Death Plays D&D: Final Destination and Columbine
Of course, I knew what death was at 14, but the ages of both the 15 deceased and two perpetrators at Columbine High School were terrifyingly close to home. Columbine was in Colorado, just a state away diagonally on the US’ famed Four Corners, a tourist trap that older Arizonans often talked about with a weird pride. I also spent a few days in Colorado Springs, an hour outside Littleton, and found it beautifully peaceful. It wasn’t difficult to imagine a serene, early morning full of ambient sough broken by the harsh crack of gunfire, and people around my age hitting the floor. To a middle schooler, Columbine instantly transformed into a Bruce Willis movie. Before they could even consider the carnage, students drew up plans on the crude campus maps included in their daily planners. Three were expelled within a week. At the graduation assembly that year, Mr. Keegan, a Spanish teacher, thumbed through my paperback edition of American Tabloid, in case I hollowed it out...
