The Quest for High School Mathletic Glory

Chapter 29: Unfortunate overdose

The next day, after having seen Krista getting blanked out by her mental health problems that suddenly surfaced, she receives another email from MAA that concerns her directly because the MAA was informed of an overdose that happened with one of the original qualifiers. Ouch; what could have happened for her to overdose? My first impression is that she had a bad round of college admissions; after all, it's around this time of the year that this kind of students is most at risk to attempt suicide, Gen thinks, realizing the morbidity of the circumstances surrounding her sudden EGMO qualification forced the MAA's hand, and she was not in the mood to celebrate because of the circumstances in question.

Meanwhile, at TJHSST, the school's community is shocked when they learn that one of their own is at hospital to treat what seems to be an overdose. In addition, the rest of the school's mathletics team, which it has to be said, is much larger than what the Venomous Agendas were able to align, holds an emergency meeting regarding drugs as the VMC approaches.

"What happened to Lucy was unfortunate. This talk is long overdue; now that we have seen the dangers of doing drugs, please, if you are taking study aids such as Adderall or Ritalin, stop!" the Colonials' coach screams at his mathletes, most of them being Asian.

"Looks like Lucy got a Venomous Agenda sting too many... earlier this year we lost in the Math Madness to them, now the EGMO?" a Colonial mathlete asks his coach.

"How do you know the alternate is a Venomous Agenda? She could have been from, you know, Montgomery Blair, Phillips Exeter, Saratoga, Lexington, Stuyvesant, that kind of schools" another Colonial seems to harbor doubts.

"Yeah, when the EGMO team was announced, they kept quiet about the alternates!"

"If any of us are invited to MOP and is not a senior, please, avenge Lucy by qualifying for the EGMO or IMO!" the coach invites his players to avenge the fallen.

"It has to do with college, I'm sure of it. Lucy has been awfully secretive about college in the past few days, she was as convinced as any of us up to this point that she would get into an Ivy" yet another Colonial mathlete states his observations.

"We have one last opportunity to defeat the Venomous Agendas on the national stage this year: the VMC!" the coach keeps screaming at them.

But, around the breakfast table, Geneviève and her parents seem a little troubled by this sudden announcement relative to the EGMO which arrived in the wee hours of the morning. She begins with the unsettling circumstances.

"Honey, you had enough talent to compete there without having to rely on someone else's collapse! I saw you go at it for months solving math problems that would make me squirm, that would make practically everyone in the parish squirm, in this state even, it's there that all these comparison games played by the parish newspaper these past few months take shape" Gen's mother cries, moved by this rout.

"I no longer have anything to prove to anyone"

Then the most significant figures of American women's mathletics history are, in reality, not much better than I am? That's what the parish newspaper was insinuating... Gen ponders while she informs Florence by text message. « Even though I am now part of the EGMO team, I would like to have a second No to drugs poster as promotional merchandise for the EGMO; I only qualified because one of the 4 original girls overdosed on drugs ».

And it happens that Imélie is also entitled to her share of appearances on promotional merchandise because she's entered into the VMC final, in which case there are two pictures to take at tonight's pep rally.

Speaking of pep rally, it wouldn't be one but two competitions that would be the topic, even though both competitions are still weeks away. What is not her surprise when, at the pep rally, there are several trucks from the state's major news channels in the stadium's parking lot, which is packed! Undoubtedly to make a news report on how a girl of the state made her way through the highest echelons of international mathletics.