Chim- In aeternum

Chapter 5

It's the same five question's each time. Does she feel guilty about leaving everything and everyone behind? Does she feel guilty/saddened/heartbroken about Justin's death? Are Girls Aloud getting back together? Is the fact that they're fighting the reason why they're not getting back together, or is her ambition to get back into acting the real problem?

Last, but certainly not the least.

What's the status of her friendship with Cheryl – alive, dead, on the mend, irreparable?

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Before she'd had the privilege of traveling around the world, long before the group or even the two week stays away from home, the greatest trip she'd ever made was with her dad when they'd gone to Roundhay Park in Leeds to see Tropical World. She'd been six, embracing the chance to have her father's attention solely on her, when as the son, Adam normally had it. It had never been a great concern to her before, but her parents had just split and her time with her dad had rapidly decreased, little Kimberley oddly knowing that she preferred this to her parents constant yelling. She hadn't known what was going on at the time, but the trip had eased the uncertainty around it, and Leeds in general had stuck in her mind as a place where she'd felt safe.

She's bought a three bedroom home in Headingley, close enough and far enough away from her family, not minding the travel time into London, crashing on Nic and Rick's couch when she needs to. Countless magazines have asked her for an exclusive story, a detailed account of her stay in the Australia, and she's knocked them back each time, not the least bit interested in re-brightening the slowly dimming spotlight on her life. She wants to be known for something else now, something other than the pop star that flew off into the unknown, only to return ten years later for her ex-boyfriends funeral. The ex she cut and ran from.

It's the reason she's at this audition in some West End dance studio on a Saturday afternoon, feeling the arches of her feet tingling without the feel of stirrups against them. She'd been forced to cancel the weekend with Leigh because of this, the youngster's disappointment evident in her voice when Kimberley had called the Crane's.

“Right, Miss Walsh...you're up next.”

She's running through her line's with a disinterested grey haired woman when her phone rings, Sarah's name lighting up the screen. She cancels the call and apologises to the producers watching her, their irritation as transparent as the script she's reading from. She switches her phone off quickly, deciding she's going to make use of Nicola's hospitality tonight.

Something tells her she's going to have a crappy afternoon.

She completely forgets the call, forgets her phone is switched off, only remembering the chunk of plastic as Rick starts saying something about an accident involving Leigh and her horse, the world suddenly dropping out from underneath her.

-----

They get news that Leigh's being flown to Newcastle by the air ambulance, Kimberley unable to feel her legs carrying her towards her plane seat, a hand cautiously at the base of her back, guiding her along. She thinks it's maybe Rick, but she can't remember if he's driven to Heathrow or whether she did. All she knows is she's shaking, so utterly scared that she finally understands what her parents must have felt that first week, not knowing if their daughter was all right.

She understands it now, now that she's suffering the same crushing uncertainty.

She was so much like her mother. There were little gestures, tiny little mannerisms that were so completely Cheryl that Kimberley wonders if it's these that have drawn her to the little girl, rather than the characteristics Leigh possesses on her own.

“Kimberley, we're here.”

Rick's looking at her expectedly, already out of the taxi, offering his hand to her. The wind outside's shooting straight through the door across her body, her hand violently shivering as she reaches for the one offered.