Chapter Thirty Four
Cheryl smiled politely to the man stood in front of her, aware that she was being filmed, although her mind was firmly on Kimberley. Normally it wasn’t so bad, she could usually focus her attention on work long enough to do the job, but lately, Kimberley seemed to be the only thing filling her head.
“Cheryl?”
Simon’s voice startled her a little and she jumped before nodding, “yes that was very good” she mumbled before giving an enthusiastic nod. Simon looked at her as if she had grown another head before getting back to the contestant stood in front of them.
“something on your mind?” Simon asked as the dejected young boy walked from the audition room.
“no…its nothing” Cheryl replied quietly, her phone gripped tightly in her hand. She unlocked the handset before looking at the text message she had received a few moments before she had walked in to the studio’s to start the filming.
“They are running with the story – I did all I could”
No matter how many times she read it, she got the same sickly, aching feeling in her stomach each time. She had phoned Hilary on her break and although Hilary had tried to throw the papers off the scent, it hadn’t worked. The truth was, there was just to much evidence to point to their relationship, and no matter how careful she thought they had been – it wasn’t careful enough.
“how’s the flat?” Simon asked. She shrugged her shoulders before answering, ”it’s fine”.
“and Kimberley?” He went on, unable to hide the mischievous smile that had crept on to his face.
Cheryl’s stomach churned a little as she heard his words for what they actually meant. Although she hadn’t worked with him for that long, she knew a hint when she heard one, and that was most definitely a hint.
“How…?” she asked with a frown, wondering how Simon had managed to guess, if there was one thing she could guarantee, it was that she had been careful in front of her work colleagues.
“I got a phone call this morning” he told her vaguely before cutting the conversation short and turning to talk to Dannii.
She sat quietly and tried to process the information in her head, although the more she thought about it, the worse her head started to pound. In the space of one hour, it seemed that nearly everybody had been made aware of hers and Kimberley’s relationship, and she didn’t like it one bit.
“if I was you I’d make a statement”
She turned around and looked at Simon, unsure whether he was talking to her or someone else. She rolled her eyes when she seen that his attention was firmly fixed on her.
“what are you talking about?” she asked defensively, continuing with the charade that she didn’t know what he meant.
He didn’t answer her directly, instead he gave her a smile, one which infuriated her but temporarily relieved her of her worry at the same time. For all Simon liked to tease her, she did respect him and his opinion was usually correct whether she liked to admit it or not.
“I never said it was true” Cheryl corrected him. She put her phone back in her pocket and smoothed down her hair.
“you never denied it either” replied Simon with a knowing look. Cheryl smiled uncomfortably but for some reason found it hard to meet his gaze. All through her life she had stuck to the mentality that she didn’t care what people thought about her, but now, with everything about to blow up in her face, it seemed to be the only thing she could think of.
“it really doesn’t matter to me who you sleep with Cheryl…well unless it happened to be Louis, then I’d have a problem” he laughed a little before trying a different tact.
“whatever happens…we will back you” he shrugged before turning away, his signal that no more conversation on the matter was necessary.
-
She watched the speedometer as it told her she was doing the speed limit and then some, but it was a risk she was wiling to take, if only to shake off the two vans that had been following her for the past half hour.
She hadn’t realised when she left the house that morning, but driving herself to and from work was probably the worst idea she had had.
She breathed a sigh of relief when she turned in to the gated car park of the block of flats and managed to get in before the paparazzi could follow her, although she noticed from her rear view mirror that they had already abandoned their vans and were leaning in through the gates, camera’s at the ready.
She parked the car in her usual spot and got her keys out of her bag ready, so she didn’t have to wait around outside the door, being photographed.
Over the last few years she had gotten used to all the hype and publicity that her life seemed to attract, yet this time it was different. This time every camera flash felt like a little smack in the face, an intrusion that she wasn’t prepared for and one that she knew would probably never go away.
-
She managed to get in to the foyer without too much hassle, although catching a glimpse of herself in one of the panes of glass, she realised her hair was a bit of a mess, which on a normal day would have made the papers on its own credit.
The receptionist smiled at her sympathetically before putting her head back down to the paperwork that lay in front of her. Cheryl smiled back before she got in the lift and pressed the button to her floor.
She used the short moment in the lift to straighten herself up and run through what she was going to say to Kimberley.
-
She walked around the corner and in to the open plan living area, she didn’t even have to say anything, the look on Kimberley’s face told her all she needed to know.
“the receptionist has managed to keep most of them away, a few got up before though” Kimberley told her after she waited for Cheryl to put her coat away and sit with her on the sofa.
“its only gonna get worse babe” Cheryl replied with a sigh as she slipped on to the sofa beside Kimberley. She let her head fall on the older girls shoulder and rested her hand on the girls knee.
“I know” Kimberley sighed with resignation in her tone,
“but your worth it”
