Cari looked over her notes from the track meet. She also had a pocket recorder that she’d used for some oral notetaking. She pulled it out to listen to her reactions after Ithaca had gone down. Everything after that had been such a blur. They had continued with the track meet, which felt insane to her, but the show must go on, right? She rolled her eyes and hit play.
“The star, um, Stephen has just fallen onto the track. I can’t tell if he tripped. Oh my goodness, the young woman next to me looks like she might faint. No, she’s going to try to run onto the field. They’ll never let her. She must be close to the athlete. Probably not a sister. They don’t look anything alike. The kid is still on the track. It looks like a trainer has come over now. Yes, one of the university’s medical staff is kneeling next to him. Oh no, I think... What? I think he’s unconscious. I thought he might have hit the hurdle, but it seems like he collapsed and oh! They’re trying CPR. There’s a lot of chaos. The track coach is running over now. And Whitham is sprinting over. No, no, no. I can’t. He’s dead. They can’t bring him back. They used the AED and now they’re starting to clean up. They’ve brought over a cart with a stretcher. This is heartbreaking. Are his parents here? I don’t see anyone that seems to be one of his parents. The young woman—where is she? She’s being held back by a friend. The friend is holding her and lowering her to the grass…”
Cari hit stop. She felt sick to her stomach reliving the experience. The anguish on that young woman’s face! She must have been his girlfriend. Cari wondered what her name was. The whole thing didn’t sit right with her. Didn’t they screen athletes for that enlarged heart thing nowadays? She made a note to look up the name of the condition. The rest of the meet had continued under a shroud. It was as though none of the athletes felt like they should really be competing, but what else were they going to do? She had received a pdf of the results in her work email. Otherwise, she might not have remembered that the home team won the meet for the women’s and men’s teams. Cari wondered what the coach was sharing with his team right now. She had wanted to interview him but decided it would be better to catch him later. She could do a follow up article once they figured out what had caused the athlete’s death.
She started on her write up for the track meet but couldn’t stop thinking about the young man who had died. She didn’t want to just gloss over his death, but was that really a story for the sports section? Maybe this was her chance to show what she could do with a real story. It felt awkward or maybe a bit unethical to try to profit from this tragedy, but would ignoring it be wasting an opportunity? She reached for her locket and ran it along the chain. She decided to give her grandmother a call. Grandmother always had good advice.
“Is that my Cari?” Her grandmother’s voice rang through clearly.
“Hi, Grandmother. How are you today?”
“Oh, I’m so much better now that you’ve called.”
“Is something wrong? Are you sick?” Cari asked with concern.
“Oh no, dear. Just happy to get to talk to you. You sound upset, though. What’s on your mind?”
“Well, Grandmother, I went to the university track meet today—”
“At Onore University?”
“Yes, at Onore. I was covering the track meet for the Beagle. Anyway, part way through the meet, the athlete that was supposed to be the next big thing collapsed in the middle of his race. I thought maybe he’d fallen, or maybe I just hoped that he had, but that wasn’t it. That wasn’t it at all. He died, Grandmother. The young woman next to me must have known him. I’ll never forget the agony in her voice when he went down.” Cari paused, unsure how to ask her question.
“How tragic. Now you’re wondering if you should write about it—how you should write about it.”
“You know me so well, Grandmother. I don’t know what the right thing to do is. I honestly think that something else was wrong with this kid. People his age with his level of fitness, don’t just collapse and die. Doctors screen athletes for the possibility of that now. This shouldn’t have happened and I think there is more to this story than just a tragic death.”
“I think you would be honoring him to find out what that is. You are a good and honest person, Cari. Follow your heart; it won’t steer you in the wrong direction.”
“Thank you, Grandmother. You always know just what to say. I have to go now. I love you!”
“I love you more, sweet girl.”
Cari ended the call and started organizing her thoughts. She had a few contacts that could help her learn more about Stephen Ithaca on and off the track. She thought about what her grandmother had said. Follow your heart. She felt like her heart was sending mixed messages: one about her dream for a front page, above the fold byline, and another about a tragedy that was unthinkable for the young man’s family and loved ones. She would have to remember what the purpose of this story was: to honor Stephen’s memory. If it got her on the front page, well, that would be a bonus. Her green eyes danced as she thought of the possibilities.
* * * * * * * * * *
Andrew couldn’t believe it when he got the message from Dr. D. No powder pickup today?! Was he crazy? He knew that Wiley Granfor was in the program and decided to call him out on it.
i know ur in the program i want 2 talk
Wiley didn’t respond immediately. Andrew wanted to figure out who else was in the program too. Maybe together they could get Dr. D to reconsider. Andrew didn’t know how the powder worked, but it definitely worked and he didn’t want to lose his edge. He figured that they needed regular doses to keep its effectiveness at the right level. He had his eyes set on going pro one day. Losing any progress could ruin that. He checked his phone again. Why the hell wasn’t Wiley answering? Wiley had been at the university a year longer than Andrew; surely, he had figured out some other participants in Dr. D’s program. Finally, a message popped up from Wiley.
Baseball program? What?
Andrew groaned. Why did Wiley have to pretend? What a rule follower. He rolled his eyes and sent off another message.
i know u know
meet me at the commons in 5
He grabbed his jacket and headed out the door. Maybe Wiley had some answers.
* * * * * * * * * *
Emma Savol looked at her phone and grumbled under her breath. She had suspected that Stephen was in the program too. This message from Dr. D all but confirmed it. He must be putting the program on hold while they figure out what happened with Stephen. She was still a bit shocked by what had happened at the meet this evening. Prior to today, she had only heard about athletes collapsing on the field; she had never actually witnessed it happen. Normally, she didn’t watch many of the sprinting events, but they had started running her event the evening before the meet to help keep things moving. Of course, this meant that virtually no one watched her compete. Sometimes it even felt like the track coaches acted like they were obligated to be there for her. The 10,000-meter run was a long race, but it was still exciting. She still worked hard! Plus, ever since she’d joined Dr. D’s program, she always placed in the top three at the meets. Wasn’t that worth paying attention to?
Emma ran her fingers through her straight, black hair. She had always been told that she was built like a long-distance runner with her long, slender arms and legs. Her dad used to joke that she ate like a lineman, though. She wondered who else was in Dr. D’s little program. She had frequently seen another kid from the swim team leaving the building whenever she was going in to pick up her next powder dose. She hated that word—dose. It made it sound like she was using steroids, which she was NOT. Dr. D had been very clear about that. The powder just helped your muscles work more efficiently; it took away the brakes slowing you down. She hadn’t told anyone about the powder. He had also been very clear about that. It was almost like they were helping the scientific community by running a test study here. And the results were damn good. She’d shaved two full minutes off of her 10k time since she’d started participating. It was a miracle worker. Maybe she would make the Olympics in 2028!
But now, Dr. D was at the very least pausing the program. How fast would she lose what she had gained? Would her muscles retain any memory of this state? She tried to remember the swimmer’s name; the girl was in her College Algebra class their freshmen year. What was her name? Casey. Casey water-something. Ryvers! With a y. Emma had thought it was funny that someone with such an incredible swimming ability had the last name Ryvers. Maybe she could find her in the student directory and see if she knew anything else. She pulled out her phone to look her up.
* * * * * * * * * *
Derek Menemy paced around the weight room. Why would Dr. D stop the program? He wanted to go over to his office right then and talk to him. Did he realize that he was putting his scholarship in jeopardy? What if he wasn’t able to throw the football as far next season? What if he got cut? He couldn’t let that happen. He knew that Alan Debony was in the program too. Dr. D had told them not to try to find out who else was in it. They didn’t want it getting around because everyone would want it and so on and so on. Alan was a junior and Derek knew his stats from his freshman year. Granted he was a freshman, but he wasn’t nearly as fast as he was now. His forty time had gone down by an insane amount. People thought Tyreek Hill was fast, well, even Tyreek was going to be blown away by Alan Debony. The kid was like greased lightning.
Derek glanced around the weight room and saw Alan over on the squat rack. There weren’t a lot of other athletes here on a Friday night, so he decided to risk it and talk to Alan. Maybe they could convince Dr. D to change his mind. Why on earth would he pause such a successful program?
* * * * * * * * * *
Coach Whitham slammed his fist into his palm. Who did John think he was? Taking this program away from him! He could not let this happen. Was it only just this morning that he’d been gloating about how well life was going? How could this be happening? All of the athletes had been required to have an exhaustive physical completed before they could begin with their teams at the university. They should have been made aware if Ithaca had a heart condition! Or any other kind of condition!
This was so unfair. This could cost him his job! He’d put his heart and soul into his work. He’d built all these programs from virtually nothing. He rubbed the back of his neck, trying to release some of the tension in it. He’d be damned if Delamont was going to rob him of this one joy in life. He looked through the list of athletes in the program. Which one of them would be desperate enough to get that powder back for the good of the department? Some of their coaches knew a little bit about the program—not about the powder specifically, of course. They only knew that one or two of their athletes were in a special nutrition program with Dr. Delamont. Maybe it was time to bring someone new into the fold. Whose team stood to lose the most if the program went under? Who would John trust the most? Smiling, he highlighted the phone number of the best candidate. They’d be back on track in no time.
* * * * * * * * * *
Cari had only read about athletes dying in the middle of competition; she had never seen it happen before. She knew that there was some sort of heart condition that had been the cause of the majority of the deaths of young, healthy athletes. What was that called? She opened a Google tab and ran a search for sudden death and heart disease in athletes. The first ten results were all articles about something called HCM. Cari was not a scientist, so she skipped the explanation once she figured out that this meant someone had an enlarged heart. The first two articles went on to say that screening for HCM had become standard for all young athletes.
She scrunched up her nose. It seemed unlikely that the school’s sports medicine doctors would have missed this diagnosis. She redefined her Google search for sudden athlete death and added the word causes. She wished there was a search filter option that she could check for a non-scientific explanation. The list of conditions and diseases all had obscure names that she could barely pronounce, let alone understand. She made a list of a few that showed up more frequently and set it aside for later. She couldn’t get too technical in her article or her editor, and more importantly, her readers wouldn’t stay engaged. People would want to know why a healthy kid collapsed and died, but they didn’t want a complicated science lesson. She needed to call someone who understood these topics and could explain them to her. For now, she would finish her brief write up of the track meet and check in with their student interns about the other sports articles.