Extract

 

It was 6.29 a.m. The digital alarm clock beside the bed was about to go off. Just as it started up with its nasty little beeping, the bedside phone began to ring too.

Bella leaned over to click off the alarm and answer the phone.

'Hello?'

She heard a distant 'Hello!' far from the other end of a crackling line, followed by singing.

'Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you . . .'
'Don!' she shouted and heard it echo back at her.
'Hello Bella, wake up, I love you, I want phone sex now.'

'I love you too,' she said laughing.

'What? It's a terrible line.'

'I love you too!' she shouted. 'When are you allowed to come home?'
'Ah ha . . . well I'm phoning you from Grozny airport. By the time you get back from work, I'll be there.'
'Yeah?! I can't believe it! That's bloody brilliant!'
'My job here is done,' he said in mock superhero voice. 'Seriously, it's been a nightmare and it's getting dangerous now, so they're pulling me out. Plus I told them it was your birthday and I had to get home, or else a fate worse than a rebel gunman awaited.'
'Are you OK?' she asked.
'I'm very tired, it's been three weeks from hell. Oh bugger, hon, I have to go now, I'll see you tonight and I am so looking forward to it.'
'Me too. Take care.'
'Missing you already,' he joked, then the line went dead.

She was smiling hard, was going to be smiling all day long, she thought, as she got out of bed and started on Operation Bella. The difference between Bella and other women whose looks were somewhere between moderate to good on the scale was that she tried harder. In fact, 'tries hard' was a description that had peppered her report cards since she was tiny.