That final week, life proceeded as normal. People were talking Prom at school, but I didn't care too much. I knew Dylan was going with Robyn and that people were trying to hook Eric up with a date. He asked a few girls, but they all turned him down. In the end, he wound up inviting a girl over to his house on Prom night to watch a movie, then catching up with Dylan later at the after-Prom party.
Me, I had to work that night; I had a job as a manager at Pizza Hut. Besides, I had just broken up with my longtime girlfriend only a few weeks beforehand. Prom was the last thing on my mind.
Two days later, Becca and I asked Eric and Dylan if they wanted to skip fourth hour and meet us for lunch at McDonald's. Eric said sure, but that he and Dylan were going to stop by Eric's house first. We skipped class a lot; it was only a little more than a month until graduation, after all. We were high school seniors at the end of the year, looking past Columbine at what lay ahead. We were ready to get out of that school. Ready to get on with our lives.
It was April 19, 1999.
According to the initial Jefferson County Sheriff's Report, released to the media one year after the Columbine tragedy occurred, Dylan Klebold wrote an entry in his notebook late on the night of Sunday, April 18.
“About 26.5 hours from now, the judgment will begin,” Dylan reportedly wrote. “Difficult but not impossible, necessary, nerve-wracking and fun. What fun is life without a little death? It's interesting, when I'm in my human form, knowing I'm going to die. Everything has a touch of triviality to it.”
Dylan also wrote out his itinerary for April 20, including when he would be meeting Eric, how they would fill their propane tanks, and when and where they would gear up.
Zach Heckler told police that on Monday, April 19, he called Dylan at around 10:30 p.m., as he often did. On his first try, the report says, Dylan was on the phone with someone else. On the second attempt, Dylan told Zach he was tired and not in the mood to talk. Heckler told police it seemed odd, because Dylan didn't usually go to bed until 12:30 or 1:00.
Police also report that on the same night, Eric recorded a message into a tape recorder.
“It will happen in less than nine hours now,” he said. “People will die because of me . . . It will be a day that will be remembered forever.”
Tuesday morning. April 20. For once I didn't oversleep.
Aaron and I got into his car and headed for school. Now that he had his license too, we were alternating who drove. My class was playing dodgeball in P.E. today, so once we pulled into a spot at Clement Park, I headed for the gymnasium.
Nothing seemed unusual until I arrived in third hour. I sat down next to Becca Heins, who asked me if I knew where Eric was.
I shrugged. Maybe he and Dylan went downtown or something, I said. Both of us were astonished that Eric was skipping today's test on Chinese philosophy.
The same was true when I arrived in fourth hour. No Eric, no Dylan. Strange that neither of them had mentioned their plans to skip. We had no idea where they were.
Somewhere between 10:30 and 11:00 a.m., Eric and Dylan were at Eric's house, making final preparations. Their weapons complete and assembled, their bombs packed into duffel bags, all that was left was for them to record one last message on videotape.
While the actual tape has never been released to the public, members of the media were allowed to view it, and much of their conversation was also described in police reports.
“It's about half an hour before our little judgment day,” Dylan said into the camera. “Just know that I'm going to a better place than here. I didn't like life too much, and I know I'll be happier wherever the fuck I go. So I'm gone.”
Dylan also held the camera for Eric, who had his own parting words.
“I just wanted to apologize to you guys for any crap,” Eric said. “To everyone I love, I'm really sorry about all of this. I know my mom and dad will be just fucking shocked beyond belief.”
From behind the camera, Dylan spoke up. “We did what we had to do.”
The two made their final comments to friends, then Eric ended the tape. “That's it,” he said. “Goodbye.”
Fourth hour ended, and I walked outside to have a cigarette. I went down to the sidewalk at the edge of Pierce Street, looked to the south—and saw a little Honda pull into the Columbine parking lot.
Eric.
I never saw Dylan pull in. I had no idea of what was going to happen. I was still a high school kid whose biggest concern at the moment was whether or not to skip fifth hour.
So many things about that day are a blur. But I remember one thing clearly.
I remember Eric Harris—the kid who had threatened to kill me, the kid who was now carrying lethal weaponry in duffel bags on the ground next to me—laughing as he told me to go home.
Part Two
AFTERMATH
12
the nightmare begins
WHEN BROOKS OBSERVED ERIC HARRIS PULLING DUFFEL BAGS OUT OF his car, he couldn't have known that those duffel bags contained explosives, including two massive propane bombs. The bombs were hidden by gym clothes, so that anyone who got suspicious and looked inside the bag wouldn't see anything amiss. After Eric spoke with Brooks, the killers placed those two bombs in the cafeteria. Their timers were set to go off at the exact time that they calculated the highest number of students would be eating lunch.
The two had parked their cars outside two of the lower-level entrances to Columbine. They had additional bombs rigged in the cars, timed to go off exactly half an hour later—right around the time that police and rescue personnel would be on the scene.
If things went according to plan, the cafeteria bombs would go off, killing hundreds and doing massive damage to the school itself. Eric and Dylan wanted to be waiting outside, wearing black trench coats with their weapons concealed underneath, to pick off survivors as they emerged from the carnage.
However, the timed bombs failed.
Waiting outside, Eric and Dylan realized something was wrong. Witnesses saw them standing atop the west staircase overlooking the school, perhaps deciding what to do next. Underneath their trench coats, they were armed with pipe bombs, cricket bombs, the two shotguns, Eric's Hi-Point 9-millimeter carbine, and Dylan's TEC-9.
One of them shouted to the other, “Go! Go!”
Brooks's brother Aaron was eating lunch in the cafeteria at the time. He remembers everything seeming normal until a few kids stood up and began gathering around the windows, pointing at something. When Aaron looked, he saw two kids already lying on the ground, and he watched another collapse and lie still.
“No one knew what was happening,” he said. “We didn't see any blood. We thought maybe it was a fight.”
Then teacher Dave Sanders ran through the cafeteria, shouting at students to get down and take cover under the tables. Aaron turned to a friend and laughed. “You have any idea what's going on?”
That's when he heard the crack of gunshots. Aaron and his friends dropped to their knees and started crawling along the floor. When they heard another series of gunshots, they got up and ran. They tore through the auditorium, coming out in the hallway on the other side and getting swept up in the massive crush of students fleeing for the exit.
Aaron didn't look back at the shooters. He could hear them; bullets were flying over his head. From somewhere behind him, Aaron heard another student scream, “I'm shot!” Ahead of him, bullets shattered the glass in the entrance doors.
Aaron made it out safely and ran to his car with his friends. They drove home as fast as they could.
Others were not so lucky. Two students, Rachel Scott and Daniel Rohrbough, lay dead outside the west entrance of Columbine. Sean Graves, Lance Kirklin, Michael Johnson, Mark Taylor, and Anne Marie Hochalter had all been injured, several of them critically.
According to the Jefferson County Sheriff's report, witnesses heard one of the gunmen shout, “This is what we always wanted to do. This is awesome!”
Thank God. Thank God.
> Those were the only words going through my head as I ran from the car to my house. My little brother was alive. I threw my arms around him and cried.
I looked around. Aaron had a few friends standing around. I hugged them, too. I was happy to see anyone I knew. If I saw them, that meant that they were alive, that there was one less death at my school.
I went inside and sat down in front of the TV, which was already on. There was Columbine, all over every channel. Aerial shots, ground shots, and every kind of media you could imagine.
And then there was a picture I'll never forget. Sarah Bay appeared on the screen. She was alive. I realized that this TV was my window into who was making it out safely.
So I kept watching.
Teacher Patti Nielsen, who was serving as hall monitor that day, was approached by student Brian Anderson about some sort of activity going on outside. She told police she walked to the glass doors of the west entrance and saw Eric Harris with a gun—and that at first she believed it to be a toy, perhaps part of a prank of some kind.
Harris turned and looked at her, then opened fire. The bullets shattered the glass and grazed Nielsen's shoulder. Fragments also hit Anderson. The two turned and ran for the Columbine library, where Nielsen dialed 911.
Several police officers—including Deputy Neil Gardner, the officer assigned to the school—arrived on scene and exchanged gunfire with Eric Harris. However, they did not pursue the gunmen into the school.
Friends kept coming over to my house as the afternoon progressed. My cousin Josh Ellis left work and came by to see me; he had heard the news on the radio. My friend Mike Troutman, who was a student at Heritage High School nearby, got out of school early and came over. Trevor Dolac came by. As each of my friends arrived, I thanked them for coming and we hugged, but I was so numb that, to be honest, I remember little of what we said. Nothing felt real about that day.
We knew that Eric was involved in the shooting, but we weren't sure about Dylan. That really had my mom frightened. We were hearing reports on the news of multiple shooters, “clad in black,” and we all knew that wherever Eric went, Dylan was sure to be somewhere nearby.
Now that she knew Aaron and I were both safe, my mom thought of her friend Sue Klebold. She had spoken with the Klebolds briefly on the phone; they had already heard the rumors. Since Aaron and I had our dad there, my mom decided to drive to the Klebold house to offer her friend support.
We were hoping it would turn out that Dylan wasn't involved. But logic told us otherwise. Dylan had skipped class with Eric. No one had seen or heard from him since the shooting started. It looked bad.
My fears were confirmed as I saw Dylan's name appear on the screen. He was one of two suspects; the other was Eric. I felt my heart sink into the floor.
Right at that moment, the phone rang. It was my mother. She was with the Klebolds, standing outside the house. A police detective was already at the Klebold home.
“Have you heard anything?” she asked me. “Do they know who the shooters are?”
I took a moment. “Mom, it's Dylan.”
“Are you sure? I mean, do you know that for sure or is that just what someone said?”
“Mom, they just showed his name on the TV. It's Dylan.”
While their parents and friends were in anguish over what was happening, Eric and Dylan were in the library, alone amidst the carnage they had made.
Ten more people were now dead. Dave Sanders—the teacher who had warned Aaron Brown and hundreds of other students in the cafeteria to run—was still alive, but had been badly wounded in the hallway. He had made it to one of the science rooms, where he now lay bleeding to death as students tried frantically to save him. He would be dead in another few hours, becoming Eric and Dylan's thirteenth victim.
Ten students had been killed in the Columbine library. Shortly after Patti Nielsen made her 911 call, Eric and Dylan came through the library doors with guns in hand. They took their time picking off victims one by one, shooting under desks, executing kids, and laughing.
The police knew this because Nielsen's 911 call was still open. She had set the phone down and taken cover under the library counter, so the receiver was still picking up everything. Even though fire alarms were ringing throughout the school, thanks to the multiple pipe bombs Eric and Dylan had lobbed into the cafeteria, police could hear the screams, the gunshots, and the taunts.
The police weren't moving. Later they explained that they had been trained to establish a perimeter around a suspect, ensuring that there could be no escape. However, no one was actually entering the school to try to engage the shooters, even though the 911 call offered a clear indication of where they were in the building.
Because police weren't pressuring them, Eric and Dylan left the library—allowing thirty-four students to escape out the back door in the process—and went downstairs to the cafeteria. Security cameras recorded Eric attempting to set off one of the failed propane bombs by shooting at it with his shotgun. He had no luck. The tape also captured Dylan lobbing one last pipe bomb, creating a fire in the cafeteria. Then the pair returned to the library for the final time.
One of the first things Aaron did once he got home was go to the computer and make sure we had a saved copy of Eric's Web site. Somehow, even amidst the shock of what was happening, we knew we had something that people needed to know about.
I remember hearing one of the television reporters say that, according to police and school officials, “the suspects had no history of violence.” That upset me. So we called the news hotline for one of the TV stations, wanting to correct them. When I told them about the Web pages and my history with Eric Harris, they asked if they could send a crew out to speak with me.
Half an hour later, reporter Ward Lucas from Channel 9 was knocking on our door.
We sat on the porch, and I told him what I knew. I showed him copies of Eric's Web site. I told him about my last meeting with Eric in the parking lot. I talked about the Trench Coat Mafia, and about how the group had been bullied by the jocks. Basically, I was rambling, trying to get points across even though I was still freaked out by everything.
Lucas was very kind. He said what he could to make me feel at ease. He thanked me for having come forward. Looking back, I think he felt sorry for me.
Once that interview hit the airwaves, other reporters started calling. The Denver Post wanted to talk. So did the Rocky Mountain News. Clips from Ward Lucas's interview with me were on CNN. For the first time, people were hearing what the police had known for a long time: Eric Harris was a dangerous kid.
Through it all, we still didn't know the details of what was happening at Columbine. We still watched events unfold on TV. I saw the live shot of Patrick Ireland crawling out the library window and being rescued. He had been shot multiple times, in the head and elsewhere.
The police were still waiting outside the school. We knew nothing about Eric and Dylan's fate. But deep down, I knew how this was going to end.
Perhaps Eric and Dylan had dreamed of dying in a glorious final shootout with police, and were disappointed that none were coming in. No one will ever know.
Four hours after the shooting began, Eric and Dylan would be found dead in a corner of the library—killed by self-inflicted gunshot wounds to the head.
The carnage they left was staggering. By now, Dave Sanders had succumbed to his injuries, despite the efforts of students who dialed 911, put up a sign in the window saying “1 Bleeding To Death,” and waited for hours for help to come.
The ten library victims included Cassie Bernall, Steven Curnow, Corey DePooter, Kelly Fleming, Matthew Kechter, Daniel Mauser, Isaiah Shoels, John Tomlin, Lauren Townsend, and Kyle Velasquez. Nearly two dozen more students were injured.
I knew Eric and Dylan were dead long before they announced it on TV. Still, actually hearing the newscasters say it made it real.
My friends were gone. They had murdered other friends before they went. They had set off bombs and shot at the cop
s.
Yesterday we had skipped class to eat lunch together at McDonald's.
I couldn't even get my mind around something like that.
Parents were gathering at Leawood Elementary School, waiting for lists to be put up of kids who had been accounted for by the authorities. They waited for school buses that might or might not have been carrying their children out of danger.
Some parents waited through the night, finally realizing after the last bus had left that their children hadn't made it.
It wouldn't be until the next day that we would hear confirmed lists of the dead. The bodies wouldn't even be removed from the school that night. Students and parents alike could do little more than guess about who had lived and who hadn't.
Our family survived the attack. But another nightmare was just beginning.
The exterior of Columbine High School near the west entrance. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold would begin their shooting rampage of April 20, 1999 in the area near the top of the stairs at left before entering the school.
Dylan Klebold (left) and Brooks Brown, age eight, attend a meeting of the Cub Scouts.
Brooks (right) and Dylan enjoy a moment of playing together in the park during their elementary school days.
As young boys in Littleton, one of the interests Brooks and Dylan shared was a love of music. In this photo, the two sixth-grade boys perform in a band at a local talent show. Brooks, left, was on saxophone, while Dylan played the drums.
Dylan, age seventeen, shares a memory of the high school theatre program as Brooks Brown records him behind Blackjack Pizza, where Klebold and Eric Harris held part-time jobs, in late 1998.
No Easy Answers Page 12
