I Should Die

swollen tongue that is choking me. I wrench my eyes open, but I am sightless. My lungs want to explode. And then my throat releases and I am gulping air, frantically inhaling it into my burning chest.
    A hand takes my chin and holds it roughly as liquid is poured into my mouth and spills over my lips. But I am able to swallow, and the presence keeps feeding me until my mouth closes and my head settles back. My consciousness ends there.
     
    I am cold, though I sense a fire close by. My body feels like it has been frozen solid and is now defrosting, sharp needles stabbing the entire surface of my skin. My muscles cramp painfully and I feel my arm jerk up to my chest, the joints in my fingers spasming, clenching my hand into a claw. I still can’t see, and my mouth is parched. I hear footsteps and the hand is back, feeding me water—I can taste now.
    Something brushes my lips and forces its way past my teeth. I bite down and taste the sweet juice of a fig and feel its pulpy texture fill my mouth. I swallow and take another bite, desperate to get the food inside my cramping belly. The fig is followed by walnuts. Three. I swallow them, and then immediately turn my head to the side and vomit them up, retching past the point of emptying my stomach. Retching and crying and shaking violently. The hand waits until I’m done, wipes my face, and starts over. Water. Fig. Three walnuts. This time I keep it down. The footsteps walk away and my mind shuts down once again.
     
    I hear water lapping close to my head. My eyes fly open. I am staring at a wooden ceiling. I can see. I try to sit up, but something restrains me. I pull my head up far enough to see that I am bound to a bed by cords. I am dressed all in black . . . no, not black. Dark red—my fingertip brushes against my leg—and crusty. With horror, I realize that my clothes are saturated in my own dried blood.
    Feeling panic, I try to get my bearings. The wall next to me is painted metal. I swing my gaze across the sparsely furnished room and out a window across from me to see an expanse of water stretching to a riverbank.
    I’m on a boat. Tied to a bed.
    “Ah, she’s awake,” a voice says, and I crane my head to see Violette walk into the room. Behind her, Louis stoops to get through the low door.
    I recoil as they come into view. Something has happened to my vision. The colorless inch-wide aura I used to see around numa has disappeared and instead there are mistlike crimson haloes encircling their heads. Inside me, something new screams that numa are near. As if I didn’t already know. A nauseating fury overcomes me and I shudder and taste bile.
    They stand above my head, upside down, staring me in the face. Louis looks worried and Violette triumphant. “Welcome to the afterlife,” she says.
    I stop straining against the cords and gape at her. I try to speak, but my throat makes a croaking noise.
    “This is so fascinating!” she says, clasping her hands together. “I’ve never witnessed an animation before. It never actually interested me until now.”
    I don’t understand what Violette’s talking about for a minute, and then—suddenly and sickeningly—I do. She stabbed me, I remember. But did I die? No, I couldn’t have. Violette has kept me alive, suffering and on the brink of death, so she can continue to torture me.
    I struggle against my bonds, kicking and straining—uselessly, I know—but I am furious and the fight makes me feel better. I whip my head toward Violette and try to form words with my bone-dry mouth. “You . . . are . . . ,” I rasp.
    “Yes, dear?” she says, beaming. “I am what?”
    “A . . . psychotic . . . bitch,” I manage to say, pouring all of my hatred and fear into my words, willing them to hurt her with every drop of energy I still possess.
    “Aww. Isn’t that cute,” she says, laughing delightedly, and sweeps out of the room with Louis following closely behind. “And how appropriate as Kate’s first words as a revenant,” I hear her comment as she shuts the door behind her. “Shows she’s got spunk! This will be more fun than I thought.” And her voice fades as they walk away.
    I lie there, stunned. What is she talking about? Me—a revenant? I can’t be. But after a moment, I push aside the doubt and let myself consider it.
    Not only would I have had to possess that mystical revenant predisposition or gene or whatever, but I would have had to die saving someone. Violette tried to murder