LAST-MINUTE negotiations over Cheryl Cole’s television career were abruptly terminated last night after her management team decided to start living actual lives.

Former Girls Aloud singer Cole had been on the brink of a multi-million pound contract following a bidding war between the makers of two broadly similar television singing competitions.

Cole’s former manager Tom Logan said: “Twelve of us had been up all night, sleeves rolled to the elbows, alternately shouting down the phone at Americans and Simon Cowell, pausing only to cradle our heads in our hands and say ‘fuck’ in a low voice.

“Behind us was a whiteboard with the words ‘Cheryl’s core brand values’ written on it in blue marker pen, below which was a list reading ‘sassy’, ‘feminine’ and ‘hair’.

“I got up to take my ninth slash of the night, vaguely aware that all this stress was beginning to affect my prostate, when I heard a crunch beneath my left shoe. On closer inspection, I found I had stood on a green and yellow caterpillar.

“Suddenly I realised that a living creature, yes one that looks like animated toothpaste but a life form nonetheless, had become collateral damage in the battle to shoehorn some Cuprinoled bint into either Piece of Shit Television Programme A or Piece of Shit Television Programme B.

“I told everyone: put down your phones and see. See what we have done.”

Cheryl Cole’s former brand manager Emma Bradford said: “We knew instantly that Tom was right. In that caterpillar’s crushed insides I saw the leaking remnants of my humanity.

“No one said a word. We simply filed out of that room and disappeared into the world.

“I am going to work with injured chimps, or maybe get an ice cream van.”