Tuesday, May. 13, 2008

Outgoing Mahon was known for her way with words

USC freshman Lauren Mahon was a vivacious Delta Delta Delta pledge who made friends easily and liked to shop for MAC cosmetics.

She also was a standout student, getting more than 1350 on her SAT last year.

She had a way with words. No matter what she said, friends recall, she was articulate.

“She gave advice like a 50-year-old woman,” said Amanda Kamman, who went to Hillcrest High in Simpsonville with Mahon. “And it was always the right thing to say.”

One of Mahon’s loves was Bella, a light-brown-and-white Chihuahua she had for two years.

They went almost everywhere together, Bella tagging along in Mahon’s purse.

But she left the dog at school with her roommate, Amanda Palacio, when she headed to Ocean Isle Beach, N.C.

“She loved that dog,” said Andy Evans, Mahon’s friend for the past two years. “She painted her toenails and put a pink-studded collar on her.”

Palacio, also a friend from Mahon’s Hillcrest High days, is still caring for Bella.

Mahon enrolled at USC even though she was an avid Clemson fan because she valued the reputation of South Carolina’s business school.

Mahon wanted to be a real estate lawyer, according to her family.

“Lauren would have conversations with my parents at the dinner table and discuss how the Greenville community was growing, how it would be like a new Charlotte in the next 10 years,” said Olympia Mastrokolias, who attended Hillcrest High with Mahon.

Mastrokolias said Mahon loved broccoli and cornbread.

“I remember her coming over to our house, opening our fridge door and eating anything in there,” she said, laughing.

Mahon liked to drive with her car windows wide open on her way out to Hickory Tavern in Laurens to attend church with her grandparents, Buck and Lydie Mahon, Evans said.

“It was a getaway for Lauren, to drive out to Hickory Tavern to see her grandparents,” he said. “She said it was the most calming experience she ever had.”

Besides making new friends in her first two months at Carolina, Mahon began dating Justin Anderson, a J.L. Mann Academy graduate in Greenville who also died in the fire.

Mastrokolias, who attends Wofford University, met Anderson on her fall break, just two days before he and Mahon died.

“Lauren would call me and say, ‘You have to meet this guy,’” she said. “He really was a nice guy, very polite, very smart.”

Evans talked to Mahon nearly every day the past two years. They had even talked about what they would want if one of them died suddenly.

“She said previously, ‘Don’t cry, but let it be a celebration where everybody goes out with no tears,’” he said.

“But it’s hard to keep it in that form,” he added. “She was so big-hearted, full of life and so strong, the strongest person I know.”

Reach Riddle at (803) 771-8435.

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