, gently bumping his shoulder with hers.

"I guess it was because it was unexpected of me. I'm so done with playing it safe all the time and going with you seemed like the most unlike me decision I could've made." Gabriella answered truthfully.

Troy didn't look entirely satisfied with her response. Or maybe he was just looking for something else.

"But for what it's worth," she continued, "I'm really glad I did. Partly 'cause of the risk and thrill of it all but mostly because of, well...you." she admitted embarrassedly.

The brilliance of the smile that graced Troy's face following that statement could've powered all of New York City. Her eyes cast downward self-consciously and consequently noticed their hands. Mere centimeters separated her small delicate hands from his large, callused ones. He must've noticed too because when she looked up again, his face was only inches from hers. She gasped softly and turned a subtle shade of pink.

"Gabriella?"

"Yes?"

"I really want to kiss you right now." He said quietly. His fingers brushed along her jaw and she felt her eyes flutter shut in response.

"So why don't you?" Her voice was in a whisper, almost inaudible above the breeze whipping her hair around.

"Because," He paused and licked his lips, looking for the right words. "Because I don't want this to mean something to me that it doesn't for you. So please, if in..." he checked his watch, "five hours, you plan to completely ignore me at school, don't keep going with this, Not if you just want us to be a one night only type thing."

"Don't be silly." Without giving herself a moment to second-guess her decision, Gabriella closed that microscopic distance between them and kissed him with all that she had. Pulling away slightly, she pushed his too-long hair behind his ears and forced herself to maintain eye contact with the pools of his eyes, resisting the urge to run away. "I plan on us spending many more nights together...I could see myself really falling for you, Troy Bolton." She confessed.

The digital clock in Troy's dash read 4:28 as they soared down the freeway. Gabriella's head rested on Troy's shoulder as he drove leisurely. She felt her eyelids begin to droop, it had been an eventful night and it was beginning to wear on her. He must've noticed when he stole a quick glance at her exhausted face.

"Go to sleep," he urged her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "I'll wake you when we're back."

She nodded and drifted off to sleep.

The sun was just beginning to rise when Troy pulled up to Gabriella's house, the pink tinge staining the clouds as he put his car in park. He gently jostled her awake before jumping out of the car and coming around to open Gabriella's door before she could even unbuckle her seat belt. Grabbing her hand, he pulled her up to meet his lips which she did, without complaint.

Opening her sleep-clouded eyes, she smiled lazily and rested her head against his chest. "Thanks for tonight, Troy." She said shyly. "It was perfect."

Hand in hand, they walked to Gabriella's door and she unlocked it, knowing Troy's eyes were on her. But just as she was about to slip inside, Troy's hand stopped her.

"Where's my good night kiss?"

She could've pointed out that it was no longer good night and had long ago become good morning but instead, giggled and obliged. Once then twice then once again. "Good night." She said with finality, stepping into her foyer.

Gabriella had only taken a few steps into the house when her cell phone buzzed in her pocket. A radiant smile spread across her face as she opened up her new text message.

Thoroughly persuaded, aren't you?

Yay, all done. Kind of trite but what can you do?

Side note: so I was at Barnes & Noble the other day and I was in the YA section (such a sucker here) and a copy of Along for the Ride caught my eye because it had bonus material in the back! Including a SD made playlist for the book. Score! So I decided to make my own (incorporating 2 of the same songs as Sarah). On my Mind was probably the one I listened to the most during the making of this fic.

"On my Mind" - Justin King / "No Sunlight" - Death Cab for Cutie / "Whatever it is" - Ben Lee / "Lovely Tonight" - Joshua Radin / "Mona Lisa" - Grant Lee Phillips / "A Light on a Hill" - Margot & The Nuclear So and So's / "Add my Effort" - The Weepies / "Heartbeats" - Jose Gonzalez /

So...you all made it to the end, you couldn't have hated it that much so if you could drop me a review, I'd love you forever. And ever.