Small, make-shift vigil sites are appearing all over Aurora.
A few people arrive at a time, laying down candles and flowers, pausing to reflect.
The gentle sound of sobbing can be heard at each one - it is as if the whole of Aurora is shedding a tear.
Exactly 24 hours since the shooting began, there was a palpable intensity to the mourning in this Denver suburb.
Chris Ramos, who was in the cinema during the shooting, told me he felt he had to keep telling the story in order to deal with his anger and hurt.
"I have to get rid of this, it is the only way I will be able to forgive and I have to do that or this will ruin my life.
"I don't know why I survived but I did and I have to lead the best life now for those people who didn't. If I don't I may as well have died too."
Recently named as one of the safest places to live in America, Aurora will now be forever associated with a crime of horrific violence.
The local authorities have laid on counselling services for anyone who has been traumatised by the events of Thurday night, even if they were nowhere near the cinema.
Psychologists say it is impossible to predict how long it will take the scars to heal, if ever.
Clinical psychologist Marc Hekster told Sky News that because the shooting happened so close to the scene of the 1999 Columbine massacre it meant many people might be "re-traumatised".
One by one the stories of the 12 people who lost their lives in the Century 16 cinema are emerging.
Over the next few days we can expect to hear much about lives full of promise cut short.
And all of Aurora is searching for an answer to the question of why it happened here.
