What started as simply getting lunch between a survivor of the Aurora theater mass shooting and a police officer who responded to the scene grew into something much more than a friendship.
Wednesday, July 20, was the ten-year mark of the horrific mass shooting that occurred at the midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado.
Lasamoa Lanier, then Lasamoa Cross, and her fiancé, AJ Boik, 18, were sitting near the front of the theater that night when the gunman entered the theater and started shooting.
As chaos ensued, AJ grabbed Lasamoa’s hand to try and exit quickly, but he was shot twice.
Responding to the scene that night was police officer Cody Lanier, who later went to Gateway High School, where families had gathered, as he was a resource officer at the school. Lasamoa and Cody later recalled her going up to him and asking where AJ was.
Cody also ended up being the one who told AJ’s mother that her son’s name was not on any of the hospital lists.
AJ was among the 12 who died that night, while approximately 70 people were injured.
Needing an outlet to heal, Lasamoa started journaling and wrote letters to AJ. After watching the trial of the massacre, she then wrote letters to the police officers who responded that night to express gratitude.
Cody was one of the officers who received a letter from her. She shared the letter with 9News.
“I have always thought of you as a headstrong determined and courageous person for having the amount of strive to serve and protect Gateway, Aurora and your family. Every single day,” Lasamoa wrote to Cody. “And that alone has changed my life all together.”
After Lasamoa dropped the letter off to Cody at the Gateway High School, where she also attended, they went out for lunch at Chipotle, which ended up lasting four hours, 9News noted.
After that lunch, they bonded over the trauma they shared from that night and ended up dating for three years. Lasamoa used photography to capture the joyous moments they shared together.
Then, on October 3 of last year, Lasamoa and Cody tied the knot and married, and she became a stepmother to two of Cody’s children, the Daily Mail noted. They also noted that Chipotle was served at the rehearsal dinner.
“Beauty from ashes, man. I don’t know what I would do without her,” Cody told 9News.
“Sometimes I stop and think about it and I am like, oh, you are able to find love again,” Lasamoa said.
Lasamoa continues to pay tribute to AJ ten years after the massacre through her Instagram.
You can follow Ethan Letkeman on Twitter at @EthanLetkeman.