8:00 am Wednesday. 15 nervous yet eager aspiring doctors walk into the Prometric testing center on Old Lee Highway.

9:00 am. Already one of them walks out. She has had a nervous breakdown and canceled her test with only the first section completed.  After calling her mom to pick her up, she lies on the front lawn, crying and hating herself for being too weak.

What circumstances led the poor unfortunate girl to this state?

4:00 pm Monday. Happy with the 40 on her practice test, she feels ready-to-go and confident for the actual test. In a cheerful mood, she banters into the kitchen to find some study fuel and finds a warm hard-boiled egg in the microwave. She innocently raises the egg towards her mouth and bites down.

!!

The egg explodes in her face, burning her upper lip and right cheek. Her lip immediately swells until it looks like she had just gotten a collagen injection. Faced with this painful nuisance, she shrugs and continues to study. It’s just physical pain – no reason to let it affect the MCAT.

10:00 pm Tuesday. Like a good student, she prepares to go to bed, but a nagging headache is keeping her up. She tries listening to the Les Miserables soundtrack, but doesn’t fall asleep until past 2 am.

6:30 am Wednesday. She notices a new small blister on her scabbing lip; probably just another blister from the burn.

7:30 am. She binges on coffee and red bull to supplement her four hours of sleep.

8:00 am. The test starts. She reads the first passage. Didn’t understand that – move on to the questions. Reread the first passage, still don’t get it. Move on to the second passage. Repeat. and repeat again. She feels her body getting warmer and warmer, her head lighter and lighter. Time’s up, you have a ten minute break.

9:00 am. Excuse me, but how do I cancel my test score now?

9:30 am, in her mind. Crystal, you failed. All you had to do was get enough sleep last night. You prepared so hard for this. You let yourself and everyone down. You wasted 225$ and all your time.

10:00 am. The late-blooming blister from this morning has spread to three times its original size across her upper lip. We should probably go see a doctor.

2:00 pm, doctor’s office. You have a fever and your burn has incited a secondary viral infection.

And that, my friends, is what we call a series of unfortunate events.

Today, I walked out on my MCAT because two days ago, an exploding egg burned my lip, which initiated an infection, which caused a fever.  FML.

Apparently exploding eggs are quite common.