Cheryl Cole, Liam Payne. Karwai Tang/WireImage
Cheryl Cole broke her silence on the death of her ex-boyfriend Liam Payne, with whom she welcomed son Bear, now 7.
“As I try to navigate this earth-shattering event and work through my own grief at this indescribably painful time, I’d like to kindly remind everyone that we have lost a human being,” Cole, 41, wrote via Instagram on Friday, October 18, sharing a photo of Payne holding a then-infant Bear. “Liam was not only a pop star and celebrity, he was a son, a brother, an uncle, a dear friend and a father to our 7-year-old son. A son that now has to face the reality of never seeing his father again.”
Us Weekly confirmed Payne died at age 31 on Wednesday, October 16, after falling from a hotel balcony in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was on the third floor of the CasaSur Palermo Hotel when he went over the side. According to the Buenos Aires City Police, authorities were dispatched to the hotel following a 911 call reporting an aggressive man who may have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol. When officers arrived, the hotel’s manager stated that he had heard a loud noise coming from the internal courtyard at the rear of the hotel.
Payne and Cole dated from 2016 to 2018 after initially meeting in 2008 while Payne was a contestant on The X Factor UK. At the time, Cole — who is a member of the girl band Girls Aloud — was a judge on the series. Payne returned to the show two years later in 2010, when Simon Cowell famously put him together with Zayn Malik, Harry Styles, Niall Horan and Louis Tomlinson to form One Direction.
Cole and Payne welcomed their son, Bear, in March 2017. One year after their split, Cole opened up about coparenting her little one with the boy bander.
“I’m the strict one; Liam isn’t,” she told The Telegraph in April 2019. “I’ll be the one saying, ‘Just one square of chocolate,’ but Bear is so good. … [Liam is] much softer than me. But it is what it is, and I’m OK about it. When you have a baby, you are not consumed with just thinking about yourself. It’s your responsibility to keep things settled and happy, so you make the best of everything. And we have.”
In May 2022, Payne admitted that he initially struggled with becoming a father in his 20s.
“To be honest with you, it ruined a relationship for me at that point but for all the right reasons,” he explained on an episode of Logan Paul’s “Impaulsive” podcast. “I was so excited for him to be born that I was actually worried [that] I wouldn’t love him enough.”
In the same interview, Payne praised Cole for being an excellent mother and coparent. “She is the best mom in the world. I couldn’t ask for someone better,” he gushed. “I get to take my son to school one or two times a week and it’s the best thing. The relationship we have now as friends has only grown more. We broke up for a reason and now she gives me full autonomy of my life and to do what I do and I know [Bear’s] taken care of. He is all she cares about and I couldn’t ask for more. They live, like, three minutes from my house.”