Jessica Ghawi wrote on her blog in June that she had a new-found appreciation for the preciousness of life after surviving the Eaton Centre shooting. Little more than a month later, she would be dead, killed in Colorado by a man wielding a gun, something she had so narrowly avoided in Toronto.

Ghawi, 24, was one of 12 people killed when a gunman opened fire in a movie theatre in Aurora, just outside of Denver, a little bit after midnight on Friday. The Texan aspiring sports broadcaster, known professionally as Jessica Redfield, went to see the premiere of the latest Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises, with her friend Brent Lowak.

Lowak, who remains in hospital after he, too, was shot, later told Ghawi’s brother, Jordan, that Jessica had been shot in the leg and head. On his blog, Jordan Ghawi recounted Lowak’s story, writing that Lowak and Jessica were sitting in the middle portion of the theatre, when a device was thrown in their direction “that produced a ‘hissing sound.’”

Amid the panic and confusion that gripped the theatre, Jessica urged Lowak to call 911. It was while he was attending to her injured leg that he said Jessica was shot in the head.

More than 50 people were injured in the shooting, one of the deadliest in recent U.S. memory. Police have arrested 24-year-old medical school dropout James Holmes.

Jessica Ghawi’s death sparked an outpouring of condolences through social media on Friday, with both her name and the Eaton Centre trending in Toronto on Twitter, bringing back painful memories for the city’s residents. Tweets also came from several NHL players, as well as Toronto-based The Hockey News.

Many spoke of how Ghawi’s death by gunshot was a cruel twist of fate, considering just three minutes had separated her between life and possible death in early June at the Eaton Centre when a different gunman shot into a crowd of innocent people.

Ghawi had been in Toronto to visit her hockey player boyfriend, Jay Meloff. In the last post on her blog, dated June 5, she wrote of having been on a “mission” at the Eaton Centre to shop and eat sushi. But for some reason, she decided at the last minute to eat a burger instead.

She wrote that her receipt showed 6:20 p.m. as the time, at which point something led her to go outside in the rain, rather than pursue her shopping expedition. The first shots rang out at 6:23 p.m.

It was only later she would find out that, had she gone for sushi, she would have been in the same place where one of the victims had been.

“I was reminded that we don’t know when or where our time on Earth will end. When or where we will breathe our last breath,” she wrote. “I wish I could shake this odd feeling from my chest . . . The feeling that may have potentially saved my life.”

On Friday, Meloff, who had been dating Ghawi for about a year, tweeted that she “made the world unbelievably better for everyone who got to spend time with her.”

He told the Canadian Press that she had wished him goodnight over the phone minutes before entering the theatre. “She said for me to sleep well. She knew it was late here,” said Meloff, who lives in Markham. “That was the last thing we ever got to say to each other.”

According to an article posted Friday on the Denver portal of sports website SB Nation, Meloff was trying out for the Denver Cutthroats, a minor league hockey team. The article’s author, Cheryl Bradley, wrote that a major reason Meloff wanted to play in Denver was to be closer to Ghawi.

Among those remembering Ghawi on Friday was Peter Burns, morning show host of Denver’s Mile High Sports, who described Ghawi as a passionate hockey fan who was “vibrant and full of life,” saying she was the kind of person “who would show up at every [Colorado] Avalanche game.”

Burns knew Ghawi well. She had interned for him in San Antonio, Texas, and she followed him when he moved to Colorado. Other radio stations she worked at include Clear Channel San Antonio and 104.3 The Fan in Denver.

On air, Burns told a story about how, during dinner with his wife and Ghawi a week ago, she had said she wanted to start a charity for victims of the wildfires that had been raging through the state, particularly to help children who had lost their hockey gear.

“Even if she could just help three or four families, that would have been great. That was the kind of person she was,” he said.

She also worked at Denver-based You Can Play, an organization that supports LGBT athletes founded by Patrick Burke, son of Toronto Maple Leafs general manager Brian Burke. Patrick Burke tweeted “Jessica interned for us for a few months. She was a wonderful, bright, talented woman.” The organization is not commenting further for the time being.

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Ghawi’s friend Jesse Spector, national NHL writer for Sporting News, posted a piece Friday morning saying that Ghawi possessed the kind of enthusiasm and passion for sports and journalism that were needed for success.

Spector was the last person to receive a tweet from Ghawi on the night she died. She tweeted “Movie doesn’t start for another 20 minutes.”

With files from the Canadian Press and the Associated Press

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