The artificial turf that lines the walls of Wonderland is bright green and dingy in the fluorescent light. Running her hands down its spiky surface, Normani is looking for clues. They could be anywhere — tucked in a corner, freed only after finding some hidden lever or button — and we’re running out of time.

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“Should we ask for a hint?” Normani asks the room, which is full of friends and handlers, after a couple minutes of searching. All we’ve found is a set of four kooky-looking hats. We’ve already consulted the set of instructions we received — a riddle suggests we need to be looking for tea — but are stumped on where to begin. We all raise our hands, and a voice crackles from a hidden speaker: “Match the hats to the heads on the walls.”

It is a hot and sunny fall day on Melrose Boulevard in Los Angeles, and Normani, her crew, and I are in a pocket replica of Wonderland at the city’s #1 ranked escape room company, 60out.

Moments earlier, we listened to our objective: Alice has been accused of stealing from the Red Queen, and we have an hour to build a case that proves her innocence. A professed fan of escape rooms, Normani quickly takes the lead, rifling through some prop luggage and diplomatically suggesting new ideas whenever we get stuck.

The 23-year-old singer, dancer, performer, and former Fifth Harmony member’s mind is still ticking after a very busy year. From March through June, she was on the road with Ariana Grande, opening for the pop star’s Sweetener World Tour before finally releasing her debut single, “Motivation,” in August — her first major release since Fifth Harmony announced an indefinite hiatus in March of last year. A brass-inflected stadium-pop number, the song and its accompanying video trended at the top of on YouTube upon release, and her subsequent live performance of the track at the 2019 VMAs only served to prolong the feverish online conversation.

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While making the rounds this September at New York Fashion Week, Normani landed a short but significant cameo in Rihanna’s Savage x Fenty lingerie show, along with pretty much the highest compliment a rising performer can receive: “NORMANIIIIII you bad BIH!!!! Ugh why can’t I be you,” Rihanna gushed in a tweet after the show. Early in my trip to L.A., Normani brings it up, beaming: “[She’s] somebody that I've looked up to for a very long time. There's nothing that she can't do. I hope to follow in her footsteps one day.”

The importance of this juncture in Normani’s career is not lost on her. The story of Fifth Harmony is one of resilience in which five young women of color formed a girl group manufactured by a wealthy white man on a national television competition show, finished in third place, and was still the most famous act from their season. What followed: intense public scrutiny, a rigorous recording and performing schedule, and a messy, public split that ground all that busyness to a halt. Now that that time in her life is behind her, Normani faces another challenge just months out from the release of her debut album: She has to decide which version of herself she wants to introduce to the world.