Until I Die

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.” I smiled, knowing that the outfit emphasized my good points. Too bad I never wore it outside of the armory. I’ll have to be a vampire slayer for Halloween, I thought.

  “As much as I’d love to stay and watch you in action,” Jules said, grinning, “I’ve got to run. Be back in an hour to pick you up.” And he jogged up the stairs, closing the door behind him.

  I should have jogged right out the door after him. Because the next half hour was unquestionably my worst training ever. Not only was I distracted by thoughts of what Vincent could be up to, but I was used to training with both him and Gaspard. Without Vincent there, ready to jump in every few minutes to let me catch my breath, I finally had to signal Gaspard to stop. “Time-out,” I called breathlessly, as he lowered his sword.

  I staggered to the edge of the room and slid down the wall, putting my head between my knees as I tried to catch my breath. When I looked up, Gaspard was standing above me, holding out a bottle of water.

  “Thanks,” I said. “It’s a lot harder when Vincent’s not here to pick up my slack.”

  “Is that all it is, my dear? You seem rather … distracted today.”

  I looked at the older revenant, guessing that he would have a hard time flat-out lying to me. “Actually, I was wondering what Vincent was up to this morning. Jules didn’t seem to know. Do you?” I asked as innocently as possible, feeling a little bit guilty for prying.

  Gaspard eyed me cautiously. “I really can’t say,” he responded in his formal nineteenth-century style.

  Can’t, or won’t? I thought. Gaspard and Jules know something I don’t. And Vincent says it’s not important enough to talk about. I suspected that Vincent was trying to protect me. To shield me from a situation he didn’t want me to know about. I could only imagine that it was something I wouldn’t like or there would be no reason for this subterfuge. I trust him, I thought. So why does this one case of secrecy make me want to scream?

  “Okay, I’m ready,” I said, pushing myself up off the wall. Gaspard smoothed his hair off his face and readjusted his short ponytail before arranging himself into a fighting stance. I picked up my sword and, with my newly acquired frustration-driven energy, began hacking away at him as if he were Lucien resurrected.

  “Now that’s more like it!” my instructor exclaimed with a smile.

  We fought for another half hour, until I backed away from the fight and hung my sword on an empty hook on the wall. I held up my hands and gasped, “That’s it for me!”

  The sound of clapping came from the stairway. “Brava!” called Violette. She was perched on the steps in a comfortable position that made it look like she had been there for a while. “You are really very good, Kate!”

  I smiled and, catching a towel that Gaspard threw me, swabbed the sweat from my face. “Thanks, Violette. Although I have a feeling that with your centuries of experience you’re just saying that to be nice.”

  She smiled coyly, as if I had caught her, and said, “Not at all. For the little training you have been given, you must have natural talent.”

  “Exactly my point of view,” Gaspard affirmed. “So, Violette—do you need me for something?” he asked.

  “No. Jules wanted to go to his studio, so I told him I’d walk Kate home and sent him on his way,” she said. “Take your time, though.”

  “Thanks,” I said, peeling off the top of my fight suit and exposing my “I Heart New York” tank top beneath. I had been sweating so much, the heavy fabric was starting to make me feel claustrophobic. “And thanks so much for the book and the flowers.”

  “Arthur behaved so badly the other day, I felt it was up to me to make amends. Did you figure out the message?”

  “Yes,” I said, pulling off the trousers and adjusting the gray jersey gym shorts I had worn underneath. “Purple hyacinths say ‘sorry’ and yellow roses, ‘friendship.’”

  “Very good,” she said, delighted. “The hyacinths were in hopes that you will forgive Arthur his insensitivity, and the roses my wish that you and I can be friends.”

  Even though I didn’t want to seem overeager, I couldn’t stop a smile from spreading across my face. Charlotte had been gone barely over a week, and already I was suffering girlfriend withdrawal. I had Georgia, of course. But she was so busy with her own social life that it left me with a lot of free time—which Vincent usually didn’t mind filling. But now that he was off doing whatever … “Hey, instead of walking me home, do you want to grab some lunch with me once I’ve showered?” I asked.

  “Yes!” she exclaimed brightly. “Grabbing lunch”—she faltered at the modern colloquialism—“would be lovely. I will wait for you upstairs.”

  I practically skipped to the shower, where I speed-washed and dressed. “Thanks, Gaspard!” I called as I ran up the steps to the ground floor.

  “The pleasure was all mine,” he said, smiling slightly as he performed a stiff little bow, and went back to cleaning the various weapons he had pulled off the wall.

  Before I could get halfway down the hallway, Arthur appeared, his face buried in a book as he barreled out of a doorway. “Vi,” he called, and then looked up and saw me. His face went from normal to freaked out in a second flat, and his forehead scrunched up in a dozen little lines.

  “Yes, dear. You were calling me?” Violette glided up behind Arthur, smiling as if no previous weirdness had happened between us and we were all just there for a pleasant chat.

  “I just found something in Heidegger that I thought would interest you,” he said in a monotone, glancing between me and Violette.

  “Kate and I are going out for lunch. You’ll have to show it to me later,” she said, taking my arm and staring at him, as if daring him to say something.

  She wants him to apologize, I thought.

  Arthur gave Violette a look that couldn’t be translated as anything other than a glare.

  “Come on, Kate. We should go,” Violette said. I left arm in arm with my defender, but couldn’t help glancing back at Arthur. He stood immobile in the hallway, glowering.

  “Do not mind him,” Violette whispered. “He can be so terribly temperamental. Sometimes I love him dearly. Other times I wish he would … how do you say it … buzz off?”

  I laughed out loud as we walked through the foyer and out the front door.

  We sat across from each other in a tiny restaurant, eating steaming bowls of French onion soup while gazing through the window at the covered market outside. The aroma of flame-grilled chicken hung deliciously on the air. And the market stalls were a visual delight, filled to overflowing with seafood, vegetables, and flowers. Behind them, vendors called out to the Saturday afternoon shopping crowd, extolling the virtues of their fruits, while holding out samples for people to taste.

  “I do not think I have ever been here before,” Violette admitted, after primly wiping a strand of melted cheese from her lips with her napkin.

  “It’s the oldest market in Paris,” I said. “I think it was around four hundred years ago that it was transformed into a market from an orphanage that dressed its children in red. Which is why it’s called the Marché des Enfants Rouges.”

  “Market of the Red Children,” Violette mused in English.

  “You speak English?” I gasped.

  “Of course I do,” she responded. “I learned it quite a while ago, although I have not had much of an occasion to use it recently. But if you wish, we can speak in your mother tongue. It will be good practice for me.”

  “Deal!” I said enthusiastically, pausing when I saw her look at me quizzically. “And I’ll try to stay away from using slang”—I smiled—“to make it easier on you.”

  “No, no!” she insisted. “Charlotte was right when she said I needed to be in step with the times. Where better could I learn twenty-first-century language and mannerisms—in English—than from a twenty-first-century American girl?”

  “Actually, if you really mean that, I have an idea. Do you like films???
?

  “Are you referring to the cinema?”

  “Yes. Besides reading and hanging out in museums, going to the movies is my absolute favorite thing to do.” I scraped the last spoonful of the delicious soup from my bowl and finished off my glass of Perrier.

  “Kate, I must admit,” Violette said, looking embarrassed. “I have never been to the cinema. It has not been around that long, you know, and I just cannot see the point. Like you, I would rather spend my time reading a book or looking at art.”

  “But film is art! In fact, it’s the French who dubbed it ‘The Seventh Art.’” I thought for a second. “Do you have anything to do after lunch?”

  Violette shook her head with an expression of alarm as she realized what she had gotten herself into.

  I reached under the table for my book bag, pulled out a worn copy of Pariscope—the weekly guide for Paris events—and flipped back to the cinema section. Scanning the classic film pages, I searched for something that would be worthy of someone’s very first film ever.

  A few hours later I squinted in the bright January sun, as Violette and I walked out the doors of a vintage-film cinema. Above us hung a billboard for Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious.

  “So,” I asked, glancing toward her. “What did you think?”

  A broad grin—the grin of a fourteen-year-old, for once, instead of a centuries-wizened old woman—spread across Violette’s face. “Oh, Kate. It was amazing.” Her voice was hushed with awe. She grabbed my hand. “When can we do it again?”

  TWELVE

  VINCENT CALLED THAT NIGHT, APOLOGIZING FOR disappearing for the day. He had already sent a couple of texts, and from their tone, he was obviously feeling guilty about something and trying to make up for it.

  “It’s okay, Vincent. I actually spent the whole day with Violette.”

  “You did?” Although he sounded tired, I could hear the surprise in his voice.

  “Yeah, she was supposed to walk me home, but I took her out for lunch instead. What was up with the numa alert, anyway? Jules said some might be lurking around your neighborhood.”

  “Nothing. It was a bad tip, actually. Violette told Jean-Baptiste to call off the alert tonight. Everything’s as it was before: invisible numa ready to jump out when we least expect it.”

  “Well, you were right about Violette. She’s actually really nice. It’s just Arthur with the ‘humans suck’ attitude problem. I think I’m just going to avoid him as much as possible.”

  “That’s probably a good plan.” Vincent sounded exhausted and distracted. Whatever he had been up to today, it had definitely taken its toll. He didn’t sound like himself.

  “Vincent, I’d better go. You sound beat.”

  “No, no. I want to talk,” he said quickly. “So tell me: What are you doing, mon ange?”

  “Reading.”

  “Not surprising,” he laughed, “coming from Paris’s most voracious devourer of books. Is it something I’ve read?”

  I flipped to the front of the book. “Well, it was published four years after you were born, but was banned for most of your life—existence. At least in its uncensored version.”

  “Written in 1928 but banned for years. Hmm. Does it have a passage about entering the peace on earth, by any chance?”

  “Vincent, you skipped straight to the sex scene! Lady Chatterley’s Lover is about a lot more than a tumble in the gamekeeper’s hut, you know!” I chided jokingly.

  “Mmm. Tumbling sounds really good about now.”

  My heart hiccuped, but I tried to sound calm. “You know, that is one of my favorite daydreams. Tumbling with you, not gamekeepers.” I grinned, wondering what effect my taunting was having on him.

  “Are your grandparents home?” he asked after a pause, his voice sounding suspiciously husky.

  “Yes.”

  He cleared his throat. “Good thing, or I’d have to come over and ravish you on the spot. They do talk about ravishing in that book, don’t they?”

  I laughed. “I haven’t gotten to any ravishing parts yet. But ravishing and tumbling … I’m not sure I’m available for that, since I have a date with this hot dead dude tomorrow night.”

  “Okay, I get it. A very wise change of subject.” He laughed. “So … you haven’t forgotten?” I could hear his tired smile over the phone line.

  “Forget a date to see the Bolshoi Ballet at the Opéra Garnier? In our own private theater box? Uh, no—I don’t think that would be possible.”

  “Good,” he said. “Be there at six to pick you up.” These last words were barely audible. It sounded like he was not only tired but in pain. What had he been doing? Now I was past curiosity and entering very concerned territory.

  “See you then. Can’t wait …,” I said, and as I hung up I finished the sentence in my mind: to find out what you’re up to. If he was as worn down tomorrow night as he sounded now, I might just be able to convince him to talk.

  Vincent stood outside my door dressed in his tux, his black hair pushed back off his face in waves. It was like a repeat of my birthday evening: him in his tux and me in the red Asian-patterned long dress he had bought me, worn under Mamie’s floor-length black-hooded coat. Vincent’s eyes shone appreciatively when he saw me, and once we were out on the street, he gave me a long and delicious kiss.

  We parked underneath the Opéra. Although I had seen it several times—as a tourist and during the daytime—the building always took my breath away, looking every bit like a marble wedding cake. Tonight it had transformed into a fairy castle, its warm yellow lights glowing magically through the chilly winter air. We followed richly dressed people walking arm in arm through the monumental doors.

  “Have you been here before?” I asked as we walked into the foyer.

  “I’ve come a few times as a fill-in date for Gaspard or Jean-Baptiste when the other was dormant. They always have season passes.”

  We stepped into the center of the room, and I looked up. “Oh,” I gasped, the sumptuous surroundings robbing me of my capacity for intelligent speech. The enormous space was decorated in an over-the-top mash-up of styles—with every single inch of the floors, walls, pillars, and ceiling decorated to the nth degree in gold, marble, mosaic, or crystal. In any other setting it would seem like too much. But here it was stunning.

  Vincent led me up the left-hand branch of the grand marble staircase to the second floor, and down a curved hallway lined with dozens of little wooden doors. We stopped in front of number nineteen.

  “I didn’t reserve the royal box,” Vincent explained as he placed his hand on the doorknob. “I didn’t think you’d like the ostentation. Everyone’s always ogling it, trying to see who’s inside. This one’s just a good ten-spectator box, but I bought all ten seats and had them clear out the extra chairs for us.”

  I watched uncertainty flicker across his features and shook my head in disbelief. “Vincent! As if I would even know the difference! Just being here is incredible. We could be sitting in the nosebleed seats and I’d still be over the moon.”

  Reassured, he opened the door to show a long, narrow passageway papered in dark red velvet and hung with an oval mirror. A narrow fainting couch sat against one wall under a pair of old-fashioned electric lights with flame-shaped bulbs. On the other end of the tunnel-like room was a balcony that opened onto the grand opera, with two wooden chairs set behind a knee-high rail.

  “Holy cow. All this is for us?” I asked, feeling like I had just stepped into a romance novel.

  “Is it okay?” Vincent asked hesitantly.

  I turned and threw my arms around his neck. “It’s more than okay. It’s incredible.” He laughed as, without letting go, I started jumping up and down in a fit of pure joy.

  We watched the first two acts of Prince Igor sitting side by side in our private box. At first it was hard to concentrate with Vincent next to me, mindlessly tracing circles on my knee as he watched the stage, but after a few minutes the mise-en-scène and costumes swept me away as the dancers
performed their acrobatic feats. I lost myself in the spectacle, feeling like I had just awoken from a dream when the curtains closed and the houselights went up an hour later.

  “What did you think?” asked Vincent as we stood.

  “It’s bewitching—all of it.”

  He smiled, satisfied, and holding his arm out for me, said, “This is the time for the promenade.” He led me outside our box into the corridor. We followed other couples into a large gilt hall with enormous chandeliers and ceilings painted with angels and mythical figures in a style that reminded me of Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling.

  “Do you want something to drink? A glass of champagne? A bottle of water?” Vincent asked, and I shook my head, seeing that the refreshment line already stretched halfway down the hall.

  “I want to use the time to look around,” I said, clutching his arm so I wouldn’t fall over as I tried to walk and gawk at the same time.

  We explored every nook and cranny that the building had to offer, each room opening onto another more exquisite than the last. When we ended up in front of our door, Vincent asked, “Want to see anything else? We have a few moments left.”

  I hesitated. Although I didn’t want to ruin the night by quizzing him on something I suspected he didn’t want to talk about, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to simply bring it up. “No, let’s go inside,” I said. Once through the door, we sat on the fainting couch and smiled like kids trying on their parents’ clothes.

  “This isn’t exactly like pizza and a movie at my place. Does it feel weird?” Vincent leaned forward and turned his head to look at me. The way his hair fell across his face as he grinned made the flame already burning inside my chest flare a little brighter.

  “Not weird,” I responded. “To be honest, you could have taken me bowling and I would be having just as much fun. It doesn’t matter what we’re doing, as long as I’m with you.” As soon as I heard the words leave my mouth, I burst out laughing. “That should totally be on a poster with a fluffy kitten saying it. Cheese factor through the roof!”

  “Totally cheesy,” he agreed, grinning. “But I was basically thinking the same thing. I’ve had that feeling ever since I met you.” He leaned in and began to nuzzle the skin at the base of my neck.