Ellie walks into her mom's diner after school, smiling at the familiar customers that always came in and that she often talked to.

" Ellie! There's my star of a daughter!"

She turns beat red and bows her head in embarrassment, knowing it was her mom that basically yelled that throughout the diner. She walks over to the counter where her mom, Clara, was standing in front of it, smiling at her daughter.

" Mom." she whines.

Clara chuckles, finding it amusing. " Oh, come here, you." she pulls Ellie into a hug.

" So, I guess you heard I got the part?" Ellie asks as they pulled apart from the hug.

Clara nods. " Yes, yes I did. Your brother told me."

Ellie sighs and mumbles, " Of course he did."

Clara chuckles. " I'm so proud of you, Els. I know how much you love those movies." she nudges Ellie with her elbow and grins. " I always knew you were a Gabriella."

Ellie smiles shyly and shrugs her shoulders. " Thanks, mom. But I don't think we're going to have a Troy..."

Clara furrows her eyebrows. " Why not?" she asks as she walks behind the counter, telling the chef to make Ellie's order she always gets whenever she went there, and Ellie sits on one of the stools in front of the counter.

" The guy who got the role, Ricky," Ellie starts to say, already regretting it whenever she sees the smirk on her mom's face.

" Let me guess, Andy also told you about Ricky." Ellie assumes.

Clara nods and gets Ellie's drink, which was always a Coca Cola. " Yes he did. Ricky seems like a nice boy." she sets Ellie's drink in front of her and Ellie mumbles a ' thanks ' and then takes a sip of the drink.

" He is." Ellie admits. " But his ex girlfriend is my understudy and they got into a fight. Now I don't think he's going to be in the play anymore and I don't want his understudy to have to take the role."

" Ex partners can be awful sometimes." Clara said, knowing that for a fact since she dealt with it before and she only hopes neither of her kids have to deal with it either. " And that sucks that he might not be in the play anymore because of her."

A bell rings and that means that the chef is done with the food. Clara thanks the chef and puts the plate of cheeseburger and fries in front of Ellie. " I'm sure he'll rethink his decision."

Ellie shrugs as she begins to eat the food. " I don't know. I really hope he does because I don't think I could do the musical without him."

****

The next day at school Ellie was in the library looking for another book to read since she finished reading the Michael Vey series and her brother told her the Harry Potter series were great so she was keeping an eye out for the first book of the series.

She smiles whenever she finds the book and takes it off of the shelf. She raises a brow whenever she hears the sound of Carlos' voice.

She walks over to the end of the aisle of books and peaks over to see that Ricky was doing the dance that they were supposed to do at the end of the musical. She was shocked that Ricky has actually been practicing since she thought that he was dropping out of the play, but she smiled, glad that he decided not to. Well, she at least hoped he decided not to.

She walks out of the library after checking out the Harry Potter book and walks down the hallway. She walks backwards towards the auditorium she past whenever she heard the sound of a piano.

Ellie looked at the doors, noticing them partly opened so she quietly walked in the auditorium. She walked down the aisle, and then up the stairs of the stage surprised to see Ashlyn playing the piano.

" Wow." she says in awe which makes Ashlyn stops playing.

Ashlyn looks at her with wide eyes. 
" Hi."

Ellie awkwardly waves at her. " Hi. Uh, don't stop playing because of me. Whatever you just played was beautiful."

Ashlyn looked at her with surprised, but then smiled. " Oh, uh, thanks." she shrugs her shoulders. " It was just a song I wrote. Miss Jenn asked me to compose a song for my character."

She shakes her head. " Its probably way too much."

Ellie shrugs her shoulders. " I don't know much about writing songs, but from what I heard it sounded great."

" Thanks." Ashlyn tells her. "  I'm playing-"

" Ms. Darbus, I know, Ashlyn." Ellie interrupts her with a smile.

Ashlyn stares at her. " You know who I am?"

Ellie nods. " Yeah, of course. You're like in a ton of clubs, and I sat across from you at the read-throughs."

Ashlyn is silent for a moment, surprised that someone like Ellie knew who she was. She then notices the book Ellie was carrying and smiles. " Those books are great. I'm sure you'll like them."

Ellie glances at the book and nods. " I hope so."

" Would you, um, want to hear all of the song?" Ashlyn suddenly asks.

Ellie grins. " I would love to."

A small smile forms on Ashlyn's face and she turns to the piano and starts playing. " Seems like part of me will always have to lose. Every single time I have to choose. Swore that it felt right, but was I wrong? Is this where I'm supposed to be at all?"

Ashlyn looks over at Ellie with a nervous smile and Ellie smiles at her reassuringly. " I don't have the answers, not today."

Ashlyn continues to sing and Ellie has to admit Ashlyn has a beautiful voice. " It's like nothing makes the questions go away. What I'd give to see if the grass was greener. On the other side of all I've had and lost would it be enough or would I still be wondering?"

" If I could go back and change the past, be a little braver than I had and bet against the odds. Would I still be lost? Even if I woke up in my dreams, would there still be something I'm missing? If I had everything would it mean anything?"

Ashlyn looks at Ellie and gestures to the paper that the lyrics were written on, as if she was saying she could join. Ellie looks at her with surprise, but smiles and looks at the lyrics while singing along with Ashlyn.

" Maybe I should turn around and take the other road. Or maybe I'm just looking for what I already know." 

" I'm just wondering." Ellie only sings this part and Ashlyn smiles at how beautiful her voice was. She nods at Ellie, wanting her to continue.

Ellie smiles nervously at her and Ashlyn moves over so Ellie could sit next to her. Ellie looks at the lyrics as she sits down next to Ashlyn, not hearing the footsteps of someone walking in.

" It feels like I might have broke the best thing that I had." Ellie sings while Ashlyn continues to play the piano.

" I said too much to ever take it back. I'm scared I'll never find something as good. And would I even know if I could? If I could go back and change the past, be a little braver than I had and bet against the odds. Would I still be lost?"

Ashlyn then joins in Ellie singing this part while behind them, Ricky slowly walks in the room, watching in awe.
" Even if I woke up in my dreams would there still be something I'm missing. If I had everything would it mean anything.."

" To me?" only Ellie sings the last part of the song while Ashlyn looks over, finally noticing Ricky and smiles.

Ellie looks over, noticing Ashlyn looking in that direction an d her eyes grow wide when she sees Ricky standing there. He stares at them, opening his mouth and closing it similar to a fish since he didn't really know what to say at the moment. 

" We're back." Ricky says awkwardly after a moment of silence.

Ellie stares at him with confusion, wondering why she was thinking that he meant him and Nini. " What?"

" Downstairs." Ricky said. " Miss Jenn wants to see everyone in the bomb shelter."

Ellie slowly nods. " Oh, okay."

Ricky nods, biting his lower lip as his eyes never leaving hers until he turns around and leaves the room.

In the bomb shelter, Miss Jenn was opening up a box as Ellie sneaks in and stands between Trevor and Avalon.

" Hey, where were you?" Trevor asked her.

Ellie glances over at Ricky who she locked eyes with and just as quick as it happened it ended as she quickly looked away.

" I was hanging out with Ashlyn." she quickly replies.

Trevor and Avalon share a look and then stares at her suspiciously for a moment. Then in unsion they both say, " Okay."

Ellie looks over at Miss Jenn. " So, what's up with the box?"

" Miss Jenn got something from the original movie." Avalon answered.

Miss Jenn gets out the phone that Vanessa Hudgens used in the original High School Musical movie. " Here it is, people." she says as she carefully holds it.

" Is that a garage door opener?" Seb asks her.

Miss Jenn shakes her head, staring at Seb in disbelief. " No, Seb."

She shows the phone to everyone.
" This is Gabriella's phone. From the film."

As soon as she said that, everyone got excited. " I plan on creating a time capsule display in our lobby. If they can have 40 sports ball trophies, we deserve a little movie museum." Miss Jenn smiles.

As she talks, Ellie notices Gina walking to Nini's backpack, and her eyes grow wide when she sees Gina put Nini's phone into what she thinks is EJ's backpack.

Ellie furrows her eyebrows together in confusion. Why was she doing that? EJ probably put her up to it, it seemed like something EJ would do....maybe, she's not for sure since she doesn't know EJ at all. But she still wondered what the reason was.

Miss Jenn smiles. " Okay, people, enough dazzle. Fetch your scripts please."

A/N yay another chapter is up & I'm still loving ellie & ricky. now i'm loving ellie & ashlyn tbh, I can tell you that they're definitely gonna be bffs. & you guys met andy's & ellie's mom which is exciting! I love their mom tbh. since school is canceled maybe I'll actually get more updates done! I hope you enjoyed this chapter & dont forget to check out some of my other books!