AUGUSTA, Ga. – Family and friends of Brenleigh Kitchens are continuing to tell her story tonight. The 20-year-old Lakeside High graduate was shot and killed last week. Her ex-boyfriend is charged with her murder.
We’re now learning Brenleigh was an organ donor and because of that she’s saving 122 other lives.
This is just one way at Lakeside High honors the life of Brenleigh Kitchens. As friends and family hold on to hope for how her legacy lives on.
“(Crying) There’s no words to get rid of the pain in our hearts that we just don’t understand,” said Melissa Testino, a family friend who knew Brenleigh since she was two. Her daughter and son were close friends with her until the end.
“She was like my daughter. I mean, she really was,” she said.
Over the weekend they left flowers at the rock memorial at Lakeside High School. It’s where she went to middle and high school and loved to dance and play basketball.
“Brenleigh didn’t have fear. She was always willing to try something new,” Testino said. “She just met friends everywhere she went because she was just so outgoing.”
Friends and family say that’s part of why her death is so shocking.
“She didn’t have enemies. She was just loved. She loved life. She loved people, and she didn’t like confrontation by any means,” she said.
And she is now living on in the lives of 122 other people. Brenleigh’s sister says she is an organ donor. And many are now calling her a hero.
“Whoever gets that heart I just hope they love with that heart as much as she did,” she said.
122 lives saved by one lost so suddenly. A blessing to others that family and friends may never see. But still the blessing that she always was.
“We all have another little angel watching over us,” she said. “It’s not goodbye for now. It’s just see you later.”
Brenleigh’s sister said in a Facebook post that Brenleigh was a fighter and one of the toughest people she knew. She called her a hero.
