Title: Ruined Forever (In the Best Way Possible)
Author: Kristen
Date: August 2007
Pairing: Troy/Sharpay
Setting: FutureFic
Rating: T/M for language

Summary: This was not the Sharpay Evans that he knew. This one had mismatched clothes and dirty fingers and ratty hair. She seemed a thousand miles and a million years removed from the Sharpay of Twinkle Towne and East High and Darbus' homeroom. And yet, there was something more beautiful about this version then he could have ever imagined.

Author Note: I promise that it's a Troypay, just join me on the journey. Most of the story is going to take place in Africa, so there are some terms you need to know ahead of time. I'll put the ones used in each chapter here in the authors note so that you can keep up. All will be explained within the story as well, but just for the integrity, here's a heads-up.

ARV – Anti-Retroviral Drugs. Leading treatment for HIV/AIDS
HIV/AIDS – a disease that attacks the immune system. The rates of it in most of the world and Africa especially have reached pandemic proportions. Passed through the exchange of bodily fluids
Matatu – Kenyan taxi system
Hakuna Matatta – "no worries" in Swahili
Kibera – 2nd largest slum in the world. Located in Nairobi, Kenya. Roughly 750,000 people live there. It's featured in the movie Constant Gardener

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click

"Seriously, Troy."

click click click

"Gabi. Shut up."

"Troy, we have been here since 6am. It is now 2pm. There is now way that you can need any more pictures of muddy Scottish hippies."

After eight years of playing this game, I could complete the speech for her. I think she kept talking… not quite sure…

"If the sassy broad in the obnoxious had could just shift…" I muttered, not even acknowledging Gabi's whining. "There you go, sweetheart."

click

"Troy! Are you even listening to me!?!"

"Nope."

"Argh!"

click click click click

"Gabi, I swear to God that if you don't shut up, I will show Andrew the Twinkle Towne DVD."

She gasped. "You wouldn't."

"Do not test me woman," I tore one eye away from the viewfinder briefly. Gabi knew that if I made the point to look at her during a photoshoot, I wasn't messing around. "As you already so astutely pointed out, we've been in my living nightmare for eight hours already. I am muddy and hungry and all they have is haggis and fried Mars Bars and I'm getting increasingly cranky and I don't even have close to my cover shot. If you're bored, go make out with a Scottsman. See if all the rumors are true."

click click

I could almost hear her roll her eyes at me. I chuckled softly under my breath and continued to scan the crowd with my camera.

I heard Gabi's phone sing out that special ring tone and I knew that our time was done for the day. "Tell him I said hi," I called to her as she answered her husband's phone call.

"Hey Andrew," she said sweetly. "No, of course he's not done…" She turned and smiled at me and I heard her voice drift away. She always meandered off when Andrew called.

After about fifteen more minutes, I had the shots I wanted. The annual Glastonbury Festival in Scotland was a staple for my magazine and something I took pretty seriously. Although, Gabi and Andrew would tell you that I take just about everything with the magazine pretty seriously.

My business card, in case you're curious, proclaims me as the "Senior Photojournalist for the Footprints Media Group". A very fancy way of saying that my two best friends and I started a magazine about ten years ago and that's spawned into an entire media group and somewhere along the way my love of photography turned into a job.

Packing up my cameras (I've got six. I know. Excessive. Gabi sings that song frequently.), I found myself watching Gabi talk to Andrew on the phone. I've known her since high school, actually. We dated for a little while in the midst of this incredibly awkward season that involved talent shows and sequins and an incredibly scary woman named Ms. Darbus. We both graduated from East High in Albuquerque and headed our separate ways for college. I accepted a basketball scholarship for the University of Kentucky and moved to Lexington. Gabi, however, got a full ride to Dartmouth up in New Hampshire. Freaking genius. I was pretty sure that we would never see each other again.

Best laid plans, eh?

"Are you finally ready?"

Gabi's voice broke into my reverie and I nodded my assent.

"He said to remember that the dinner tonight is black tie and that your Scottish accent sucks."

"Tell him thanks and that he can kiss my ass."

"So mature, Bolton. So mature."

"It's why you keep me around."

"Pretty much."

I checked my watch and noted the time. "So, I want to grab a few shots of the surrounding countryside while I've still got the light. Why don't you head back to the hotel and I'll meet you guys in the lobby tonight for the dinner?"

"Sounds good. Don't get run over by sheep, okay? I hear they're vicious."

"I will steer clear of the fluffy, skittish creatures, Gabriella. Don't worry," I smiled.

She stuck her tongue out at me and walked away to hail a cab. I shouldered my camera bag and went in the opposite direction.

Bad Scottish accent my ass.

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"Loretta, this is very important. I need to know if you've been taking the ARVs."

"No, Sharpay. I have not."

I took a deep breath and ran my fingers through my hair. They stopped a few times at all of the knots and I thought once again that I should just shave the whole mess of it. Or at least put it in dredlocks. Long blonde hair in Kenya just wasn't the most practical.

"Loretta, you know that I want to do everything that I can to help you. But I cannot do that if you are not taking the drugs!"

"I know that, Sharpay. But I have to eat."

And we're back to the same place. Loretta and I have been doing this dance for almost three weeks now.

"Loretta, did you sell your drugs?" When she nodded that yes, she had, I sighed. "Well, friend, then I am sorry. I will have to cut you from the drug program."

"NO!" She screamed at me in rapid Swahili and I willed myself to not cry and hug her and tell her that we would figure it all out. That is not what was going to help her.

After several minutes of screaming and crying, I did place my hand on her arm and say, "Loretta, friend, calm down. Take this bag of maize and come back on Friday. By then, I should have more information for you for more food programs. If I find you places to get food, then we might be able to talk about putting you back on the assisted ARV rotation."

In the eight years that I had been doing this kind of work, it never got easier. Ever.

My dear friend slumped her shoulders in defeat. I could already see the HIV eating away at her skin. The ARV drugs were the best hope she had at a prolonged life. However, there were so many other danger factors to life in Africa. HIV/AIDS was just the tip of the iceberg.

I saw my last few clients for the day and then closed up the clinic. As I walked home through the streets of Kibera to reach the matatu to get to my flat, I smiled at the children playing with their balls in the street. Of course, their balls were made of trash bags and twine, but they were still play objects. As I turned one corner in the densely populated slum, I heard my name being called.

"Sharpay!"

"Oh, Yusef! Friend, how are you?!"

"I am very well," he smiled broadly and launched into a lengthy monologue about his family and his school and all of the goings on in his world. He asked about mine back and then got a pretty serious look on his face.

"Yusef, what is it?"

"I received a call from America today."

"Really? From who?"

"From a magazine editor named Andrew Morales. He wants to send a photojournalist to live with us for a month and do an in-depth report on the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Kenya."

"Well," I said slowly, measuring my response. "That could be fun. He could at least bring me peanut butter."

"So you'd be okay with it?"

"Would this photojournalist work with me?"

Yusef nodded. "He'd work with you and I would probably also ask you to take him around to other sites around the city. Maybe even down to Mombassa or the Mara."

"He wouldn't live with me, right?"

"Oh no. He'll be staying at the Gracia Guest House in Nairobi. It would not be proper for a young man to stay with a young woman when they are not married," Yusef was appalled at even the thought. Kenyan culture was still pretty formal in that area. Even though so many people lived together and such, it was never acknowledged. People would either get offended or turn a blind eye. Drove me crazy sometimes, but it was one of the things I had gotten used to, I suppose.

"Of course not, Yusef," I responded, biting back a smile. "Just let me know when he's getting here. I'll make sure to pick him up from the airport."

"Excellent, Sharpay. Thank you."

"Hakuna Matatta, Yusef," I laughed. As I began to walk away, I turned and said, "By the way, what's his name, this photojournalist guy?"

"Um, Troy. Troy Bolton."

And that's when my insides began to liquefy.