Braced to Bite by Serena Robar

keep my eyes open in the car. It was obviously going to be very hard to stay awake during the day. I was beginning to get nervous about going to school again.
    Piper showed up at our door right when we arrived home, so I figured she’d been looking out her window, waiting for our return.
    I opened the door to her knocking and nodded a greeting. She was lugging a heavy backpack and dropped it unceremoniously on the floor just inside the door.
    “Dude, what is up with all the AP classes? Do you always have this much homework?”
    She pulled out a paper with my class assignments. I briefly scanned the page and nodded in approval.
    “Yep, this is pretty standard.” I picked up the bag and was surprised it felt so heavy. Didn’t I have superhuman strength now that I was a vampire?
    “This is heavy,” I said in surprise.
    “Yeah, I know. Try lugging it home from school.”
    “No, I mean this is heavy for me . And it shouldn’t be. Remember? Last night I was shoving couches through walls, now a book bag is heavy?”
    Piper’s eyes widened in understanding.
    “Oh yeah, that is weird. Maybe you’re only strong at night. You know, during prime sucking time?”
    I let the sucking comment pass but acknowledged she had a point. Maybe because of my half-blood status, I wasn’t always superhuman. Maybe I was only a vampire at night. Sort of like a superhero with a secret identity. I liked the idea of being a mild-mannered cheerleader during the day and a superstrong badass vampire at night.
    “I am so tired.” I groaned as I half-carried, half-dragged the book bag into the formal living room.
    “You can’t go to sleep now, or you’ll never be able to get up tomorrow. You have to acclimate yourself to being up during the day and sleeping at night.”
    “Yeah, I guess you’re right. So, how was school today?” Or more importantly, what’s everyone saying about me? I thought.
    “Well, everyone was talking about you, of course.” She sat down on the bottom stair of the staircase.
    “Yeah, did Aidan say anything?”
    She looked at me in surprise. “How would I know? It’s not like he and I eat lunch together or anything.”
    She had a good point. Piper and I didn’t hang with the same crowd, so she could hardly know what Aidan thought of my disappearance.
    “Sorry. Guess I wasn’t thinking.”
    She continued as though I hadn’t spoken. “Well, all your teachers were very worried about you and Mrs. Gillman wanted me to double-check if you were still going to make it to your university appointment.”
    Mrs. Gillman, our school counselor, had secured an interview with one of the board members of Puget Sound University to see which of three applicants would be getting the full-ride scholarship offered this year. I was up against Tim Jones and Pam Lauer. I wasn’t too worried about Tim because he didn’t have many extracurricular activities, but Pam and I were pretty evenly matched. I wondered briefly if I could use my half-blood status as an affirmative action bonus to get the edge over her.
    I shook the thought away and said, “Hey, I got new contacts and makeup. Want to see?”
    I went up the stairs to my room, not waiting for an answer. After a short moment, I heard her follow.
    I sat down at my vanity and popped the lenses in with practiced ease. I made a little grimace in the mirror. They looked completely fake to me, but much better than the sunglasses alternative.
    “What do you think?” I asked.
    She stood behind me, looking into the mirror.
    “They look okay. Not completely normal, but the best you’re going to get, I guess. Hey, wait a minute. I can see your reflection!”
    “Well, duh, why wouldn’t you?”
    “I was doing some research about vampires on the Web and it said you couldn’t see a vampire’s reflection.”
    Ah, the wise words of Demonic Angel were coming back to bite me in the butt, yet again.
    “Listen, not everything you read about vampires on the Web is true.”
    “Well of