The Stage Door (Camren/Norminah)

You're Not Alone

The week seemed to pass by quickly. On Wednesday after waking up late and getting a rough start to her day Camila had met with her Music and Composing teacher, but she hadn't told anyone the decision the two had made when it came to the song she was going to perform at the show, she hadn't even indulged Lauren's many requests to find out. The girls tried, badgering Camila until she threatened to leave their group meeting if they didn't start writing their song and the other girls resigned on the one-sided conversation. The song was easier to write then they had originally thought it would be. Each one of them giving their input with only a few creative bumps along the way and by Friday, they had a rough draft of what they believed, once finished would be a very emotional song. They didn't have music yet, not really. Camila had taken Ally's recorded humming and turned it into a melody using her guitar during thwir lunch hour so they had something to really work with, but they were planning to ask a few Senior students to help them because they decided the song would sound better with a full band behind them. They wrote the entire song in English over the course of six hours and then collectively agreed Ally and Camila would be responsible for translating certain sections of the song into Spanish. They presented the song to Mr. Rinaldi, Mrs. Devlin, and two other teachers, Mr. Harwood and Miss. VanderBurke who were all a part of the planning committee for showcases such as the one they were currently preparing for and three out of the four clapped, praising the girls on their creativity and dedication, surprised at how far they had gotten in just two days but Mr. Harwood just looked at them with hard eyes and the girls didn't know what that meant.

"It needs something," the man said standing up and smoothing out his slacks. "More harmony, there's five of you so it needs more harmony. Other than that," Mr. Harwood said turning to Mr. Rinaldi with a stoic face. "It's good, really good. You're right they are some of the most talented freshman we've ever had." Mr. Rinaldi looked proud of his students, smiling at the girls and giving them a quick thumbs up. "And a name, you need a name."

"We have names," Dinah mumbled, Lauren reaching out and smacking her hard on the arm hoping the white-haired teacher hadn't heard Dinah's disrespect. Lauren had seen him around school and she had heard things, he was hard and he was tough, but he knew talent.

"Find a group name," he said turning to the girls. "It's more professional to have a name, something that describes you and will differentiate you from the others."

All four teachers shook hands and then the group dispersed leaving Ally, Dinah, Normani, Camila, and Lauren looking at each other with a combination of different expressions plastered on their faces.

"So we'll pick this up tomorrow?" Ally questioned, knowing that with all five of them having dates tonight they wouldn't have time to work on their song. "We've only got another week and then it's showtime," she said worrying they wouldn't have enough time to convince the Senior students to help them. "When are we going to deliver the invitation?" She said turning to Lauren who just shrugged her shoulders, she hadn't thought about the when part of her plan.

"Let's do it tomorrow morning," Dinah suggested. "We can deliver it early and go for breakfast, then come back here and work on the song.

"I already spoke to Max," Camila said addressing the group and hoping to ease some of the nerves she knew Ally was holding inside. "He is going to talk to some of his friends and then text me tonight and let me know what they say, I already played him what we have and he recorded it so he could give his friends an idea of what they would be working with."

"When did you see Max?" Lauren asked, wondering why Camila hadn't said anything to her before.

"Last night," Camila replied. "When you were working with Ally on perfecting your duet." On top of working on their song, the girls still had to work on their duets and Camila her unknown solo. "I took a break from my song and went to get coffee and Max was outside the library and asked if I wanted to hangout for a bit."