Seattle, Washington (CNN) -- When Amanda Knox's parents head to Italy for closing arguments in their daughter's murder trial they'll be carrying a present they hope desperately she can use soon: a plane ticket home.



In that purchase lies one family's entire hope.



Curt Knox and Edda Mellas say their daughter is nothing like the person they've seen depicted before and during her trial.



They grimace at the description prosecutors have used in court: that Amanda Knox was a resentful American so angry with her British roommate Meredith Kercher that she exacted revenge during a twisted sex misadventure at their home two years ago.



Prosecutors say Knox directed then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito and another man infatuated with her, Rudy Guede, to hold Kercher down as Knox played with a knife before slashing Kercher's throat.



"She is totally nonviolent, almost a passive person," Mellas told CNN in a joint interview with her former husband.



So passive was Knox, the parents said, that she couldn't even continue a kickboxing class because she felt it was too violent. She was so caring, they said, that she would make her friends stop a car to let a spider out rather than kill it.



Knox was an easy child to raise in Seattle, Washington, along with her younger sisters Deanna and Ashley, her parents said. She took to soccer early on but hit the books as hard as she played.



It was on the field that she earned the nickname Foxy Knoxy, though they say it was rarely used and taken out of context when Kercher was found killed to portray their daughter as a sex-hungry party animal.



"It was totally associated to soccer and how she prepared herself as a defender, waiting to take on a striker going down," Curt Knox said. "So how people read this nickname is totally wrong."



Eventually, though a star player at college, Knox gave up the sport to focus on her education. She knew she wanted to study in Italy and wouldn't be able to leave the team to go abroad. Her mother said she threw herself into jobs to help the family save for the trip, working as a soccer coach, a barista and in a gallery.



They recall a young woman far different from the wild party girl depicted by prosecutors, one they said found more enjoyment in going to a coffee house and reading a book than going out to a club.



They say she met her former boyfriend and co-accused Sollecito at a classical concert.



Yes, they concede, Knox, now 22, and Sollecito say they were smoking marijuana and having sex at his home the night Kercher was killed, but that was as wild as it got.



They reject the idea of revenge as a motive for Knox to kill Kercher. Mellas said her daughter e-mailed and called to tell her about her new roommate regularly. Knox told her they got along great and spent time together, going to libraries and a chocolate festival.



What has happened in Perugia, Italy, is unfathomable to them.



On November 2, 2007, at 4 a.m. in Seattle, Mellas was awakened by the phone.



"Amanda called [and said] 'I hate to wake you up, but something's not right here, I think someone's been in my house,' " Mellas recalled.



The door to the home she shared with Kercher had been ajar when she came home that morning, and when Knox got out of a quick shower, she noticed drops of blood. Kercher's door was locked, and Knox couldn't reach her, she told her mother, adding that Sollecito was calling the police.



Later, when officers broke down the door to Kercher's room, Mellas said her daughter struggled to understand what was going on, hanging on the few words of Italian she understood at the time.



"They were screaming 'A foot, a foot,' that's what they could see," Mellas recalled Amanda Knox saying.



When she learned Kercher was dead in the room, a hysterical Knox
Whose parents are hopeful of aquital? Who says they still hope their daughter will be acquitted? Who is being referred to as a "vengeful killer?" Do the parents agree with their daughters portrayal by the prosecution?
Amanda Knox's Curt Knox and Edda Mellas Amanda Knox nothing like the person they've seen depicted
question: Whose parents are hopeful of aquital?, answer: Amanda Knox's | question: Who says they still hope their daughter will be acquitted?, answer: Curt Knox and Edda Mellas | question: Who is being referred to as a "vengeful killer?", answer: Amanda Knox | question: Do the parents agree with their daughters portrayal by the prosecution?, answer: nothing like the person they've seen depicted