You’re Army, John Puller. You’re an Army Ranger. You can do the impossible.

You’re expected to do the impossible on a regular basis.

 

So open the bag, John. Open the damn bag and just let it out.

 

Finally.

 

His fingers reached out to take hold of the zipper.

 

He imagined his father glowering at him.

 

Come on, soldier, you put your life on the line for your country. A damn zipper

shouldn’t be too hard.

 

He slid it down, spread open the canvas, and saw what he had put in there.

 

He touched the edge of the letter but didn’t pull it out. Not right away.

 

He had to work up to it, as strange as that sounded. The gravitational pull of

family dynamics; it left a black hole in the dust.

 

He finally eased it out enough to see the name written on the front of the

envelope.