“They absolutely can,” I say. “Just in general, not a specific way. We need them noticing any alarming behavior from anyone, not focusing on just a few.”
“I get that now,” she says.
“Where is Chip?” I ask. “I figured he’d be here by now.”
They both smile.
“We may have told him the meeting started a little later,” LeAnn says.
“Give us a chance to go over everything together first,” Kim says.
“It’s an old trick we used to pull in high school too,” LeAnn says.
I think about how in many ways they’re still in high school, how it’s like they never left.
“Speaking of . . .” LeAnn continues. “We better keep moving or we won’t finish before he gets here.”
Kim nods and says, “It’s counterintuitive or at least contrary to conventional wisdom, but most school shooters are from two-parent homes, are in the mainstream crowd in school, make pretty good grades, don’t usually get in trouble, aren’t extreme loners, and aren’t addicted to violent video games and movies—though a lot of them are into first-person shooter games and the Oliver Stone film Natural Born Killers.”
“A big factor seems to be difficulty coping with loss or failure,” Le Ann says. “Especially if it’s significant and they are young. Things like failed romances, family illnesses and deaths.”
“So we need to be thinking about these factors when we look at the kids on our lists,” Kim says.
“Let’s talk about them,” I say.
Kim says, “You know how we each have four guys on our lists and only two of them show up on both lists. We were talking and neither of us thinks the two that show up on both lists are significantly more likely to be the shooter than the other four that weren’t on both our lists.”
“Interesting,” I say, glancing down at the lists.
Kim’s list includes Mason Nickols, Dakota Emanuel, Evan Fowler, and Zach Griffith.
LeAnn’s list includes Mason Nickols, Dakota Emanuel, Tristan Ward, and Chase Dailey.
“Either of you had any other thoughts or questions since making your lists and talking about them?” I ask. “Anyone else to add? Anyone you’ve reconsidered and want to take off?”
They look at each other and then me, shaking their heads.
“Okay,” I say. “Now I want you to make a new list independent of each other—no conferring. Exclude white guys and include girls. See who comes to mind.”
Kim’s eyes widen as she nods appreciatively. “Because less likely isn’t the same as impossible.”
“Do we have handwriting samples for all of them?” I ask.
LeAnn nods and hands me a file folder from her desk.
“I’ll look at these while y’all see if anyone makes the new list,” I say. “Cool?”
It must be because both of them are so busy thinking and writing that neither responds.
A few minutes later I look up from the folder to find them looking at me. “I’m assuming Potter High doesn’t have a penmanship class,” I say.
“Did it back when we were here?” LeAnn asks.
“I’m not sure I could exclude anyone from the list based on these handwriting samples,” I say.
“That’s what I said,” Kim says.
“I thought Zach’s was different enough,” LeAnn says, “but . . .”
“What’re the ages of the boys on the list?” I ask.
“Mason, Dakota, and Tristan are juniors,” LeAnn says. “Chase, Evan, and Zach are sophomores.”
“Anyone make the new list?” I ask.
Kim looks at LeAnn, nodding for her to go first.
“Denise Royal,” LeAnn says.
“I put her too,” Kim says.
“She’s our only truly goth girl,” LeAnn says. “Always writing dark poetry and drawing dark pictures. I’m not sure I could see her doing it as much as helping someone do it.”
“Does she hang out with any of the guys on the list?” I ask.
“Tristan Ward a little,” LeAnn says. “She doesn’t hang out with anyone much—and he’s got a girlfriend, but they do hang out some.”
“Anyone else?” I ask.
“Not really,” LeAnn says. “Besides a little with Tristan she’s a loner.”
“No,” I say, “anyone else make your lists?”
They both shake their heads.
“She’s the only possible girl,” Kim says, “and I just can’t see any of our black kids doing it.”
“I agree,” LeAnn adds.
“Okay, let’s talk about our suspects,” I say. “What came out of your meetings with them today?”
“I was thinking . . .” LeAnn says. “Right now there’s drama and band practice happening out in the arts building and a home baseball game at the baseball stadium. Between all three, most if not all of these kids are on campus. We could take you around to them so you can either put a face with the name or actually talk to them if you want to.”
“Absolutely,” I say.
“Great,” she says, “but we should warn you about the approach we take. Our focus is on at-risk kids and our best hope is to maintain a rapport with them. These are often the most fringe kids and we let them be themselves. They can not only be odd but disrespectful and foulmouthed. We don’t strain out the gnats.”
270
You want to hear something interesting? Dylan Klebold grew up in a home with no guns. Not even toy ones. Dylan’s dad was adamant. Said they didn’t need guns in their house because they weren’t going to play with them. I’ve got no father, but my mom said the same thing about our house. Boy, will she be shocked if she looks at the arsenal under my bed.
The main building of Potter High is a circle—a huge round hallway with classrooms on the right and a large library on the left.
What was known as the band and agriculture building in our day and is now the arts building is a smaller detached circular building in the back. Beyond it is yet an even smaller circular building that used to house the auto-mechanics program but now sits empty.
We walk up the dim hallway of the main building and around toward the arts building in the back.
I can remember walking these very same halls a lifetime or two ago—Merrill beside me, my mind often somewhere else, except when I hoped to catch a glimpse of or have an actual encounter with Anna.
I’m a step behind them and get to observe the enormous size difference. Kimmy looks like a kid next to LeAnn—even in her green deputy’s uniform. She walks with energy, kind of bouncing down the hallway, her ponytail swinging back and forth as she does. Next to her, LeAnn, who looks like her clothes come from a mens’ big and tall shop, lumbers along, one of her strides equaling three of Kimmy’s.
“Is it strange for you to be back?” Kim asks me.
I nod and smile. “Some, yeah.”
The school smells and feels the same, though much has changed. Unlike when we were students here, the hallway is carpeted and the lockers line the walls between the doors instead of being located all together in an alcove.
There are far more pirate mascots around than when we were here—painted on the glass of windows and doors, on the cinderblock walls, splashed across lockers and on welcome mats and rugs. The building seems cleaner and better maintained, but it’s the same.
The single biggest difference—both in the hallways and the entire school—is the seemingly excessive amount of security cameras. If there ever is a school shooting we should have plenty of angles on it.
“Do y’all ever miss being in school?” LeAnn says. “I miss it. We had a good class and a lot of fun back then, didn’t we? And no adult shit to deal with—like paying bills or watching the world fall apart around us.”
Kim shrugs. “Sometimes, I guess. I guess I miss certain things about it, but I wouldn’t want to go back.”
“What about you, John?” LeAnn asks.
I shake my head. “Don’t miss a thing about high school,” I say.
“E
xcept getting to hang with us,” Kim says.
“I’m doing that now.”
“You were always so . . .” LeAnn begins.
“I was always so what?” I ask.
“I don’t know exactly,” she says. “You didn’t really act like the rest of us. I can’t think of the right word, but you were—”
“Self-contained,” Kim says. “More mature.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s it,” LeAnn says. “You were so focused—but not on anything school or normal teenager-shit related. Sort of set you apart.”
I think about that. “That’s interesting and I think you’re right, though at the time I just felt like I didn’t fit in.”
“I can tell you what he was into,” Kim says. “He was focused on God, the Atlanta Child Murders, and Anna Rodden.”
I laugh. She’s right, but I would’ve never guessed she or anyone else would know any of that.
“None of us stood a chance because of Anna,” Kim adds. “And you wound up with her.”
“Sometimes the guy gets the girl,” LeAnn says. “You got Ace Bowman.”
Ace Bowman, who is now the head football and baseball coach and athletic director of Potter High, was two grades ahead of us and a star athlete when we were in school here.
“That’s true,” she says.
“I didn’t know you two were—” I begin.
“It’s a world class workplace romance,” LeAnn says. “Both of them had a yin for each other back in school. Neither of them knew it. Years later, after relationships and kids and whatnot, they’re back in high school and available. Hell, the kids set them up. It was so— I’ll tell you what it was like. It was like one of those damn Lifetime Christmas movies—’cept without the snow or Christmas or cheesy lines and ridiculous plot lines. But it had every bit of the romance.”
“Our first dance was at the prom,” Kim says. “We chaperoned last year.”
“It was,” LeAnn says. “I’ll tell you what it was. It was romantic as a son of a bitch. That’s what it was. The kind of shit that gives the rest of us single girls hope.”
“Which is what you should have,” Kim says. “You’re going to find someone soon. I just know it.”
“Sure,” LeAnn says, “some massive cornfed female who likes big-mouthed Amazon women with frizzy blond hair and saggin’ tits is gonna come walking through the front door to apply for the vacant driver’s ed job and’ll take one look at me and . . . ’Course when she tries to sweep me off my feet she’ll break her back, but I won’t leave her bedside until she can pee on her own again.”
“I’m serious,” Kim says. “She may not waltz through the door of PHS, but she’s out there.” She turns to me. “I keep trying to get her to try online sites or apps.”
“What do you think, John?” LeAnn asks. “Should I get myself a Farmer’s Only account?”
“Well, Cornfed Only, maybe, but yeah. You live in a very small town. Why not use the tools that give you access to the larger outside world?”
“That’s a good point,” she says. “And it’s certainly not like I’m against using tools. I wear the hell out of some vibrators.”
271
School shooters are able to easily acquire high-powered guns. Hell, in many cases their parents helped them get them, either directly or through negligence. Always seems to be a lot of negligence. Rampage killers prefer guns with rapid fire capability, weapons of personal mass destruction that spray bursts of bullets in a matter of seconds. More bullets in less time equals more victims. And that’s what it’s all about. It’s a numbers game.
The art building is a microcosm of the main building—a smaller circle with classrooms around the theater in the center.
And bad student art on the walls.
When we were students here this was the band, ag, and shop building. Now there is no ag or shop program, so instead of soil and fertilizer and freshly sawed lumber or wood burning, it smells of spray paint, epoxy, latex, cooking clay, and creative teen spirit.
We find Tristan and Denise in the theater working on an original play written by Tristan and directed by Denise.
The theater is small and dim except for the stage. Tristan and Denise are sitting on the fifth row up from the front, watching as student actors in drag and blackface move overly dramatically across the stage—each overacting even for a high school musical.
Based on the words and lyrics, the costumes and casting, what we’re witnessing is a heavy-handed exploration of teenage angst as it relates to identity, race, and sexual orientation. The production lacks both subtlety and subtext. Everything is self-consciously obvious and on the nose. They have an important message and want to make sure no one, not even the densest, unwokest adult misses it.
The setting is a school cafeteria, where students move around like cattle, herded into small cliques by loud and obnoxious jocks and cheerleaders and milquetoast goody-goodies.
Suddenly a half-male/half-female, half-white/half-black school shooter slowly walks in and begins shooting, each student singing about his or her crime before falling to the floor dead.
Kim glances at me, eyes wide.
LeAnn whispers, “Are we witnessing a confession?”
The crimes the students confess to are typical teenage trespasses.
I was too self-involved to even notice you.
I only thought of myself.
I was too insecure to let you be you.
I called you faggot because I was questioning my own sexuality.
I picked on you to make myself feel better.
As soon as Denise notices us, she points us out to Tristan and he stops the rehearsal.
“Good work everyone,” he says. “We’re getting there. Let’s take five. Get a breath, grab some hydration, and we’ll take it from the top.”
He then stands and walks up the aisle to meet us, Denise trailing behind him.
“Miss Dunne,” he says, nodding toward LeAnn.
He’s a soft, pale boy with a bird’s nest of blond hair, big, bright red lips, and odd blue eyes with large dark circles beneath them.
“There a problem?” Denise asks.
Neither kid makes direct eye contact with any of us.
Denise Royal is even more ghostly than Tristan—a fact emphasized by her jet black Flock of Seagulls hair and her black lipstick and eyeliner. Her myriad piercings make it look as if she fell face first into a tackle box.
“Why’d you stop the rehearsal?” Kim asks.
Tristan doesn’t respond.
Denise, without looking at or acknowledging Kim, says, “This is a closed rehearsal. We’ve been given assurances from administration that we won’t be hindered or censored.” Nodding toward me, she says, “Who’s this?”
“Just a guy who used to go here too,” LeAnn says.
“Smells like bacon,” she says, still talking to LeAnn. “They both do.”
I smile.
“So we can’t stay and watch your play?” LeAnn says.
“You’re welcome to attend the premiere,” she says, making it clear she just means LeAnn.
“Is your play about a school shooting?” Kim asks.
Tristan looks at her directly for the first time, disgust and disdain filling his pale, puffy face. “Art isn’t about anything. It just is. It requires no justification or explanation.”
He says all this like he’s the first pretentious person to ever be on this planet.
“I won’t explain my work to you. I’m sure you wouldn’t get it even if I was willing to.”
“There’s nothing to get,” I say. “Nothing to intuit. You gave it all. Forcefully. There’s nothing left to explain. It’s all there on the stage.”
He nods and smiles as if I’ve just given him a compliment.
Denise nods. “It’s like theatrical rape. We’re sayin’ Take it hard, bitches. Whether you want it or not.”
Kim nods. “Yeah, that’s what it felt like to me.”
Tristan lets out a sinister little laugh.
“That’s funny,” he says, as if he’s just received a new insight from his muse. “It’s like fuck the police. Literally.”
“Actually, it’s not,” Kim says. “If you’re gonna be a playwright you should probably know what literally means.”
“We’ll be sure to get a dick . . . tionary and do that,” Denise says.
“Anything else?” Tristan asks.
“When is your premiere?” I ask.
“Friday,” he says. “Which is why we need to get back to work.”
“We’re performing it in front of the entire student body,” Denise says. “During school. And mark my words . . . It’ll be a day none of these losers will ever forget.”
Kim looks over at me. “You marking it or should I?”
Tristan says, “This little piggy went to market. This little piggy made a joke.”
“Soon no little piggies will be laughing though,” Denise says.
“They’ll be squealing all the way home,” Tristan says.
272
You know what? Not everybody has to do what you say they have to or what you want them to. Does that come as a shock to you? You really do think you rule the world, don’t you? Well, you don’t. And high school isn’t the whole world anyway. I know it’s your whole world, but it’s not the whole world. You should maybe know that. You should also know that you are only doing what every other stupid and ignorant person in history has done. You attack and torment people who aren’t like you. You aren’t even original. You ruined my life. All I’ve done is pay you back in kind.
“Please tell me at our adolescent worst we were never that bad,” Kim says.
“Not even close,” LeAnn says.
“I remember being far too earnest and taking myself too seriously at times,” I say, “but I don’t think I was ever that pretentious.”
The three of us are back out in the hallway of the arts building, walking toward the music room and recording studio.
“You weren’t at all,” Kim says. “You were the sweetest boy. Always so nice to everyone.”
True Crime Fiction Page 107
