The Songbird and the Soldier Read Online Free PDF Page B

after work, to help him with his car, so it’s just the two of us tonight.”
    “Great. Let’s get a Chinese. My treat.”
    “What a good idea, but I’ll pay. You can pay when we go to your house for tea.”
    Sam laughed. “I won’t be able to afford a Chinese once I’ve got my own place.”
    “So, we’ll eat beans on toast. But tonight, I’m paying.”
    Half way across the world, Andy was settling into life in theatre. It was a basic way of life, with few of the luxuries of modern living that most people take for granted. Boredom was commonplace and the food, by necessity, was uninspiring.
    The vast expanse of sky had been the first thing to hit him when he stepped off the plane in Kandahar. It had been the middle of the night but the sky was clear and it was hung with a myriad of stars. The atmosphere had changed perceptibly en route, with the excitement of the beginning of the flight subduing by mid-flight and then replaced with a more contained sense of tension by the end.
    The empty stretchers on the plane had been a chilling reminder of where they were heading. When they transferred onto the Hercules for the short stretch to Helmand, donning helmets and body armour for a blacked-out approach, the adrenaline had definitely begun to flow.
    Camp Bastion, in northern Helmand, was the closest to civilisation they had, with its facilities and air-con pods, but it carried with it its own shadows. The hospital for all the casualties was based there too. But for now, home was a forward operations base to the south near Lashkar Gar.
    This was a compound that had been deserted by fleeing locals during some fierce fighting a couple of years before. Andy looked around him at his fellow soldiers. They were all back safe. Relief was expressed in the whoops and cries of the men in his team as they dispersed to their various corners and took off their kits.
    Andy checked in with the guys who had been on guard that day, to see if there had been any more contact while they were away. There hadn’t. He looked about him. Piles of water bottles were stacked up under a tarp in one corner and Andy wished he could dive in and bathe in every single one. He was filthy. Dust had got in everything. Mud caked around the bottom of his legs from crossing the drainage ditches and tacking in and out of the fields. It baked hard in the sun as he walked and added to the considerable weight he carried around with him. He took off his helmet and started to remove his body armour. Tomorrow was their turn to man the base while the other team ventured out, so he could wash his clothes in the morning and they would dry out in the heat of the day. He checked his rifle and made sure it was clean and then went in search of food.
    The following day they took a delivery of mail, one of the highlights of the week for most of them, but Andy didn’t lose too much sleep looking forward to it. A letter from his mum every couple of weeks and the odd parcel was the most he could expect. However, if one of the lads happened to have a birthday while they were there, you never knew what treat might wing its way over to them.
    He decided to take personal responsibility for distributing the mail that day. He wandered through the compound calling out the names and delivering the post to each in turn. Some men got loads. Andy assumed they must have a harem back home constantly writing to them, while others got only one or two. Where they were, they received deliveries of mail about once a week. In larger bases there was internet communication, but he knew from experience that those in other more remote posts had it worse. He shoved his letter from his mother into his pocket and carried on calling out the names.
    In a shady, mud-floored room in the corner of the compound Dean answered his call. Andy walked in and handed over a bundle of letters. Dean thanked him and started rifling through his post to see who his letters were from. Spike looked over at the number of