Warren the music producer lived in a big, beautiful Silverlake house. I had driven the boys there and back for five weeks, but this was the first time I was finally going to be going inside.
“Wow,” I gaped as we stood on a slightly hidden side mat, waiting for someone to open the door. “This place is huge! It’s like a museum. I was kicked out of one before, did I ever tell you guys?”
“Don’t be embarrassing, Jen,” was the only response I got (thanks, Louis).
The inside was even more big and beautiful. Framed records, guitars, electronics, and photos of Warren and his famous clients lined the walls. Almost everything was white and made of marble, including the grand staircase that spiraled up to his in-house studio.
Warren himself was a tall, slightly squishy-looking British man in a dress shirt – a bit like a rock and roll Jason Segal. When we walked into the soundproofed studio, he removed his large headphones and stood up immediately in greeting. “Ay boys, how are you?”
“Hey, Warren,” they all replied in their polite, chipper voices. They dropped their things onto a long couch and got ready to enter the soundproof room. I lagged awkwardly behind.
Warren noticed me. “Well, well,” he stuck out a hand and grinned. “So this is the famous Jen! It’s fantastic to finally meet you. You know, the lads never stop talking about you.”
I shot the guys a playfully skeptical glance. “Hopefully they say good things.”
“Yeah, we told him all about how you starve us,” Louis helpfully called from the corner of the room.
“And how you almost let Zayn drown in the pool that one time.”
“Well, it’s fantastic to meet you too.” I shook Warren’s hand and gave him a professional smile, purposely cutting the boys off before they could get into even worse truths... “Thank you so much for having me.”
-------
It didn’t take long for me over the course of the day to realize why the boys picked Warren as one of their producers for the new album. He was the best at what he did. Even though I didn’t understand a thing he was doing on his complicated electronic gizmos, the end result just sounded good – so whatever he was doing had to be working.
The boys had already rehearsed two of the three songs they were working with Warren on: one called “Rock Me” and another called “I Would.” The former was exceedingly suggestive – which I brought up when they asked me how I liked the song. (They just laughed.)
The last song left was “Summer Love,” the one that Niall had invited me to think of lyric ideas for. Too bad I’d been too scared to handle a responsibility like that to actually come up with something. Regardless, I was still excited to hear it.
Taking my seat next to Warren, I put on my headphones and gave the boys an enthusiastic thumbs-up before they began. The melody that started up was slow, wistful.
Zayn sang first: “Can’t believe you’re packing your bags, trying so hard not to cry…”
Aw, I thought, tilting my head sadly. That’s going to be me when they leave next week. I paused. Oh my god. That’s so soon. I’m actually going to be really sad. Shit.
Harry’s deep voice cut through: “Don’t promise that you’re gonna write, don’t promise that you’ll call. Just promise that you won’t forget we had it all…”
Okay… is it just my imagination or is Harry staring intently at me. …Nope, not my imagination. Fuck, yup. This is going to make me cry.
YOU ARE READING
Hard to Handle (A 1D Story)
FanfictionThrough luck and connections, jobless Jennifer is hired as the temp handler for One Direction while they're in LA. But living with and playing assistant 24/7 for five guys her age isn't as easy as she expected. Through hangouts, hookups, and handlin...
