Lauren and Ryan Turner on their wedding day in Central Park || Photo Credits to Lauren Turner

A beautiful bride glides through Central Park on what has turned out to be a bright, balmy fall day. Children “oooh” and “ahh” at Cinderella in her white gown, as she walks with a light blue, medical mask covering her relieved smile. The bride meets her prince on steps under the Manhattan skyline, and they say “I do” in front of an audience of eight.

Cinderella, or Lauren Turner (formerly Lauren Davis), is a newlywed and recent college graduate, who at 22 years old experienced life’s biggest and most celebrated moments during 2020, the year of the Coronavirus. Along with staying healthy and sane while living in New York City during a pandemic, Turner got engaged, had her last semester of college moved online, survived a canceled internship, signed an apartment lease with her now-husband, moved from Brooklyn to Manhattan, graduated college over Zoom, landed a job, planned a wedding (or two) and tied the knot on Sept. 5 with Ryan Turner.

“I think it's hard to embody what Lauren dealt with over the last seven months. Every aspect of her life and future came to a head in the middle of a global pandemic; I don’t think a lot of people can say that,” said Laura Sneed, a friend of Turner’s from The King’s College.

Ryan Turner proposed to Lauren Davis on Jan. 18, in a snow-coated Central Park. “Everyone was so excited for 2020,” Lauren, now Turner, said. “Taco Tuesday was on a Tuesday, Halloween was on a Saturday … when we got engaged we were like, ‘this year is going to be so fun.’”

The couple made plans for a New York wedding followed by a honeymoon to the Almalfi Coast in Italy.

“We really felt like we found the perfect day [to get married],” Lauren Turner said. “We decided that everything had been taken away from us, but we still had the date … no matter what, we were going to keep that date,” she said.

Soon after COVID-19 spread to all regions of Italy, in early to mid-March, the Turner’s school, The King’s College in lower Manhattan, announced that students would take classes remotely until the beginning of April. Within days, Lauren Turner’s sales communication and design internship at Marvel Entertainment was suspended, and the Coronavirus quickly took over New York.

“At this point, we decided to split up the wedding,” Lauren Turner said. They shifted their original plans to accommodate a smaller New York wedding. A delayed reception would be held in Lauren Turner’s Texas hometown.

“We still wanted to get married in New York, we met in New York, we’ve only known each other in New York, but I think when you’re living in that absolute kind of dystopian nature, you say to yourself, ‘there’s no way this is going to work the way that you think,’” Lauren Turner said.

Lauren Turner walking through Manhattan on her wedding day alongside friends Laura Sneed and Greta Hanten || Photo Credits to Lauren Turner

Students fled to safer-havens across the country when King’s declared the remainder of the spring semester would be online, but the Turners decided to stay. “We’ve always said, even before the pandemic, that we wouldn’t leave New York until it kicked us out and it hasn’t kicked us out yet,” Ryan Turner said.

When classes went virtual and her internship was prematurely terminated, Lauren Turner filled what could have been an empty schedule. “My whole life had just been me go-go-going, so I ended up applying to over 500 jobs,” she said. “I was taking Google ad classes and a bunch of certificates. I asked myself ‘what can I do during this time to make myself more marketable; what can I do to better myself?’ That was a good distraction if I didn’t want to apply for jobs or figure out wedding stuff.”

Every night at 7 p.m., Lauren Turner joined the cacophony of clattering pans and chants that rang across the boroughs. Like clockwork, she walked out onto her fire-escape to cheer on the healthcare heroes; many days this exercise marked her first and only time outside. While ambulances sped through the empty streets below, Lauren Turner peered a few blocks away to see a gray skyscraper reaching into the sunless sky with hundreds of heads popping-out of its windows. Alone but together, each yell, scream and clang relieved an ounce of angst from the day. And for Lauren Turner who spent her waking hours scouring StreetEasy or lurking on LinkedIn, this was a break she looked forward to.

“The end of March and the beginning of April will go down as the hardest moments of my life,” Lauren Turner said. “I had no idea where I was going to live, everything with the wedding and graduation was up in the air … sirens were going off every 15 minutes, morgue trucks were everywhere and we were freaking out to get food.”

Lauren Turner’s method of scraping StreetEasy paid off. “We signed a lease without seeing the apartment,” she said. “Before we walked in we were sitting in the car praying ‘please let this place actually exist.’ We got here and it was exactly like the videos, it was clean.”

Pacing the floors of her new Manhattan apartment and clad in her navy cap-and-gown, Lauren Turner graduated college over Zoom with the company of her fiancé, a few friends and a charcuterie plate.

“We decided to go on a six-mile walk and it started snowing. We were like ‘of course, this is 2020, it’s snowing in May on our graduation day’ … the last time it snowed was when we got engaged,” Lauren Turner said.

Lauren Turner’s graduation day celebration || Photo Credits to Lauren Turner

Lauren Turner’s college career didn’t get a proper end, so she is thankful to be working at her alma mater as a program assistant for the McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute. She will pursue an MBA degree at Montclair State University alongside her full-time job.

Paul Glader, Lauren Turner’s prior professor, and current boss remarked, “every time we offered design training … or internships, I always noticed she would sign up. Lauren … stood out as one of the most technically adept and well-rounded students I’ve taught at King’s.”

With an apartment acquired and a job secured, Lauren Turner turned to her next assignment: acquiring a marriage license. On April 18, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo issued an Executive Order allowing New Yorkers to obtain marriage licenses remotely.

The Turner’s applied for their marriage license in May; the next available appointment was in November. “I would check for new appointments every hour. One day at 3 p.m. there was an opening and I just grabbed it,” Lauren Turner said.

“We fought so hard just to get our marriage license,” she said. “So we knew we had to get married here.”

On Sept. 5, Ryan Turner hopped out of his Uber in Central Park. “I was fully expecting the park would be on fire,” he remarked. But the park was lush and green, and Cinderella was on her way. Today, Lauren Turner would mark off the final line on this page of her checklist. Her day wouldn’t end clanging pots and pans on the fire escape or applying for a job, but under the Manhattan skyline with her prince.

“We were so excited for the wedding and that it would be over,” Lauren Turner said. “Nothing bad happened; that’s what made it so fun.”

Lauren Turner and Facing Life’s Biggest Moments During a Pandemic