STARKVILLE — Late one Friday night in the spring of 2005, young Brittany Fitzhugh lost her battle. At the age of 14, the complications that came from her contracting the West Nile virus almost three years earlier claimed her life.
The next morning, a couple hundred miles away from suburban Atlanta, older brother Keith was about to participate in his first spring game as a Mississippi State player. The Fitzhughs’ mother, Meltonia, called MSU coach Sylvester Croom and told him the news. He said he’d tell Keith and send him home.
No, she said.
The family was making the drive. Brittany wouldn’t have wanted Keith to miss the game, she said.
So in a Starkville hotel room later that night, she told her son, Keith, the news he had long dreaded.
clarionledger.com
9/12/08
