You say you feel so down everytime I turn around. And you say you should have been gone by now. And you think that everything's wrong. You ask me how to carry on. We'll make it through another day, just hold on.

"Why don't we start with how you feel lately. You seem distant and detached since the loss of your father and your mother is terribly worried about you." The therapist leaned back in her chair and pushed the glasses back up to rest on the bridge of her nose, looking at the quiet and pale patient sitting across from her on the couch in silence. She frowned deeply and tilted her head to the side, putting her pen down to reach out and touch the hand of the young girl before her.

Michelle withdrew quickly, looking at the woman before her and finally came out of her daze. Being just out of high school, she was having difficulty dealing with her father's unexpected death. It shook her world, turned it upside down, and shattered the fragile existence of her happiness. Biting her bottom lip she looked off to the door before looking back to the doctor before her that was scribbling down notes on her notepad while watching her intently. "Can we please talk about something else? I can't do this…"

"Michelle, I understand that this is a difficult time but we're here to work on you and fix the problems before they get worse. Your mother loves you dearly and she brought you here so I could help you help yourself." The expression that crossed the delicate features of the shattered victim before her were enough to make her question whether angering her were the best way to deal with her unique problem.

"How do I feel? You're serious with this question, right? How the fuck do you think I feel?! My father shot himself in the fucking head so if that's enough for you to go off of doct--"

"Easy Michelle, that's enough. Being angry isn't going to bring him back or change what's happened. The hardest thing for people to do when it comes to a loss is think of the good times and try and mend a broken heart that was created by the disappearance of an important individual whether it be a father, father figure, grandparent, spouse, boyfriend, etc." She once more took hold of the young woman's balled up fists, watching her look down at her hands before looking back up at her. "We need to help you get to a place where you can cope with the death. It's been 10 years since this happened. You don't seem to have the desire to release this pain and help rebuild yourself."

"If I could fix myself don't you think I would have done that already? I don't need other people to fix me, to tell me how to do it. I'm not fixable so get off your soapbox and find another person to lay that psycho-babble bullshit on." Getting up from the couch, she walked to the door, opening it before slamming it behind her. Her mother was waiting in the waiting room for her and frowned as her daughter headed towards the door without saying a single word to her.

Diana stood up and watched, about to leave until the doctor stepped out of the backroom and approached her. "What happened?"

"Michelle is…very aggressive and angry. There are a lot of very deep emotional scars that are going to take a long time to heal. You stated that he did this in front of her, right? Well, that is a very deep and psychological wound that will need numerous sessions. Let me look over my notes and think of a better way to approach her. Give her a few days to cool off and we'll try again." After shaking her hand and placing a hand on her shoulder in comfort, she disappeared into the back, the mother traveling in the direction her daughter went.

The ride home seemed agonizingly long and it was shrouded in silence that wouldn't break, no matter what her mother said to her. When they got home a broken and saddened Diana watched her detached daughter disappear up the stairs. For two hours she locked herself away in her room, drowning out her sorrow with music; it was only at dinner time that she finally agreed to come downstairs.

She sat down at the table, staring at the plate of food in front of her and picked up her fork, poking at the chicken on the plate before dropping her head. Her mother watched her carefully before reaching over and placing her hand on her knee. Picking her head up, she forced the only smile she was capable of at this point before finally deciding to eat. They ate in silence that night before she retreated upstairs and winced as she stood before the bathroom sink to pull back the sleeves of her shirt. She didn't have time to bandage up the bleeding cuts strewn across her wrist and was too embarrassed to tell her mother about them so she just covered them up. She ran water over them to clean them out before grabbing the gauze in the cabinet and wrapping them up, then returned to her room.

A week later she would move out of the house, taking a job that had the hope of keeping her pre-occupied and busy enough to perhaps work out her problems. She didn't want her mother to suffer and worry about her constantly anymore.

One year later her mother would die an unexpected death in a mall parking lot, completely at the mercy of the perpetrator. One week following her death Michelle would attempt to take her own life, only stopped by a friend who managed to show up just at the right time and then be thrown into therapy and prescription anti-depressants for a few years following the ordeal.

And a few years later she would meet John Kramer, build a friendship, begin to trust someone again, divulge her darkest secrets, and have her desire to truly die put to the test by the man known as Jigsaw…and finally start living again.

I hate to see you fall down. I'll pick you up off the ground. I've watched the weight of your world come down. And now it's your chance to move on. Change the way you've lived for so long. And find the strength you've had inside all along. Cause life starts now, you've done all the things that could kill you somehow. And you're so far down but you will survive it somehow because life starts now. All this pain, take this life and make it yours. All this hate, take your heart and let it love again. You will survive this somehow.