Friends and family of a Lubbock woman who died in a car crash, gathered to honor her memory with a candlelight vigil.
Lakisha Hastings, 27, was killed after her car wrecked on Slaton Highway in the early-morning hours of November 25.
Police said Hastings was the only person involved in the crash, which happened along the eastbound access road of the highway, near M.L.K. Jr. Boulevard.
Police said Hastings was ejected from her car.
“This is a tragic situation, and we basically want family to come together, because at times like this we need to show our strength,” said friend Jaquatta Manahan.
“I lost the best thing that ever happened to me,” Hastings’ mother Gayle explained.
“I wait for my baby to come through the door, I wait for a phone call,” she said through tears, acknowledging that the call will never come again.
Former coworkers remembered Hastings as always having a smile on her face.
“I was a baby nurse and she took me and trained me and we worked together for over a year,” said Tacoiya Harris. “Nurses steal pens. I’m a new nurse buying all these good pens, and my pens would come up missing. I had duct tape that had hearts on it. And I found that pen at her house… Her boys had a box full of pens. They let me keep that pen.”
Hasting leaves behind three children.
“If you knew her, you knew they were her world,” Manahan said about Hastings’ kids.
“Family is everything,” Manahan stated.
“I’ll just remember her by her smile,” Harris added.
Hastings was also a nurse. Another attendee of the vigil was Corey Childers, a longtime friend. Hastings took care of him after his accident.
“We were friends before that, before she became my nurse, I knew her before I had my car accident,” Childers said. “It just doesn’t seem real to me. I’m still in disbelief.
“When I picture her face, all I can see is that smile,” Childers said.
“This is something that I’m never going to get over,” Hastings’ mother said.
Funeral preparations are being made for Saturday.
