A last-minute outing led Brandon and Taryn DiRito into a nightmare they can't shake. Brandon DiRito, 16, was having a great day.

 He played his last baseball game of the season with his teammates, went bowling with his big sister and friends, hung out with his girlfriend and then found out that he had scored tickets to the midnight premiere of "The Dark Knight Rises," even though he and his friends had waited until Thursday afternoon to buy them for the showing later that night.

Brandon, his sister Taryn DiRito and his girlfriend, Samantha Ginsburg, were accompanied by three friends uliana Curtis, Jessica Almand and Cole Pentland; they picked the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora because of how cheap the tickets were (only $6.50).

Brandon donned a T-shirt featuring the late actor Heath Ledger as the Joker, his face decorated with the scary painted-on smile he wears in the Batman movies.

When Brandon got to the theater, he saw that many people were far more dressed up than he was, in full Catwoman or Batman costumes. It was a rowdy crew, and people yelled and cheered as the trailers began to play, growing especially noisy for the Superman teaser.

Juliana, 20, updated her Facebook status: "It's going to be a good night."

The only thing threatening to mar the group's fun was that most of the seats were already taken when the six of them arrived, so they were stuck sitting in the bottom level, only eight rows away from the screen, forcing them into uncomfortable neck-craning positions.

These bad seats may have ended up saving their lives.

By now, everyone is familiar with the horrifying events that unfolded next, but when it was happening to Taryn and Brandon, it seemed unreal and impossible.

They are still struggling to come to terms with what occurred, and the fact that 12 people were killed and 58 others injured over the next few minutes.

A masked gunman wearing head-to-toe SWAT gear, a helmet and gas mask entered through the exit door on the right side of the screen while they were engrossed in the movie.

 Both Taryn and Brandon, who were sitting on the left side of the theater near the aisle, immediately noticed the exit door opening.

Taryn remembers feeling "concerned," and then the gunman lobbed tear gas canisters over their heads and fired a shot into the air. Brandon grabbed his girlfriend's hand and ran out of the theater's left exit after the gunman had gotten off only two or three shots.

The instinct to run was so powerful that Brandon never even ducked under his seat before fleeing. He remembers sprinting into the lobby and seeing the Snack Shack and surrounding area completely deserted.

He turned around to see a horde of moviegoers running out behind him.

Meanwhile, Taryn and Juliana Curtis were hunched behind the seat backs, listening in fear to the screams of other people in the theater, while Cole pushed Jessica down, too. Their location saved them from the worst of the attack.

"We were lucky enough that he didn't shoot at the front of the theater. He kept shooting up he never shot down at us," Taryn said.



via Yahoo