A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy(79)
It is a cold consolation to me. It does not surprise me that Dylan and Eric were able to deceive their teachers, a school counselor, Eric’s psychiatrist, and the Diversion specialists. But, until April of 1999, I would have told you Dylan couldn’t have fooled me.
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The week after the call from Dylan’s Diversion counselor, his college acceptance letters started to arrive. Dylan had been accepted to one school in Colorado, wait-listed at another, and accepted to two in Arizona. He seemed lukewarm about the Colorado school, but pleased to have some options in Arizona.
Life is falling into place for him, I thought as I arranged a dinner with the Harrises to celebrate the boys’ termination from Diversion. Though we had made efforts all year to keep the two apart, our concerns about their relationship had receded. Certainly, Eric had shown us he was impulsive and emotional, but he was under the close supervision of his parents, and he’d started seeing a therapist. The boys were about to graduate from high school, their mistakes behind them, and I was pleased for the families to be able to recognize their accomplishment. Life gives few enough opportunities to celebrate, and we had a great deal to be thankful for.
Some weeks earlier, I had asked Dylan about his friends’ plans. He said Nate, Zack, and some of the others were off to college; Eric was hoping to join the Marines. Before our dinner with the Harrises, I asked Dylan for an update on Eric’s plans. Joining the Marines had fallen through, he told me. Eric would be living at home, working, and attending community college instead.
During this conversation, Dylan had a faraway look, which made me worry he was having second thoughts about his own college plans. After an initial flurry of excitement over a warmer climate, he’d withdrawn, becoming even more pensive and quiet than usual, as if he had something on his mind.
“You’re sure you want to go away?” I asked. Some of our friends’ kids had started their college careers at community colleges closer to home, and I wanted to remind him there were other options. “I definitely want to go away,” he said, sounding decisive. I nodded, believing I understood: he was nervous, naturally, but ready, too. I think now he was talking about his own death.
A couple of days later, we got written confirmation of the early Diversion termination. In his final report, dated February 3, Dylan’s counselor wrote:
PROGNOSIS: Good
Dylan is a bright young man who has a great deal of potential. If he is able to tap his potential and become self-motivated he should do well in life.
RECOMMENDATIONS: Successful Termination
Dylan has earned the right for an early termination. He needs to strive to self motivate himself so he can remain on a positive path. He is intelligent enough to make any dream a reality but he needs to understand that hard work is part of it.
I finally allowed myself to exhale. Dylan was back on track. Maybe I had been overreacting by worrying so much about the theft. Boys did dumb stuff, as everyone said.
Dylan’s journals tell a different story. By that point, things had decidedly taken a turn for the worst. Given the chance to travel back in time, I would ransack every nook and corner of my children’s rooms, looking not just for drugs or goods we hadn’t bought, but for any window onto their inner lives. There is nothing I wouldn’t give to have read the pages of Dylan’s journal while he was still alive, while we still had the chance to pull him back from the abyss that swallowed him and so many innocent others.
Later in February, Dylan and I had a conversation about his senior year coming to an end, and he mentioned a senior prank. Assuming the whole class was involved, I asked him for details. He smiled, and said he did not want to tell me.
He and Tom loved practical jokes, but the thought of a senior prank made me nervous. The Diversion counselor had been clear: even the smallest and most insignificant infraction, like toilet papering a house on Halloween, could jeopardize Dylan’s future. If he made another mistake, he’d have a felony on his record.
“Don’t even think about it,” I warned him. He said, “Don’t worry, Mom. I promise I won’t get into trouble.” Diversion was officially over, but Dylan had one last appointment with his counselor, so I called and asked him to please make sure Dylan understood the seriousness of the situation he was in. I didn’t want him to take part in anything at school that might get him into more of a mess—no matter how silly, and not even if he did it with the entire senior class.
His Diversion counselor spoke to him about it at their last appointment, and made the rules clear. Dylan never mentioned the topic of a prank to us again.
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Cheez. I’m stuffed. We just got back from dinner with Eric Harris and his parents. We went there to celebrate the end of Diversion for Eric and Dylan. Just hope they will stay out of trouble now for a year so their records are expunged, whatever that means. My, I remember what we were going through a year ago!
—Journal entry, February 1999
We met Eric’s family on the second day of February at a local steakhouse. It had been nearly a year since we’d seen them. The six of us sat in two adjacent booths, with the four parents in one booth, Eric and Dylan in the next.
When Eric’s mom said they weren’t sure what his plans were, I chirped that Dylan would be leaving for college in the fall. Secretly, I was relieved Dylan had a more concrete plan than Eric did. I will forever be humbled by the foolishness of my pride.