HIGHLANDS RANCH, Colo. — “He indicated to me that he saw a body and a trail of blood.” Those were some of the first words that parent Mallory heard from her 13-year-old son, a student at STEM School in Highlands ranch, where shots were fired early Tuesday afternoon. Mallory said she frantically called her son after her own mother alerted her to the shooting. When she reached her son, she said that the teen told her that he was in theater when gunshots rang out. “Words cannot describe” the relief Mallory said she felt after reaching her son and hearing that he was OK. Another parent told us that her daughter called her, saying, “Mommy, there’s a gun [being] shot at my school.” The mother of twins said that with “everything at Columbine…You never think this would be the reality of this situation.” Hundreds of parents were instructed to pick up their children at Northridge Rec Center at 8800 S. Broadway in Highlands Ranch. Students were bused to the nearby facility after being evacuated from the STEM school.

“I just want you to know I love you,” one mom told her daughter, who called her frantically, repeating that she “didn’t know” what was going on. Anistin Paznik, a nanny of one of the students at the school, said that she rushed to the scene when she learned of the shooting only to find out that one of the shooters was still in the building. A mother who wished to remain anonymous said that her daughter told her that she was in a room where a student and a teacher got shot. “This is the last thing the state of Colorado or any state or country needs,” she said.