Meet Me Halfway (Prequel to BWIW)

Chapter 1

A/N: Hey, some of you asked me for the prequel for Better Where It's Wetter to be put on wattpad. So here it is as promised ;)

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September 2011

Like any typical romantic story, it begins with a collision.

High School. Second day of the new school year. Lauren Jauregui walking one way, Camila Cabello the other. One girl the epitome of nervousness, anxiously glancing down at the sheet music clutched in her hands and half singing to herself. The other is much more composed at first glance. However, this is only true on the outside; anyone that knows her well can see the tense line of her shoulders, the worrying of her bottom lip between perfectly even teeth that indicates an issue is niggling at her.

Thankfully not many know Lauren nearly as well as they think they do - no one around knows what's going through her head as she stares at the choir club advert clutched in her hands.

Paces away from each other now, both are lost in their own thoughts. There's a pause as Lauren suddenly comes to a halt, as though hesitating about doing something. Everything freezes and holds its breath, waiting for Lauren's decision.

A few tense moments pass before she lifts her head up and starts to move forward with renewed confidence.

A few feet to the left, or waiting just a second longer would've saved Lauren a heck of a lot of misery and happiness.

Lauren's sudden extra speed is what sends them straight into each other.

Some (particularly Camila) would call this "fate."

Lauren, ever the sarcastic one, would prefer to label it "falling on our asses", as that is exactly what they did.

The impact had sent them flying in opposite directions onto the cold concrete, scattering papers all around them. For now, whatever forces that caused them to collide and fall on this rather cloudy morning of September - be it serendipity, destiny, or physics - slinks away and leaves them to get on with it.

Lauren is the one who recovers first. She pushes herself upright, massaging the painful spot on her back which will surely have a bruise later. An acidic curse directed at the clumsy person who ran into her is already forming on her lips - her mother would probably faint to hear the words she's thinking come from the mouth of her "perfect" daughter. Still, there's a lot of things her mother doesn't know about her.

Although the words are on the tip of her tongue, they simply evaporate when she sees Camila for the first time: in all the glory of her lamb sweater and painfully short skirt. Years later, she'll tell Camila that she was captivated by her beauty. In reality, however, that comes about five minutes later. The Lauren of this time is far shallower, and to the shame of her future self she's only thinking about Camila's clothes - because one look at the still horizontal girl tells her everything she needs to know. She has "victim" written all over her – Lauren knows the type of person that ends up getting picked on at school and this one seems to be declaring proudly it for the entire student body to see with her cutesy farm animal design.

Hanging around with girls like her is like being near someone with the flu; it's as if the loser quality is contagious and attaches to anyone nearby, forever tainting their school reputation. She knows what comes after that from her sister: swirlies, being shoved in the hallway, locker filled with flour... Any manipulative scheme the others can get their grubby little hands on.

If today were a normal day, then Lauren would have already been on the other side of the school faster than you could say "repression". After all, she has obligations to take care of and she knows nothing about the tiny thing lying on the floor beyond her hideous wardrobe and the metaphorical target sign on it – not the most endearing traits. But then, just as she's about to leave, the unknown brunette sits up and blinks at her in confusion.