Loved ones say goodbye to Joshua football player

Joshua High School opened its doors once again for a student who died after a hard hit during a football game. Friends, family and loved ones took time to say their final goodbyes.

15-year-old Aaron Singleton died in the hospital a day after he took a hard hit during a JV football game against Cleburne High School last week.

There were hundreds of hugs Wednesday night for the mother of the straight A Joshua student who played more sports than friends can count.

"He was on our baseball team. He was on our soccer team. He played ice hockey,” Aaron’s friend, Tyler Roye, said. “He was in karate. He did gymnastics. He did almost every sport imaginable."

Under the lights of the Joshua High School football field last Thursday night, Aaron took an extremely hard hit and suffered a seizure on the sidelines. At the hospital, he was declared brain dead. The teenager, known to be kind to everyone, was taken off life support the next day.

"There's just a big part of my heart that's going to be gone,” said Roye. “And it's just always going to be there with him."

Few knew him better than his fellow sophomore football players.

"He's a big inspiration. He's a big leader. He had a big old heart,” said friend Mason Dooley. “He's just a kid on the football team that we all loved to play with."

Dustin Loyd was the last to spend time with him on the way to the game.

"It's hurting everybody right now. We are trying to get our emotions straight,” Loyd said. “But it's kind of hard since tomorrow will be one week he's been gone."

At the viewing Wednesday in the school auditorium, his mother spent hours receiving people as each person offered their love to his family.

School counselors were made available for the hundreds of students also devastated by his death.

Sadly, it wasn’t the first major love Aaron’s mother has lost. Her husband was killed during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The community is selling wristbands and t-shirts in Aaron’s memory and giving the proceeds to his family. His cause of his death is still under investigation.

Aaron’s funeral will be Thursday.