I wonder what people feel right before they die, right before they take their last breath. People claim that the mind would instinctually shut down due to the shock but I can't believe that someone would simply shut their mind out with 5 seconds left to remember where their life took them. Logically it wouldn't make a whole lot of sense to go blank especially stuck in the situations the Jigsaw killer puts people in. Think about it "I gotta get that k--shit, what was I thinking? BAM!" Does anyone think about it that way? I guess not, it would be kind of sick to think about how people feel while being tortured before they die. In those last seconds is it your family and friends you think of? What you had for dinner the night before? Everything you never got a chance to do? Everything you did that you shouldn't have? Do you contemplate the meaning of life, the meaning of your life? Do you feel sorry for yourself or for the people who suffered before you? How about the people that suffered due to what you did in your lifetime? What about the lonely man, homeless and helpless standing on the side of the street begging for a chance to feed himself when he's one breath away from dying? What about the mother with three children to feed, a dead-beat father who doesn't support them and beats her every night? What about those who died before you, who left you behind to learn the hardest lesson of your life - how to live without someone else breathing life into you?

I guess I failed miserably at that. I couldn't live with the death of the two most important people in my life, instead I destroyed myself in hopes that maybe, just maybe one day I would succeed and see them again. It wouldn't have been what they wanted but it was what I wanted so desperately. I wanted to cry my last tear, close my eyes, and drift away without a last thought but sometimes life has different plans for us. I didn't plan on anything that's happened to me in the past months, in fact it would have been the furthest thing from my mind. Sure, everyone knew about the Jigsaw killer and I had a lot of moments thinking "Damn, I'm screwed if that man ever figures out who I am." Then strangely enough I make friends with that very same man, divulge the idiot things I had been doing in response to my tragedy (which I'm certain he knew by that point) and end up fighting to stay alive when all I thought I wanted to do was die. I guess that's it though, isn't it? I didn't really want to die, I just wanted to live without so much anguish and pain. I wasn't living before, I was a robot just going through the motions trying to fit in to what little image others had created for me. I had to open up my eyes, I had to realize that I was me, not them but I can honestly say that I would have never been capable of doing it without seeing my own mortality before my very eyes.

They say pain lets you know you're still alive but emotional pain I can truly say kills every bit of your spirit that you may have left. Any shred of hope normally stands in the darkness waiting for you to shine light upon it. Without love the heart dies, without life the spirit fades away, and without faith your soul withers. But before you can love another you must learn to love yourself, before you can live you must understand what life really means, and before you can have faith you must believe in the faith others have in you. Sun up to sun down I will forever remember to take it one day at a time, breathe deep, and believe that someone else believes in you. Life is mankind's greatest and most perilous journey filled with pain, regret, sorrow, joy and passion that only ends when you stop living it. I shouldn't say "thank you" so I'll just say "I believe in you".

John sat back in the chair at his desk and held tightly to the book in his hands. He had provided her with somewhere to write her thoughts, feelings, anything she needed to get out and she executed it well. Her words were powerful, leaping from the page into the very soul that breathed life into him. Smiling, he looked over his shoulder at her asleep in his bed before closing the book and pushing his chair back. She was becoming more then John had anticipated and yet she still was fragile and delicate. She broke down in silence, she suffered alone and let no one know, and every breath she took was shaky and full of doubt yet she was still breathing new life into herself. John was the only one privy to her need for comfort, her need for affection, and he took it without hesitation. He set the book down under the pillow where he found it when he returned home. She was clutching the pillow tightly to herself as if seeking some sort of comfort that words alone couldn't give her. He leaned down and brushed the back of his hand against her cheek "And I believe in you." As he walked away to go work down the hallway with Amanda her words continued to ring through his mind, truer words that couldn't have been spoken by any other, including John himself : Life is mankind's greatest and most perilous journey filled with pain, regret, sorrow, joy and passion that only ends when you stop living it.