SHADOW FOR GRIEVING DAUGHTER
her laughing. She waved and off she went.”
That evening, Lauren was at home with Chris when her phone rang.
She adds: “It was my sister, saying she thought a bomb might have gone off. She was all in a panic and she said she couldn’t find our mum. Chris and I began to ring and text my mum but there was no answer.”
The family shared Lisa’s picture on Facebook and rang round hospitals, desperate for positive news. But after 18 hours it was clear all hope was lost.
The next day, May 24, was Jayden’s seventh birthday – and Lauren had already decorated the house with balloons, banners and gifts.
They kept the news of Lisa’s death from him for a week. She sobs: “My mum’s gift, a guitar, was sitting there in front of me. There was a card with her writing in it. To watch him open her present, read her card and think everything was okay on his birthday was just awful.”
Lauren, factory worker Chris and Lisa’s mum Elaine, 63, later visited the crime scene where terrorist Salman Abedi, 22, detonated his nail bomb Lauren says mum Lisa was thrilled that baby Dylan was on way close to the box office. “I ask myself ‘what if ’ all the time,” adds Lauren. “I always think ‘If she didn’t stand so close to that door’ or ‘If she’d just waited outside’.”
Lisa’s funeral took place in Royton, Oldham at St Ann’s Church. A few days before, Lauren visited her mum in the chapel of rest. “That’s when it hit home,” she says. “I prefer to remember her when I hear her favourite song, Somewhere Over The Rainbow, playing in a shop. Or when I go to a place that reminds me of her. When I talk to her at the cemetery, tell her I miss her.” Like many, the bombing has left Lauren anxious about public events. But she isn’t weighed down by hatred for killer Abedi, explaining: “I don’t even think about him because that’s what he wanted. He wanted recognition. He doesn’t get that from me.” To add Young Lauren with mum Lisa Lauren and Lisa loved to lark about Dylan gets Jayden’s thumbs-up to her struggles, former nursery worker Lauren was released from her job in September.
But with a new bundle of joy in her arms, she is more determined than ever to stay strong for her family.
She insists: “My priority is Jayden and Dylan. They’re my children and they’re a part of my mum too.
“One day, when Dylan’s a lot older, I’ll tell him the whole story about how we lost her.
“But for now, I’ll tell him he’s got a Nana and she’s an angel who looks down on him from heaven.”
vikki.white@trinitymirror.com The Sunday Mirror would like to thank Mothercare for donating a baby wardrobe for Dylan and to Argos for donating Christmas gifts for Jayden.
Mum had a contagious laugh. Not hearing that has been so hard for me DAUGHTER LAUREN PAYING TRIBUTE TO VICTIM LISA