Hunger in my Heart

Chapter 19

Sarah and Nicola had stumbled off to bed awhile ago, saying goodnight in hushed tones to Kimberley who sat snuggled into the corner of the expansive sectional in Cheryl's media room with Cheryl sleeping with her head in her lap. Kimberley had waved goodnight then contemplated waking Cheryl and sending her off to bed, instead she had just sat there sifting her hand through Cheryl's long hair afterwards. Sarah and Nicola had been in a bit of a hyper mood, Kimberley reflected, wanting loud music and a whole lot of alcohol before they had finally settled down to watch the latest romantic comedy on the large flat screen together. The girls had all had a good time but by the time the credits rolled, Cheryl had been sound asleep with her head cuddled in Kimberley's lap and Sarah and Nicola had been out of gas and taken themselves off to bed.

Now enjoying the peace and quiet, Kimberley thought she wouldn't mind bed herself, it had been a long and stressful week, she had missed Cheryl terribly as well and was dreading the upcoming month when Cheryl was going to be in LA finishing her album. Cheryl had been traveling a lot since she had started recording solo material and even more when she had actually released it. Kimberley hated it, not the fact that Cheryl had gone solo, she was incredibly proud of everything she had accomplished, what she hated was Cheryl being out of the country so much. Sometimes she found herself being irrationally jealous of Lily, Cheryl's PA who pretty much went everywhere with her, though she didn't envy her the schedule or the assistant to Cheryl Cole bit. Cheryl could be an assistant's nightmare she knew, but Lily seemed to take it all in stride and handled Cheryl really well. As as matter of fact, her and Lily had very similar temperaments Kimberley realized now that she actually thought about it. Cheryl apparently liked having a geeky, organized and slightly bossy presence in her life at all times she mused with a chuckle.

For the last week Kimberley had gone to bed by herself in her now quiet and empty flat, she had missed Justin's presence, just having another human being around and their routine. But she had actually missed having Cheryl in her bed at night more. She really was sad, she thought self-deprecatingly. Every night she had tossed and turned for hours trying to get a grip on what Justin had revealed the night they had broken up and somehow reconcile it with how Cheryl had acted for the last few years. Sometimes she thought she had made sense of it and then something would throw her off. Cheryl had made it crystal clear to her she was straight, straight, straight way back in 2004, and had gone on to reinforce that assertion by hooking up with Ashley fucking Cole soon after. Thinking back to the first six months Cheryl had been with Ashley made Kimberley cringe, Cheryl was so over the top lovey dovey with him it was sickening, it was like she had completely subjugated her personality to suit her new profile of WAG. She also went out of her way to demonstrate her absolute heterosexuality on numerous occasions right in front of Kimberley, giving no care whatsoever about snogging him or getting physical with him in front of the whole group. It had taken awhile for Kimberley to get over Cheryl and stop wanting to kill him or her, but she had managed.

Eventually Kimberley had started to notice that Justin, who had hung around with them on and off for a year because his group was with the same label, was trying to get her to notice him. At first she had just thought of him as another boy bander, kind of loud and brash, and hadn't really given him a second look. However over time, she had gotten to know him one on one and had discovered he was actually a really nice guy, very normal. More importantly he was uncomplicated, and after the emotional thrashing she had gone though with Cheryl, nice, normal, and uncomplicated seemed pretty attractive to her. So they had started dating, though she had kept him away from the band for months

Somehow, though she wasn't sure how, her and Cheryl had pretty easily maintained their friendship, in fact they had grown even closer if anything. By the time February 2005 had rolled around, Cheryl was head over heels in love with her happily ever after fantasy and Kimberley had finally decided to get serious with Justin so she'd started bringing him to band functions. She had not predicted at all the complete and utter strop Cheryl would get in when Justin came on the scene. It had not been pleasant for several months and looking back now she could pretty clearly see Cheryl had been jealous.