MARYSVILLE, Wash. -- Zoe Galasso was killed in the school shooting at Marysville-Pilchuck High School on October 24. The 14-year-old freshman never made out of the cafeteria after she was shot and killed by her classmate, Jaylen Fryberg.
"She was everything. She was a light," said Zoe's mother, Michelle Galasso. "She was beautiful inside and out. She was the most giving, the most wonderful. Just the most wonderful person."
Michelle starts her day the same way ever since the tragedy that claimed the life of her daughter. She reads a simple message that Zoe wrote a few months ago.
"It says, 'Happy Birthday to my mom, my other half, my best friend,'" Michelle said. "'I look up to you. You are the strongest person I know and I wouldn't be who I am without you.'"
Michelle said that message now keeps her going.
"I look at it all the time," Michelle said. "It's where I gather my strength."
Michelle said those words are a lot better to look at than the last message she sent Zoe on that Friday.
"Just sent her at 11:40 on Friday, 'Are you OK?'" Galasso said.
She never heard back.
When Jaylen Fryberg opened fire in the high school cafeteria, Michelle was at work.
"I was just finishing up teaching a class at the Navy base," Michelle said. "A co-worker came in to tell me that there had been a shooting at my child's school."
Michelle has two children, Zoe and Rayden. Rayden is a junior at Marysville-Pilchuck and, following the shooting, he began sending his parents emergency text messages.
"He's in a panic and he's at the school and he's scared because he knows right away that there was a shooting going on and that the shooter was Jaylen and that it's Zoe's friend group and it's possibly Zoe and her friends," Michelle said with emotion.
After the shooting, emergency responders took two boys to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle and two girls to Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett.
"Once we gathered all the family, we all went to the hospital," Michelle said.
The Galassos gathered at Providence and patiently waited, thinking they were going to see their daughter.
"With mass confusion and head wounds, it was hard to decipher who is who, because all the girls looked a lot alike," Michelle said. "That was just the hardest part, just being at the hospital and waiting through all the confusion not knowing if your child was at the hospital or not."
After they identified the two girls, Gia Soriano and Shaylee Chuckulnaskit, doctors pulled the Galasso family into another room.
"For us, they finally had to tell us that our child had already passed at the school," Michelle said.
Zoe died in the cafeteria alongside the shooter, Jaylen Fryberg. Michelle and her family watched Jaylen grow up. He had been a longtime friend to Zoe and the other kids that he shot. As much as she is angry, Michelle said she has to forgive.
"In order for me to heal from this, I have to forgive because I cannot waste my life hating or being angry. I just can't," Michelle said. "I'll never know why he did it and he took away one of the best things that I ever brought into this world, but he's a child too."
In the days after Zoe's death, Jaylen Fryberg's mom stopped by the house to visit with Michelle.
"I hugged his mom, told her I loved her," Michelle said. "She's hurting. She's grieving. She lost her child as well."
The tragedy at Marysville-Pilchuck High School goes far beyond Marysville. Michelle has a message to the millions of parents who send their kids off to school every morning.
"We can't live in fear, as much as we feel we need to. We can't put a metal suit on our kid every day, as much as you want to," Michelle said. "Live your life without regret. Tell them (your children) you love them, and take every moment and cherish every moment."
Michelle said, in the days to come, she will hang onto the good memories and forgive the bad, just like Zoe would want. She spoke of the day she spent with her daughter before the homecoming dance, just a week before the shooting.
"I feel so fortunate that she spent that time with me. She could have spent the day getting ready with her friends," Michelle said. "I don't know if it was meant to be or what, but I felt that I get to have that memory and I'm so thankful because I'll never get to do that for her wedding, which is really hard to know that I'll never have that memory."
Zoe loved life, she loved her family and she loved her friends.
"Being around her made you just want to be happy," Michelle said. "She had a laugh that was contagious."
But admittedly, Michelle said, sometimes the noise became too much.
"At times it was so funny because you'd hear her laugh and you'd think 'Gosh, stop laughing,'" Michelle said.
Now Michelle says she would give any amount of money to hear that laugh once more.
"I wish I could hear it over and over and over again," she said.
Michelle said she plans to have a scholarship in her daughter's memory, but in the meantime she is working to raise money to bring a new cafeteria to Marysville-Pilchuck High School. Donations can be made through GoFundMe.
Zoe Galasso was the first victim to die in the shooting. Her brother has since transferred schools. Three others have passed since that tragic day. Shaylee Chuckulnaskit and Gia Soriano died after a few days at Providence Medical Center in Everett. Zoe's boyfriend, Andrew Fryberg, died last Friday. Nate Hatch, the fifth victim, was released from Harborview last week after he was shot in the jaw.
