Pvt. Francheska Velez
Growing up, Pvt. Francheska Velez was a 'fraidy cat -- horror movies and bugs gave her the willies.
"When she joined the Army that all changed . . . in a good way," Pvt. Velez's cousin Jennifer Arzuaga said. "She became stronger."
Ft. Hood victim Francheska Velez
Army strong. The 2006 Kelvyn Park High School graduate served in Korea and most recently in Iraq, where she drove fuel tankers.
She made her father proud.
"She was the best I have. The light of my family," Juan Velez said of his only daughter. "She was living my dream . . . to be part of the military, part of the United States. To be part of something. Just to give back to the United States because this is where we are from."
On Thursday, Pvt. Velez, 21, was one of 13 people killed and 30 wounded during an Army psychiatrist's rampage at the Fort Hood military base in Texas.
She was due back from Iraq on Dec. 10, but came home early after she found out she was three months pregnant. Her family was planning to visit her in Texas next month.
But Friday there came a knock on the front door of the Velez family's Humboldt Park two-flat. Outside were Army officers with tragic news.
"The hardest thing is to accept the reality that she is gone," Juan Velez said through an interpreter.
Pvt. Velez had her father's electric smile, glorious dance moves and charisma that filled a room, family members said.
"This girl was full of life. She was a happy girl, and he took her from us," Pvt. Velez's cousin, Sandy Rivera said. "She was supposed to have the baby, and everything was going to be happy. We were all waiting. It's not fair."
In high school, Pvt. Velez joined the ROTC and a dance team.
She loved to dance, especially salsa. When they were teenagers, Pvt. Velez and her cousins would make dance videos pretending to be the Spice Girls. Pvt. Velez played the role of "Sporty Spice."
"Dance was her passion before going into the Army," her cousin, Yesenia Garcia said. "She felt the music. She would enliven it. She would put her own flavor in it."
After graduation, Pvt. Velez enlisted because she wanted to travel, get a degree, and make something of herself, family members said.
"I tried to talk her out of it many times. I said, 'No you're crazy,' " Pvt. Velez's cousin Jennifer Arzuaga said. "But once her mind was set that was it."
Once she returned stateside, Pvt. Velez's focus was on being a good mom.
Juan Velez, staring into the distance from his front stoop, said he remembers the joy he felt when his little girl called with news that he would be an abuelo -- in English, a grandfather.
"It was happiness. I was full of joy," he said through a translator.
Pvt. Velez planned to live in Texas during her pregnancy and raise her child there. Now, "she'll never know what its like to be a mom," Arzuaga said, trailing off in tears. "She just turned 21. She just turned 21."
In addition to her father, Pvt. Velez is survived by her mother, Eileen Velez and two brothers, Juan Guiermo Velez and Andrew Velez.
Services are pending.