The press hall in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Twenty full days had passed since the primary election.
For an ordinary person, those twenty days might have been just a few pages turned on a calendar. But for those caught in the vortex of this election, every second had been stretched into drawn-out torture.
On the massive LCD screen in the hall, the red and blue progress bars remained locked in a suffocating stalemate.
The vote count in all sixty-seven of Pennsylvania's counties was complete. All that remained was the confirmation of this final number.
Leo Wallace stood before the video wall in the Pittsburgh campaign headquarters, his eyes fixed on the cursor.
The only sounds in the room were the low-frequency hum of countless computer case fans and the stifled breathing of several dozen people.
It was a silence more agonizing than noise.
