Die for Me by Amy Plum Page A

kind of supernatural trick.
    I sat down gingerly on the side of the bed, watching Vincent’s face as I did. “I’m not in pain,” he reassured me, keeping hold of my hand as I sat next to him.
    â€œOkay, Kate, first of all, you’re touching me,” Vincent said for the room to hear. “So I’m not a ghost.”
    â€œAnd we’re not true zombies,” Charles said with a grin, “or he would have already eaten your face off.”
    Vincent ignored him. “We’re not vampires or werewolves or anything else that you should be afraid of. We’re revenants. We aren’t human”—he paused, summoning his strength—“but we’re not going to hurt you.”
    I tried to compose myself before saying to the room in as steady a voice as I could muster, “So you’re all . . . dead. But you look alive. Except for you,” I said, hesitating as I glanced at Vincent. “Although you look better than you did last night,” I conceded.
    Vincent was grave. “Jules, could you tell Kate your story? It’s probably the best way to explain. Gaspard is right: I can’t manage it myself.”
    Jules caught my gaze and didn’t let go. “Okay, Kate. I know this is going to sound incredible, but I was born in 1897. In a small village not far from Paris. My dad was a doctor, and my mom a midwife. I showed artistic talent, so at age sixteen they sent me to study painting in Paris. My schooling was cut short when I was drafted into the war in 1914. I fought the Germans for two years, until, in September 1916, I was killed in action. Battle of Verdun.
    â€œAnd that would be the end of my story . . . if I hadn’t woken up three days later.”
    The room was silent while I tried to wrap my mind around what he had said. “You woke up?” I finally managed. The boy I faced looked no older than twenty, but was claiming to be over a hundred years old.
    â€œTechnically he ‘animated,’” offered Gaspard, holding up a thin finger to make his point, “not ‘woke up.’”
    â€œI came back to life,” Jules clarified.
    â€œBut how?” I asked in disbelief. Vincent’s grasp on my hand bolstered my courage. “How could you just come back to life, unless you weren’t really dead in the first place?”
    â€œOh, I was dead. No question about that. You can’t be in that many pieces and live through it.” Jules’s grin turned to a look of regret as he saw me blanch.
    â€œGive the lady a break,” said Ambrose. “We’re laying this on her all at once.” He looked at me. “There’s this special . . . what should I call it? Not to sound too Twilight Zone , but ‘law of the universe,’ right? It says that if, under certain circumstances, you die in the place of someone else, you will subsequently come back to life. You’re dead for three days. Then you wake up.”
    â€œAnimate,” corrected Gaspard.
    â€œYou wake up ,” insisted Ambrose, “and, except for being as hungry as hell, you’re just like you were before.”
    â€œExcept that after that you don’t sleep,” added Charles.
    â€œHave you ever heard of TMI, Chucky?” Ambrose asked, clenching his hands in exasperation.
    â€œKate,” Charlotte said softly, “dying and animating are really hard on the human body. It kind of kicks us into a different life cycle. ‘Animated’ is a good way to put it, actually. We are so animated when we wake up that we go for more than three weeks without stopping. Then our body shuts down and we ‘sleep like the dead’ for three days. Like Vincent just did.”
    â€œYou mean, we are dead for three—” Charles began, correcting her.
    Charlotte interrupted him. “We’re not dead. We call it ‘being dormant.’ Our body is just kind of hibernating, but our