I Knew I Loved You

Chapter Fourteen: A Lovely Morning

Charlene blinked confused when she woke up, she had expected to see Manuel sleeping beside her soundly but she was surprised to see that there was no sign of her husband and that his side of the bed was cold. 

Climbing out of bed, Charlene quickly grabbed her fluffy dressing gown and wrapped it around herself before she left the bedroom; it was early in the morning and she had hoped that they'd all be able to sleep in. 

Since they had returned from France, things had settled into a nice routine and Charlene was happy to see that Abigail had quickly warmed to spending time with Manuel as well as her. 

They felt like a real family and Charlene knew that it wouldn't last, they were still waiting for news about what would happen now; it was only a matter of time before Sharon and Karen arrived with news about what would be done with Abigail. 

Heading down the stairs, Charlene shivered at the feel of how cold the floor was to her feet and she wished that she'd remembered to buy some slippers. 

The house seemed to be silent and it worried Charlene just what was going on, she reached the bottom of the stairs and came to a complete stop when she heard whispers from the kitchen. 

Slowly making her way towards the room, Charlene was almost surprised when she stepped inside to find both Manuel and Abigail covered in flour like most of the room. 

"What is going on in here?" Charlene asked trying to wrap her head around this, she was a little unsure how they had managed to make such a mess of her kitchen in such a short amount of time. 

Manuel and Abigail both looked like deer in headlights when she had spoken, they both slowly turned around to see Charlene standing there when they thought that she was asleep. 

"We were making you breakfast in bed," Abigail told her, a little disappointed that they hadn't been able to surprise Charlene; they had gotten up super early to surprise her with breakfast in bed. 

Manuel rubbed the back of his head, he was usually so good at this but the flour had burst and everything had seemed to go down from there; he was surprised that Charlene was even awake at this hour in the morning. 

It was barely seven in the morning and none of them had to be awake for anything, Manuel had wanted to surprise Charlene since she had been working so hard since they had returned from France. 

The brunette had returned to work and Manuel spent most of his days with Abigail, he was enjoying the break even if they didn't have a big holiday planned for this year because of the situation with Abigail. 

Charlene nodded her head looking around at the mess, they would have to clean this up before they tried again to make breakfast; she couldn't believe that this was actually her kitchen right now. 

"I will go and get dressed while you two clean this up... then I will make us all breakfast," Charlene insisted with a shake of her head, she was sure that things would be right when she came back down. 

Kissing Manuel's cheek, Charlene headed out of the kitchen so that she could get ready; she didn't like cooking in her dressing gown as the sleeves often got in the way of her hands. 

Manuel watched her leave with a smile on his face, he was a very lucky man and he couldn't imagine his life without Charlene in it; his wife had been the one constant in his life since his career had started. 

Things had been almost perfect in the time that they had returned from France, he spent his days with Abigail thinking of all the different things to do with the little girl while Charlene was at work. 

His days were filled with interesting games and teaching Abigail new things, there was not much spare time and he was glad for the distraction after the disappointment of the Euros.