( CNN ) -- When Lauren Rousseau 's boyfriend wakes up , he can smell her perfume . Tony Lusardi opens his eyes and holds a tiny pillow that Rousseau , a Sandy Hook Elementary School teacher , used to lay her head on . And then he sobs . He wants to touch her again . Laugh with her . `` I 'm convinced that I 'll see her again , '' he says . Rousseau was teaching last Friday morning when a tall thin figure wearing black fatigues and a military vest burst into her classroom . Adam Lanza , 20 years old , was armed with a Glock , a Sig Sauer and a rifle like the kind soldiers use in war . Only 30 , Rousseau had told her mother before she was even in kindergarten that she wanted to grow up to be a teacher . Sandy Hook had hired her last month as a permanent substitute teacher . That was extraordinary news . Rousseau had spent so many years working different jobs and taking substitute opportunities when she could , Teresa Rousseau told a local newspaper . Lauren Rousseau , her mom said , was thrilled to finally be doing exactly what she always wanted . Remembering the victims . A natural teacher . `` I only got one year with her , '' Lusardi says . They celebrated a one-year anniversary on November 8 . He 's been thinking a lot about time . `` It 's kinda bad to say , '' he says , sobbing , `` but I 'm jealous of her friends that got more than one year with her . I only got one . `` But it was a really good year . '' By every measure , Rousseau was a teacher of young children . She had that kind of special niceness about her . `` She did n't like to honk her horn at people that cut her off in traffic because she thought it would be mean , '' Lusardi says , smiling . Rousseau gave him sweet cards that had silly jokes . One had bananas on it because she was bananas about him . Teachers were heroes in the face of death . When she ran into anyone she knew she reached out and hugged them . She and Lusardi were planning to see the new movie `` The Hobbit '' Friday night , then go to a party . Rousseau had baked `` Hobbit '' cupcakes . Lusardi 's Friday could have been like so many others , filled with cute texts from his girlfriend , pictures from her class . `` She loved to tell me what she was doing that week , '' he says . `` She 'd send a text , Oh , we 're doing this , we 're doing that , and would send tons of pictures of what the kids had created that day . '' It was just so easy to be with her . Their first date , a wine bar . They shared a kiss . He loved her from the start . `` The first date I had with her , '' he says . `` I knew . '' Where to donate . Early gifts . She called him `` Lovie . '' He called her `` Busy Bee . '' During his conversation with CNN , Lusardi looks at pictures taken two months ago at a wedding . Rousseau was trying to outdo herself by making the best funny face . He thinks about the past year . It was only a year he had . It went by too fast . They never fought , he says . He wishes they would have been able to argue over what kind of rug to buy for the apartment he 'd always imagined they 'd share . At his home now are the wrapped Christmas presents that she gave to him . It 's the kind of thing an elementary school teacher would do -- give the gifts early , let the joyful anticipation build , bring out the kid in someone else . Lusardi is broken by the thought of unwrapping them . So he has n't . That would feel final , over . `` It does n't seem real , '' he says . `` It does n't seem permanent and finite . '' Lusardi met President Obama when he visited Newtown Sunday . Obama hugged him . `` I want a hug from Lauren , you know , and I 'm not going to get that . '' Lusardi went on her Facebook page and wrote , as if he were writing to her . `` I got a hug from the President . '' He would trade that experience in a second to embrace her again . He 's been listening to Ingrid Michaelson 's `` The Way I Am . '' It reminds him of her . If you were falling , then I would catch you . You need a light , I 'd find a match . 'Cause I love the way you say good morning . And you take me the way I am . If you are chilly , here take my sweater . Your head is aching , I 'll make it better . 'Cause I love the way you call me baby . And you take me the way I am . `` I want the world to know that Lauren was a great person , '' he says . `` She touched the lives of everyone she ever met . `` Even if you only met her once , you liked her . '' Share your tributes . Poppy Harlow and Laura Dolan reported from Newtown . Ashley Fantz wrote this story in Atlanta .
Lauren Rousseau 's lifelong dream was to become a teacher . She baked cupcakes , made funny cards , hesitated to honk at drivers because that seemed mean to her . Her boyfriend , Tony Lusardi , told CNN that he 's glad he had one year with her . He longs for her , wakes up clutching a pillow that smells of her .