"Eloise Sienna Tweedy get your bum out of bed now!" Cheryl shouted as she stood at her daughter's pink bedroom door. She had been trying to wake her sleeping child for close to fifteen minutes to no avail which resulted in her using the only technique she knew would work.
"Mammmmmm!" Lola groaned from under her pink patchwork covers, "don't call us Eloise"
"Get up then madam" Cheryl sniggered at her daughter's hatred for her full name. She was relieved when the seven year old sat up slowly and gave her mum a slight wave signalling she was finally awake. "I meant get out of bed, not just wake up!" Cheryl giggled as she tickled Lola's foot that was sticking out off her covers. Cheryl grabbed her ankle softly, not letting her daughter escape from her tickling hand, she watched as Lola's tanned foot twitched in her hand and laughed when her purple painted toes wiggled like a worm. The little girl began screaming and throwing her body against her bed as Cheryl continued to tickle letting out a chuckle as her daughter couldn't stop hysterically laughing.
"What the bloody hell is going on in here?" Sarah asked groggily as she stumbled through the open door. Cheryl stopped tickling her child and looked at the state of Sarah; it felt like they were back in the apartments they shared in London over ten years ago. She had makeup all down her face, her hair was sticking all over the place and she clearly wasn't awake yet, "Sarah you smell like a fucking brewery" Cheryl mumbled as she tried not to breathe in the stale stench of alcohol, "go and get a shower before I throw you in it!"
"Mam what's a brewery?" Lola asked as she finally sat up in her pink princess bed. Cheryl chuckled at her daughter's innocence and ruffled her messy brown locks, "nothing you need to know about just yet, now get out of bed!"
Cheryl smiled to herself while Lola threw back her covers and shuffled slowly of bed and out of her bedroom towards the bathroom. She was holding a teddy bear that Cheryl had placed in her cot in the hospital the day she was born and it hadn't left her side since. She bit her lip as she remembered Simon giving her the small toy and telling her they would be together forever. She wished they were but somehow it gave her a small amount of comfort knowing she still had a piece of Simon in her life.
She wandered out of her daughter's princess themed bedroom and almost fell over Lola who was standing still in the hallway. "Lola what you doing? Mam almost fell over you, why aren't you in the bathroom?" Cheryl asked as she played with her daughter's curly hair.
"Auntie Sare's being all sicky" Lola winced and screwed up her nose in disgust. Cheryl merely laughed at her daughter's expression and took her into the kitchen to wash her there out of the way of her hungover best friends.
* * *
Cheryl slammed the door of her apartment when she returned after taking Lola to school. Her mind was still spinning from the images of Simon in her dream, she hadn't dreamt about him for months and she blamed it on the girls coming over. She knew she had Marco and he cared for her and Lola more than any man had ever done since she'd been with Simon. A part of her felt like she was being unfaithful to Marco whilst she was dreaming and constantly thinking of Simon, she felt like she happy without him but her mind just would not let her forget about the only man she had ever truly loved.
"Chez about time you're back" Nicola shouted from the bathroom before running out and dragging Cheryl by her arm into the tiniest room in the entire apartment.
Cheryl coughed loudly at the overpowering smell of perfume mixed with hairspray and was immediately transported back to being on tour with the girls, "is there a reason we're all squashed in here?" she eventually questioned with a gasp for air.
"No, it's really only because Nadine's in the bath still" Kimberley explained pointing to the bath that was overflowing with bubbles with a blonde head resting just above them, "but we couldn't wait to tell you the most amazing news!"
Cheryl rolled her eyes in Kimberley's direction, she really wasn't interested right now in her news, she needed to get out of the claustrophobic bathroom and into somewhere she could actually breathe. Kimberley began regardless of Cheryl's lack of enthusiasm, "Well we've been given the opportunity to record a charity single, you know for Children In Need. They want us to do it because I'll Stand By You was their biggest ever seller" Kimberley smiled.
"That's lovely" Cheryl whispered as she managed to muster up a smile. Deep down she wasn't even nearly as happy as she pathetically tried to pretend to be. She knew that a new single would mean promoting it in England, especially seen as it was for an English charity. She knew it was also mean she would quite possibly be in the same room as her child's father on multiple occasions, and that was another thing, Lola. Cheryl couldn't just take the youngster out of school for a few weeks, things were a lot more complicated for her than the girls realised.
"And guess what show we'd perform it on first and they'd have an entire week dedicated to us?" Kimberley clapped excitedly.
Cheryl felt the room begin to spin as she realised what show it was. Her head felt as if it was floating amongst the moon, her throat was becoming tight and she found it difficult to breathe whilst the news sunk in, she felt the tears forming in her eyes and begged with herself not to cry in front of the girls. She didn't want them to see that she wasn't happy about this when they were clearly ecstatic.
"Yeah that's right!" Kimberley giggled as she pulled the girls into a hug, "we're finally getting our own week on X Factor!"
