Seeking comfort the next morning
In the aftermath
Bonnie Sutton is still missing a shoe.
Laura Kenost is missing her cell phone and keys.
They and others who remained on the Northern Illinois University campus Friday also were looking for comfort from within their shaken community.
The campus was nearly empty -- quiet and forlorn a day after it was scarred by terror. A handful of students remained, mentally retracing the steps they took during Thursday's deadly rampage.
Sutton and Kenost, NIU juniors who attended Fremd High School in Palatine, escaped Thursday from Cole Hall by crawling on their bellies and then running with their heads ducked.
They left behind notes, purses, books and cell phones. Sutton literally ran out of her shoe as she fled.
"God, I never thought of it, but I totally could've been hit in the back," Sutton said Friday.
"We booked it," Kenost added. "I feel like we cheated death."
The chilling scene -- and escape -- still were vivid Friday.
"He didn't say anything, then he took a deep breath and started shooting," said Sutton, a Palatine native. "He wasn't aiming at anyone. He was just shooting. He looked like he was sure of what he was doing."
As they surveyed the winter landscape, they recalled how, as they ran from Cole Hall, they feared other gunmen could be hiding behind snowdrifts or trees.
On Friday, Kenost and Sutton, wearing sweats and ponytails, attended Mass at the Newman Catholic Student Center, along with hundreds of other students and staff.
At the standing-room-only Mass, most people wore red and black, the NIU school colors.
Monsignor Glenn Nelson called for forgiveness.
"It's normal to feel anger and to want to go back and hurt someone else, but that doesn't help," he said. "The only thing to do is to let anger go away and forgive."
Nelson said God witnessed the shooting; "He saw his sons and daughters die a terrible death. He feels our pain."
At the service and around campus Friday, NIU students reflected on the difference between watching such pain from afar and standing in the middle of the storm.
NIU senior and Wheaton native Jenny Calabrese said Friday, "The whole Virginia Tech situation, everyone was really sorry about that, but it was so far away, and you don't think it will happen to you and your campus.
"No one knows how the atmosphere around here is going to be. … No one knows what to think or what will happen," she said. "It's not like we (students) have got much more information than anyone else. I don't even know about classes next week. Everyone's just kind of waiting to see what happens."
The few students and staff who remained on campus all were waiting to see; waiting to hear about friends who were shot; waiting for funerals; and waiting to retrieve possessions from the lecture hall where the shooter opened fire.
The waiting was made easier by the company of their peers.
Throughout the night, students had popped into Newman Center, starting impromptu prayer services, the Rev. Addison Hart said.
Hundreds showed up at an early-morning vigil. Candles left in the snow marked the spot Friday. Mourners left flowers to join the candles in a memorial that grew throughout the day.
"We didn't leave because we wanted to stay together and watch the press conference this morning. We woke up around 9 to see that," Calabrese said. "My parents wanted me to come home last night, but I wanted to stay."
Sutton and Kenost and classmate Alicia Essick of Elgin, an Elgin High School graduate, said they will return home this weekend.
"My mom said she can't wait to get her arms around me," Sutton said.
The three also said they plan to return to campus, though they couldn't quite picture it Friday.
"I'll be back, but I can't imagine going to class right now. I can't imagine ever going to class at Cole again," Essick said.
Nelson said it's too early to expect anyone to imagine what campus life will be like after the shooting.
"We don't have to understand or figure it out," Nelson said. "It's a process. It hasn't even been 24 hours. The wounds are still fresh."