Authors: Brooks Brown Rob Merritt
On April 15, 1999, Eric and his parents met with a Marine recruiter to discuss Eric's application. Eric was told that his application was being rejected because he had lied and told them he wasn't taking Luvox to treat depression. Because of that—and perhaps because Eric hadn't disclosed his medical history regarding his chest deformity—the military was turning him down.
Eric mentioned that at school the next day. It was the Friday before the attack on Columbine. He seemed disappointed, even though he talked like he was blowing it off.
Sometimes I wonder if, had he been accepted, Eric would have been prompted to make a last-minute change in plans and abort the attack. We will never know the answer to that. On the other hand, it's possible that the entire application was a ruse, just like Dylan's application to college; after all, if two boys look like they are actively planning for their futures, would you ever suspect that they were actually plotting a massacre that would end in their own deaths?
Some adults ask how high schoolers could have been mature enough to carry out such a detailed plan in secret. These people are selling teenagers short. Teenagers—particularly intelligent ones like Eric and Dylan—are more than capable of keeping their intentions secret, especially if they have been planning something for a long time. A lot of strategy can be discussed in a year, and if one of the plotters starts to get sloppy, the other can pull him back into line.
Their plan was amazing in its intricacy. Eric and Dylan had spent over a year working at Blackjack Pizza to save up the money to buy weapons,
which they managed through close friends. Had Eric and Dylan been acting like homicidal maniacs when they asked for help with the guns, their friends would have been suspicious. However, because they were acting so much more mature, it seemed believable that they only wanted the weapons for target practice. From there, they went “target shooting” for the next few months—to teach themselves how to shoot.
They kept their weapons hidden; nothing was ever left out where their parents would see it, because Eric had already learned his lesson with the pipe bomb.
Rather than act like rebels, they put on their best behavior. Eric, who used to shoot his mouth off on his Web site about the violence he wanted to create, had learned to shut up. He kept his plans to his personal journal now, which no one would see but him—at least, not until the plan had been executed.
In his journals, Eric wrote, “If I have to cheat and lie to everyone, then that's fine. THIS is what I am motivated for, THIS is my goal, THIS is what I want ‘to do with my life.’”
On April 3 of 1999, Eric wrote this final entry in his journal:
Months have passed. It's the first Friday night in the final month. Much shit has happened. VoDkA has a TEC-9, we test fired all of our babies, we have 6 time clocks ready, 39 crickets, 24 pipe bombs, and the napalm is under construction . . . The amount of dramatic irony and foreshadowing is fucking amazing. Everything I see and hear, I incorporate into NBK somehow. Either bombs, clocks, guns, napalm, killing people, anything and everything finds some tie to it. Feels like a goddamn movie sometimes. I wanna try to put some bombs and mines around this town too, maybe. Get a few extra frags on the scoreboard. I hate you people for leaving me out of so many fun things. And
no, don't fucking say “Well that's your fault” because it isn't, you people had my phone #, and I asked and all, but no no no no don't let the weird looking Eric KID come along, ooh fucking nooo . . .
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.
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.