Dear Eric and Dylan,
Hi. It's the future talking. I don't know if I'm the person to say this, but I'm going to take a bet and say that I am.
Well, you guys succeeded. You did what you wanted and more - maybe not that day, maybe the bombs didn't go off, but what you did reverberated. It shocked the country. And I bet you're proud of that now. You would love to see it. There are a couple thousand girls online who think they're in love with you and a couple thousand lonely boys who idolize you. Two loners from Colorado, who changed the world.
But it's late 1998, and none of that has happened yet. I'm talking to you. Sorry, but you can't do it. I know that may come as a shock, and it's gonna be hard to let go. Trust me, I get it. This is what you lived for and this is what you'd end up dying for, in the library, together. But you have to let go of the plan, because there is something else out there. There is community college, Eric, and a future for you. Dylan, there is the University of Arizona. There's Sparky, and your koala, and another shift at Blackjacks, another day shooting at Rampart Range. Another Dr.Pepper and another camping trip. You'll wake up the morning of 4/21 and your parents will yell at you to get out of bed, go to school and you will. There will be no bullets in the walls and no bombs in the hallways, and that's okay.
Breathe. Let it go. Yeah, you dreamed of news reports and shoot outs, of the library floor collapsing and the sound of shotgun blasts in the classrooms. You wanted to scare them to death, and I'll be honest - it would have felt good. Better than staring at the ceiling, lost, spinning in a circle because what's next? You hadn't planned on turning 18, Dylan. Now you are. Your mom baked a cake and it feels surreal. You thought about what your birthday would have been like had you died, and maybe, just maybe you reveled in the suffering.
It's going to take a while to change. Go outside and turn that striker bracelet over in your hands, stare at the stars. You woke up on 4/21 and so did 13 others. It's raw. There is a school shooting somewhere else and it feels like a punch to the gut. It's like you are watching yourself on TV, your face plastered up there to be gawked at and wondered about, but no one knows it's you too. You're still nobodies.
That's okay. Maybe you didn't have to get up om stage and fire off a gun for the world to pay attention, maybe you just had to get online and say, "I'm Eric, I'm Dylan, I wanted to shoot up my school, let me be honest." Okay, thank you. You didn't have to tell us your names.
There is not going to be an NBK, no bombs, no guns, no videotapes on YouTube. You'll go on to live your lives and on 4/20 every year you'll call each other and say, "Hey, Dylan. Just calling." You're thirty years old. It's faded, distant. You have a son and a wife and they don't know, because it's between you and VoDkA, you and Reb. "Hey Eric. It's 4/20, just calling. How are you?"
"Alive." You laugh a little. It's okay now, Columbine is long gone, a forgotten school with forgotten students who graduated and moved on. Brooks, Patrick, Rachel, Isaiah, Daniel, they're all gone. It's a strange world where NBK didn't happen, those bullets were never spent.
But you have to go now. The phone is ringing, and you can't live for what didn't happen for so long. "Bye Dylan, bye Eric." You say, and you hang up. The stars are beautiful outside, and you realise that it's better in the light.
Love, the TCC.
discoholicmusic
kianamaiart
annaxmalina
blakekathryn
dededos
