The alarm clock went off, as it had for the past fourteen months, at seven o’clock. Not at six, as had been the case when he had to get up to go to work. Nevertheless, it was still a shock to the system. Dan Porter groped out an arm from under the duvet and felt for the lever that would stop those infernal bells, but they rang with such vehemence that the clock juddered away from his searching hand and toppled from the bedside table onto the carpeted floor. There it continued its muffled clanging whilst the hand still blindly explored the surface of the table.

“Where the hell is it?” Both verbal and physical explosions came simultaneously. The duvet was thrown aside and Dan swung his legs over the bed and sat up. Not a wise act, he thought, as he screwed up his eyes to stop himself from being so completely aware of the oxygen pumping into his brain. As the sensation subsided and his hearing became oriented, he looked down at the clock on the floor, where its fading momentum spun it slower and slower, like a fly in its death throes.

He groaned and keeled forward to pick it up. It was still out of reach. He slid off the bed onto his knees and stretched out for the clock, but he never made it. He watched blearily as it was picked up by a beautiful, slim hand, its fourth finger bearing a band of gold that was held in place by a raised cluster of rubies set around a glinting diamond. A red-painted thumbnail flicked the lever on the clock and put it out of its misery. Dan turned his head to follow up a pinstriped arm, stopping when his eyes came to rest on the gold pendant that hung in the cleavage of her breasts, these being wholesomely accentuated by the way in which she had left open the top three buttons of her white cotton shirt. He turned his head only degrees more and looked up at his wife’s face. He had often thought that if ever he had been called upon to write down a full description of her features, he would have sat forever in front of a blank piece of paper because he could never have written all that crap about her eyes being too wide set, or her nose too flat, or her ears too big. Maybe one word was sufficient. PERFECT in big black letters. Jackie always had been, and still was, a complete turn-on. Halfway through their twentieth year of marriage, and she still had that effect on him.

Today, however, it was obvious that the feeling was not reciprocated. Her mouth bore a trace of a smile, but it was one that he could read as meaning “Dan, you really are a sorry sight” rather than “Hullo, my darling, how are you this morning?”