“Base commander hasn’t got one yet. Or did have one, but now it’s not up anymore,” Seri said.

Mary flopped down on her bed and crawled back in her sleep bag. She was hungry, but too cold from her trip outside to hunt around in the commissary food she kept in a box in the corner.

“They’ve got a cam on all these snics cleaning the airfield,” Seri called from her room, which was next door to Mary’s. “It’s snowing as fast as they’re plowing.”

“Maybe if we heat some water in our coffeemakers it’ll up the temp in here,” Mary said.

Seri laughed. Then she said, “How was it last night?”

Seri didn’t generally ask questions after a run. But, then, generally Seri wasn’t snowed in with her after one either.

“Clear.”

“T-Knee with you?”

“Yep.”

“What kind of fire did you have?”

“Paveway.”

“The enhanced ones?”

“Yeah, dual-mode. We used GPS, not laser.”

Seri was quiet.

“Well, you should know that Purdue here is writing it up,” she finally said.

“What?” Mary sat up in her bed. A press release from Purdue? These ops were secret, and last night’s hop sure was. Seri must have misunderstood.

“You were sleeping this morning when she got pulled out of here.”

“No.”

“It’s not so bad. It’s happened to me. Your family—”

Before Seri could say sorry, Mary said, “Forget it.”

They’d not talked about her mother gone, her father locked up. But Seri had probably heard plenty about it outside the hut. Gossip was in no danger of dying at Bagram.

“I was going to say your family would enjoy it. They send the press release special-delivery. My mom was …” She stopped. “I’m a royal ass, aren’t I?”

“You’re fine,” Mary said.

“My mom is gonna whup it up for you. She’ll get Ricky and Lisa on Skype, and we’ll sing some hip-hip-hoorays.”

Mary closed her eyes. The bag had gotten warm, and she’d hoped to sleep again, but now she was too jazzed. She should welcome Seri’s befriending her; she actually liked her. Instead, she felt impatient. Now especially, but often when with her, she found herself hoping for an interruption. The snow day was beginning to seem too long, especially without Seri’s relatives to keep Seri occupied online.

A mechanical scraping approached and then passed their hut. It was the mini–off-roader plowing the main path. It always shoved the snow tight against the hut door.

“I’ll dig us out,” Mary said, pulling out of her bag.

“Let’s just do the roof too,” Seri said.

“May as well,” Mary said.