Can't Stop the Questions

Chapter 25: Crystal Basketball

The VAs' postseason came to a screeching halt, and they return home empty-handed. Their disappointment is clear as day when they board the bus in Monroe back to Jennings.

"That was eight of the most exciting days in my life as a Venomous Agenda; for once that we could accomplish something in the sports arena!" Taylor sighs.

"There's always next year, I guess..." Heather comments on this elimination.

"Easy for you to say, when you're not a senior; my life as a basketball player is over!" Charlotte starts crying. "I spent my whole life up to this point preparing for this moment!"

In years past, some players were unhappy at VA and it led to them transferring out, football, basketball incurring the biggest losses. We lost players over the years to schools like, you know, Church Point, Kinder, due to inadequate funding, or perhaps the academic pressures in some cases, the comments of the players get to the coach. So while players crying at the end of the season is normal, this is more emotional to this year's outgoing seniors.

On Friday morning, Pablo meets with Audrey again, whose mood is visibly down. He feels like he must discuss his future with her.

"Oh Audrey, this game got to you... why?" Pablo asks, while he's made to feel like this loss to Wossman was a major deal to her.

"If only you saw what happened last night!" Audrey starts crying.

"I couldn't make the trip, I could only listen to the game on radio! You're making it sound like that three-pointer is even worse than freaking Huiling at Pearl River!"

"Yeah, we might have played the three most exciting basketball games in our lives, and for some of us, we might never again live that kind of excitement!"

"The seniors on the girls' basketball team? I never talked to Charlotte and Taylor much, however, Carrie and Heather have one season left to play!"

And this makes me want to give her a book about coming to terms with the end of one's sporting career. I didn't get to read The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants much, so I might want to wait until I finish it to give her a book, Pablo starts to think of what to give her next, and when.

"And we might find ourselves in a similar situation two years from now in our respective sports! We kept our academics up, and hopefully we'll attend LSU or some higher-tier college!" Audrey talks about the academics.

"You still have quiz bowl-State to look forward to, and we'll attend the HSNCT together! Just not on the same squad, though"

"We can count ourselves lucky, that we still have our chance to get under the spotlight again a few months from now! And that we can even get under the local spotlight for quiz bowl to begin with!"

"I don't think the time is ripe to talk about this topic any further here in the hallway"

"Yet everyone here knows about this stupid three-pointer of a buzzer-beater by now!" Carrie scolds her teammate.

Wossman isn't a quiz bowl-playing school, and neither is Pearl River. So there's no chance we'll play them at quiz bowl-State, much less at the HSNCT, Audrey ruminates, while she can't help but imagine how Charlotte and Taylor must feel when their entire athletic lives crashed down when the Wossman Wildcats scored that three-pointer buzzer beater in Monroe.

These two girls are easy to spot across the hallway because they are the ones crying their tears away.

"We didn't lose just about any game! This tournament was supposed to be our swan songs as basketball players!" Charlotte cries on the floor. "And then we lost in the quarterfinals to a team that somehow scored a buzzer-beating three-pointer!"