Not Just Us (Camila/You)

Chapter Two

We had been sitting in an awkward silence for about five minutes. This could not be going any worse. I was supposed to be the professional here, helping these girls achieve their next smash hit album but in reality, I was sitting looking down at my lap while the girls were looking at me questioningly. I snapped my head up when I heard somebody clear their throat. The girl with the fashionable snapback and baseball jersey smiled at me

"So Y/N we're Fifth Harmony. This is Mila, Ally, Mani, Lauren and I'm Dinah Jane"

I was so glad she broke the ice, regaining my confidence I looked each of them in the eye one by one with a gentle smile on my face then directed my attention to the whole group

"Nice to meet you ladies. We won't need to start any intense work today but we could begin with a basic brainstorm of ideas, you know me getting to know your style?"

"Thats a good idea." the smallest girl said "getting to know each other I mean, I'm sure you need to know us and we would like to know some stuff about you."

"Okay sounds fair" I closed the notepad I had on my lap and addressed the girls

"I'm Y/N L/N i'm 22 and from Sacramento. I went to UCLA on a scholarship to study music engineering and moved town to Malibu when I graduated. I've been working here for around 6 months"

The cute looking Latina got my attention next when she asked if I was in a relationship.

"Camz you can't just ask someone that, what are you 12 ?!?"

"No no its fine. I'm not actually it's just me and Laney" They looked questioningly at me so I elaborated "Laney's my daughter she's three."

Looking around at the different girls I could see a few different emotions two of the girls looked surprised, one looked like she needed more information and the other two showed looks of bemusement. I got this a lot. When you tell people you're 22, single with a three year old people automatically think the worst of you. I'm used to it but that doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt. Sure we weren't the most conventional family but me and Laney are perfectly happy. We are financially stable and a great team so I generally just ignored it when people asked rude, condescending questions. Thats why I was so caught off guard when the green eyed girl I now knew as Lauren said something nobody has ever said when they learnt of my family.

"Thats cool"

I was thrown off. 'thats cool'?? Was she serious. I kept my eye contact and saw she meant it. A fleeting comment to verbalise their thoughts on my family. This was a first. I suddenly felt at ease knowing I wasn't going to be judged by these girls.

We talked for a couple of hours. Nothing to serious just getting to know each other. They told me stories of the their time together as a group along with personal details such as their families and hobbies. I casually took small notes here and there as I've found that knowing more about somebody relates to the type of music they want to make, their voice, tone, opinions. They were a really nice bunch of girls. They just have this presence about them that makes you feel safe like you can tell the anything and it will be okay. We all swapped numbers and I told them to contact me if there were any questions or concerns. It was 12:30 which was the end of my day.

"right ladies well I'm off for the rest of the day now so I'll see you tomorrow for our first official day of album planning."

"wait you're leaving...now?' Normani asked.

Realising the girls had yet been given some sort of recording schedule I made a mental note to create one for them and their management for the next day. "Yeah well I have to pick Laney up from pre school and my parents normally collect her a couple days a week, this not being one of them."

All five girls nodded in understanding

"Alright, we'll be ready for tomorrow, you better bring your A game mr big shot" Ally joked

"Thank god, I thought I was working with some lazy ass wannabes, now I know you're serious" I rebutted smirking. This earned me a few giggles and an eye roll from Dinah.

"Okay well I'll see you all tomorrow" I was surprised when I received goodbye hugs from all of them, the longest coming from Camila. Her hug felt really comforting and just nice I guess. I left straight after that and went to Laney's Preschool.

The moment I rounded the corner to her 'classroom' I heard my favourite sound. I could hear my daughter laughing running around the playground with two other little kids. I cherished these moments the most. When I could take a step back and just watch my little princess loving life, laughing without a care in the world. This was the reassurance I always looked for from Laney. I've always been worried that I, as a young single parent, wouldn't be able to provide everything she would want or need and I've always tried my absolute hardest to give her just that, everything she could possibly want or need but it was tough. When she spotted me I had seconds to react before she jumped into my awaiting arms to give me a massive Laney hug.

Carrying Laney to the car we talked about every little detail of her day. God this kid can sure pack a lot into a few hours. Driving home was easy as there was hardly any traffic and time flew when we blasted disney music all the way home. That was a perk of being a dad, you could listen to and watch kids stuff and it was deemed acceptable. In reality I loved everything disney and Laney picked up that admiration for disney from me.

Arriving home we went about our own activities. Laney went straight to the back garden to play with her toys leaving me at the kitchen table with my laptop brainstorming ideas for possible song lyrics. From what I have learnt from today and research, I can tell they are strong women who wanted to use their voices for good. Lauren told me earlier that their main focus is to show girls and boys alike that being themselves if perfectly fine whilst having some fun on some tracks to. This was fine with me and to be frank, it was refreshing to see a young group of musicians with their heads firmly screwed on but also not taking themselves to seriously.

After two hours I had come up with a couple ideas and had written down some random lyrics that I would run past them tomorrow. Normally thats how I like to work. Finding a lyric, quote or line and building a narrative around it. Laney came in from her garden adventures, covered in god knows what, but she had a smile on her face and looked relatively proud of whatever shed done out there. She skipped over to me and sat herself down on my lap looking through all of the paper around me

"What's this daddy"

"This is just me coming up with some stuff for work tomorrow. Im working with Fifth Harmony so I want to be prepared"

"I love them, I sing them all the time, you 'member daddy"

I nodded and chuckled remembering hearing nothing else other than Worth It for a month. I mean non stop. Laney was obsessed with it as it was always on the radio. She learnt some of the dance moves and never missed an opportunity to show me how good she could do the choreographed chorus. There was a problem when I had to awkwardly avoid the question of what 'come harder just because, I don't like it too soft' meant but apart from that I can't complain that much. It was catchy and different.

We decided just to have a lazy evening, meaning we'd cook some food and watch cartoons and maybe a princess film if she was lucky.

A few hours later, once Laney had been put to bed an no less than four storybooks had been read, I sat in my bed continuing my planning for the next day. Just as I went to close the macbook resting on my lap, a succession of beeps caught my attention. Going to the open tab I saw five new followers on my personal twitter which to me was a success as I only had 600 - ish followers anyway. Checking the names, a smile crept onto my face as all of my new favourite girl group seemed to be online stalking me.

I went to sleep that night content in knowing my new assignment could actually be one of the best experiences of my adult life.