DAY FOUR
12
At 0430, the earth herself still asleep, all Wynn could hear was his feet hitting the gravel of the running trail around the perimeter of the FOB and his steady deep breathing. He hadn’t run for several weeks. He’d decided to run this morning to help purge the craziness of yesterday. After a day like yesterday, night sunk the whole earth into a suffocating silent pit, and he wondered how ordinary life could ever return. Nonetheless, every 24 hours—an immense achievement—the world turned back from the black, muted, and lethargic night into a living, breathing, buzzing spectacle. He pushed the air out of his lungs. Of course everything wasn’t asleep. Bad things happened in the night; things that could hurt his men—people like whoever shot that boy. Wynn’s chest heaved and expan
